Math Workshop-Finally figured out!

Amanda Madden is my hero.  Seriously.  Not only is she the sweetest and one of the most generous, but she has fabulous ideas that I just love stealing borrowing for my classroom!  I just wish I could actually work with her!

I have been, lets spell it out, s-t-r-u-g-g-l-i-n-g with math this year.  Due to my inclusion and ec schedule, the absolute only time I could fit in math was the end of the day.  Grrreatt.  A bunch of 7 and 8 year olds, after lunch and recess, learning math.  This what I imagined..

Not to mention that means we basically had 30-40 minutes to get everything in at the beginning of the year (due to learning afternoon pack up routines).  Now, I am pushing to get in 50-60 minutes, like really pushing.  Since we are filtering in from lunch/recess and kids need to get water/go to the bathroom I was losing some valuable time for our lesson.  Whole group just wasn't working.  We did a little mini lesson and then they had independent work to complete before going to hands on math or some kind of technology.  Most of them weren't even getting their independent work done due to the amount of time.

So I went on the hunt and saw that Amanda/ Teaching Maddenness (of course) had just posted about her math routine.  Aaand the gates of heaven open! Aaaaaaaaaaaaa {Here} is the post about her Math Workshop.

Feeling inspired, I immediately got to planning and implemented on Monday!  I only have 3 groups in my room which makes it a little easier on me! :)  Here's what my kiddos do... (I threw this together super fast so it's not cute like Amanda's, which I will be stealing!)

What's really great about having 3 groups/4 rotations and starting this after Recess is the fact that I can get everyone settled into their first rotation (none of which are with me), solve any recess problems, make sure everyone makes it to the bathroom, and even work with any kids individually who might be struggling a little more.  I love how it is working so much! I wish I could have started it earlier in the year!

We rotate every 10 minutes right now and I feel like it's a good amount of time for them to sustain doing 1 activity.  I think if we could get it to 15 that would be ideal but I don't forsee that happening unless we cut recess short (a big no-no!).  What's great about this though is that if I feel like my high kids have it, I can give them extra time to work on their task or another activity to work on and extend my group time with the other groups.  

Awesome right? Now I love math again! Hooray.

Now, if someone wants to pace out common core math for me, it would be even more awesome. Our curriculum stinks and is not even CC aligned!

Paideia Seminar: Part One

Recently, our school AIG teacher lead an afternoon of Common Core PD.  I have to admit, I was skeptical at first.  When I heard we were learning about "seminar" I thought, "How in the world does this pertain to my kids?" I had never heard of it and knew it was introduced to 5th grade by her earlier on in the year.. All I could think was "I really hope this afternoon is not going to be a waste!"  It definitely wasn't.

For anybody who hasn't heard of Paideia Seminar, it's basically a way to get kids holding conversations about pretty much anything.  It requires kids to listen to what other's are saying and be an active participant by responding to what other participants are talking about (Common core!).  In a perfect world, the facilitator (YOU) would just have to ask some questions and then the kids will lead the way.  In many cases, you may just have to ask an opening question and that will get the kids talking, listening, responding, connecting to a text, to their life, to what others are saying.. They answer the questions you had on your plan without even being asked because they are thinking deeply about the text and building on what others bring to the table. Oh, you just MIGHT have to stop them if you run out of time (Awe shucks)!

We held our first seminar last week (our AIG teacher came in a facilatated for us!).  It was definitely less than perfect but for our first one, I was happy.  First, the kiddos read a short passage and wrote down anything they were thinking. This story was about a horse who really wanted to be a tap dancer.  So she practiced and practiced.  When she thought she was good enough, she held a recital for her friends.  Her friends were less than impressed.  They told her she could not dance, she was just an animal like the rest of them.  The horse didn't let her friends get to her and continued to dance which made her very happy!

 



We went over rules (Coming to a post soon!) and set up our chairs in the circle so that everyone knew we were all equal contributors to the conversation.

 

Then of course came the conversation.  We talked about things like how the horse felt.  Had there ever been a time where you felt like that?  How did you handle it?  Did the friends make the right decision when they told her she couldn't dance?  What would you have done?  Would you have told the horse the truth?  Is it ever OK to lie to someone if you are going to hurt their feelings?  

 

The conversation needed A LOT of prompting from our facilitator.  But our goal is to be able to hold meaningful and purposeful conversations where we are able to link back to the text and are comfortable enough to share our own thoughts and questions.  Hopefully without a lot of prompting from me!  All in all, I am so excited to use this more frequently in my room and only wish I knew about it at the beginning of the year!

 

Keep a look out for more Seminar posts coming soon  (Rules, A Seminar Plan, Choosing texts, and more) so you can hold a seminar in your room (From grades K-12)!