How Do You Mark This?

In Nancy's Grade 4/5 class they have been working on different strategies to multiply and divide.  We gave them the following problem to work on in pairs:

After having them read the problem, we addressed any words that they were unsure about.  In this case, smoothie and assuming were new to them.  After completing a KWC chart the students set to work solving the problem.

As we walked around the room (and using the A4L tool) we noticed that there was perhaps too much in the problem, but the students were doing a really good job of using different strategies to solve the problem.  Then we came to one group.  This is what their paper looked like:

 
At first we both kind of stopped and stared in silence for a few moments.  Then the question came into our heads of "How do we mark this?"  Clearly, some of the feedback that we would give to the students would be that they need to work on organization!  But what about the work?  When we started to look at the achievement chart, we noticed that there really were a lot of positives happening in the work.  The students have a strong knowledge of adding and are able to apply their knowledge of fractions and reasoning to the problem.  They are also able to see that the quickest way to solve the problem is find out the total number of students and divide by two to give the amount of each type of smoothie.  We can see their thinking - although this area is a little bit weaker as their organization is not clear, and we can't see how they jump from idea to idea.  In terms of communication, they are able to get their ideas across, but it is not that clear to follow. 

When we consolidated with the students, we had them come and talk about what they think they did well on, and where they needed to improve.  Because we had used a Bansho to organize the work they were then able to clearly see where they needed to improve.  To capitalize on this, we then had the class write on a post - it note what they will do differently the next time they solve a problem. 

I Understand The Problem - But Now What?

We know that in getting students to be successful problem solvers that giving them time to problem solve is just the beginning.  Comprehending the problem is another obstacle that students (and adults) need to overcome in order to decode the important information from the problem, and then apply skills that they have in their schema to help them solve the problem.

In Sheryl's Grade 1 class they have been doing a lot of work on not only decoding the problem, but also talking about what they can do after they understand the problem.  To help them comprehend, they have been using the KWC chart to help pull out the information that they Know, What they need to do, and things that they Can't forget.  Sheryl has also began adding onto the bottom of the problem the strategies and tools that the students brainstorm that they can use in order to help get the answer.

You can see that some of the ideas that the students came up with were:  Add - using your fingers; with number sentences; using counters. Also Draw a picture.  Great strategies for Grade 1's to use, and great strategies to use for this problem!

Descriptive Feedback and Gallery Walk

When we consolidate our math lesson, a Gallery Walk is a great tool to use to help get students thinking about the math that they see, and the math that they don't always see.  A Gallery Walk is also a great way to get students using Descriptive Feedback with their peers to help give specific and clear feedback to each other on ways to improve and "edit" their work prior to handing it in.

A few weeks ago I was at at SIM (Schools in The Middle) Session.  During the sharing portion, the Toronto Catholic Board shared with us an example of how one teacher is using Gallery Walk and Descriptive Feedback Effectively with her students.

In this first post it note, you can see how Megan is getting some feedback from her peer that is not really going to help her improve on her math thinking - But more on her presentation skills.  Before the teacher hands the work back to the author, she first writes comments down to the student providing the Descriptive Feedback to help them improve on giving feedback. 

The teacher is very specific in the feedback that she gives to the student.  She tells them exactly how to improve by saying "Comment more on the math than how they talked."  Then she gets the student providing the feedback to think more deeply about what they wrote "Why were the titles proper?  How do you know?"  She then returns the work to the student and allows them to rephrase their original feedback.

You can see now how Megan is able to see exactly what she needs to improve because the peer providing the descriptive feedback to her has done the "good" job on a different colour post it note.  Now the feedback to Megan says:  "The titles were proper because they are of the polygon properties and the polygons are all sorted properly."  The only thing missing in this descriptive feedback is something to improve upon - However, learning how to give effective descriptive feedback is a process, and the students in this class are well on their way to learning how to not only give each other appropriate descriptive feedback, but also how to accept descriptive feedback from their peers. 

 
 

What Are You Looking For In A Task?

Recently at the joint Crerar and Workman PLC, the Junior and Intermediate divisions had an open discussion of what they were looking for in a good task.  After a list was brainstormed, we then went back and highlighted what part of the achievement chart that key item would address. 

What ended up happening was that we came to the conclusion that even though the students are giving us one answer, that answer is rich and covers many different parts of the achievement chart.  Look at the picture below and see if some of the criteria that they came up with would be similar to the criteria that you would want in a task you give your students.