To start out our exploration into curriculum in the BTC way, I decided to start with addition strategies. I’m still not sure if is the starting point I want to use in the future. One one hand, so many of my students approach math with algorithms and not number sense, so this is a great place to start. On the other hand, I wonder if my students feel like I’m lowering the difficult level by starting with something they think they are so familiar with.
I’m going to keep thinking on that.
Anyway, I used Addition Workout 1 from Pam Harris‘s Lesson and Activities for Building Powerful Numeracy. I drew out four strategies on the whiteboard and explained that four different students tried answering the same question the different ways. I asked them to explore the strategies in their random groups, trying to figure out what each student was thinking. We consolidated and gave the strategies names.
Fact: Maybe this is because French is my second language, but I find the translated French terms more cumbersome than the names in English. Over/Under – Aller trop loin. Adding a friendly number – Addition un nombre simple. Just not. the. same.
We pulled out our journals. I looked at the clock. 4 minutes until recess. “Keep them on your desks!” I said, “We’ll do our journals after recess during silent reading instead.” (I promise, I won’t keep doing this.)
I explained that Carl likes video games, and ended up buying a new one for $58 and a used one for $39 dollars. I asked them to try out one of the four strategies we explored to find the total and then explain why they picked the strategy they chose.
Most students opted to add by place value (which, again, is way wordier in French – additionner par valeur de position). It was, they explained, the strategy that aligned best with they way they thought. Some added that they didn’t like drawing number lines because it took too long, which is when I realized…
Oh. I somehow neglected to explain the difference between strategies and models. Oops. To be rectified after.
That said, I did have students who appreciated the other approaches too.
I had two students who ended up finding the difference between the two numbers, which led to a future lesson about my favourite mistake.
The next day, students tried some problem strings in their groups to explore the strategy of give and take (we later named it balancer). I had *thought* that I would have plenty of time to explore this and then launch note taking, but I was once again very wrong about how long we need for each activity. I briefly toyed with the idea of cramming an explanation of note-taking into 10 mins, when a responsible student saved us all from that pain by asking if the primary lunch monitors could leave to do their job.
Right. Let’s do agendas, students, and we’ll attempt note-taking tomorrow.
Notes for my future forgetful self 