Professional Documents
Culture Documents
The discussions which were planned ahead of time did not spring into
the depth of discussion which I had hoped for. The initial question I
asked, which was supposed to simply spur a quick recall about why we
use doubles when doing mental math, did not go as planned. I expected
this answer to come quickly so that we could move on with what really
mattered in the lesson. However, when I asked F.A., she did not exactly
answer why we use doubles, but instead answered why we like to work
with tens, or, numbers with 0s at the end of them. I did not want to shut
down her thinking, because number talks are not supposed to be about
using one strategy but about using many strategies. I tried to work with
her to articulate what strategy she was describing, but while feeling like
we couldnt spend too much time on this question, since it was supposed
to be a brief introduction, I didnt really ever arrive at what a double was.
Thus, the students may not have had a clear picture of what finding a
double meant before beginning our number talk, which was the main
purpose of the introduction.
Another question which did not spur the sort of conversation that I
hoped for included a question which was meant to determine the
difference between 2 different strategies which students shared. I called
a student who was not sure how to go about looking for a difference
between the two strategies, and she froze after I called on her. I tried to
give her enough wait time, but my concern with pacing may have made
her nervous and she couldnt come up with an answer until I pointed to
the place where I saw the difference, and then she could articulate what
that student did differently than the other students strategy expressed
next to his on the board.
This lesson went much longer than planned for. As an instructor, I
made the decision to focus on lengthier questions of higher level
thinking, including the analyzing through comparing and contrasting
question noted above. Keeping in mind the intended brevity of the
lesson, I might have done better to keep the automatic recall formative
assessments such as voting for the most efficient strategy and giving a
two-finger sign if a double was used rather than use the lengthier
The opening questioning process listed above indicates that students are
unclear that there is a difference between finding a double and making tens.
It could be beneficial for a number talk to be given which would highlight
when to make a ten, and when to make doubles, to most efficiently solve a
problem. Additionally, students seemed quite excited with S.Js strategy,
which was very interesting and complicated with the number of steps that he
took and how he manipulated numbers, but was also very inefficient. It
seems like students are having fun playing with the numbers, and that is
great, but that is not ultimately the point of number talks. The point is to
help students formulate their own strategies to most efficiently solve math
problems in their head. A number talk focussing explicitly on evaluating
efficiency could be beneficial, to show that strategies that can take down a
math problem with the least amount of steps and with the least stretches of
the mind are the best strategies for the purposes of mental math. Students
could use a reminder of why we are doing number talks; to devise strategies
for mental math, and not just to have fun playing with numbers on the board,
as beneficial as this is in its own right.
Ultimately, being able to couple conversations about efficiently with
conversations about definably distinct strategies can help students evaluate
different strategies for different problems in their own heads before even
applying them. Explicitly naming and applying the distinct strategies of
making tens and using doubles could help students more efficiently decide
what strategy to chose in given situations. It could help students
metacognitively think about what strategy they are doing if they understand
the differences between strategies they are using during number talks.