ACCOUNTABILITY
Definition: Being held responsible for actions.
PERIMETER
Definition: Sum of the length of all sides in a polygon.
Talk To Me
Copyright 2011 Derrick Brown & KnowledgeBase, Inc.
Talk To Me
Copyright 2011 Derrick Brown & KnowledgeBase, Inc.
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Contents
About The Author ............................................................................................................... 3 Big Ideas About Math Education ........................................................................................ 4 About Talk To Me ............................................................................................................... 4 What Are Talk To Mes Rules? ........................................................................................... 5 How Was Talk To Me Created? .......................................................................................... 6 The Motivation................................................................................................................ 6 The Problem .................................................................................................................... 7 The Initial Solution ......................................................................................................... 7 Back To The Drawing Board .......................................................................................... 8 The Revised Solution .................................................................................................... 11 Evaluating The Status Quo of Math Student Achievement At Our School .................. 12 Influential Anecdotal And Research-Based Support For Talk To Me ...................... 15 Marva Collins' Views Regarding Teaching Vocabulary vs. Teaching Language & Communication ......................................................................................................... 15 Robert Moses' Algebra Project Transition (6th-7th-Grade) And High School Algebra & Geometry Curricula .............................................................................................. 15 A Program For Raising The Level Of Student Achievement In Secondary School Mathematics (Professor Frank B. Allen) .................................................................. 16 How Can I Use Talk To Me In My Classroom?................................................................ 18 1. To Review Content Before Assessments .................................................................. 18 2. For Real-Time Assessment (Teacher-Led Talk To Me) ........................................... 19 3. As A Student-Led Project (The Talk To Me Math Challenge) ................................ 19 How Can I Get My Own Copy Of Talk To Me? ............................................................... 23
Copyright 2011 Derrick Brown (derrick.s.brown@att.net) and KnowledgeBase, Inc. All Rights Reserved. See our TpT product catalog at http://bit.ly/tpt_db
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Derrick is a newlywed, having married the former Keisha Lanier on March 26, 2011. They reside in Marietta, GA. His other passion is empowering people via methods that balance skill & will, analysis & synthesis, ideas & execution, and activity & achievement. He has published a digital catalog of more than 70 short films, learning games, visual dictionaries, poems, essays, newsletters, inspirational posters, and projects. He has also delivered more than 30 presentations, workshops, keynote addresses, and invited lectures at conferences, high schools, colleges, universities, and churches. From 2004-2010, he served as a founding faculty member, governing board representative, Director of Corporate Relations, Dean of Students, and Assistant Principal of Tech High (Charter) School in Atlanta GA. Derrick is originally from Elloree, SC, a rural community in central South Carolina.
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6. Content mastery is predicated upon using self-expression to build self-esteem, self-confidence, and self-discipline.
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About Talk To Me
Language (how we use words and sounds to communicate) and discourse (verbal expression in speech and writing) are more important than vocabulary (knowledge of words). Talk To Me is a game show (in the tradition of Taboo and Pictionary) that requires teams of contestants to build language and discourse skills by guessing vocabulary terms from verbal and/or pictorial clues presented by a single teammate. The clue giver is provided with the term's formal definition (which does not always help)!
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The Problem
The direct interactions that I had with students and teachers while working in middle and high schools suggested that the instructional approach to math had not changed much in the 15-20 years since I had left middle school. Middle and secondary school math instruction still followed an approach that emphasized mastering problem solving processes through rigorous, repetitive, and often rote methods. The emphasis placed on problem solving methods was not accompanied by an equal emphasis on developing language skills that facilitated the translation between natural language and math notation. My informal conversations with teachers never yielded a satisfactory answer as to why language was not emphasized more. The most frequent response was that teaching mandated state standards did not leave enough instructional time to devote to building math language skills. The second most frequent response challenged the very notion that there was this inseparable link between language and math.
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Debut of Talk To Me At 2004 Arthur Blank Family Fellows (BFF) Youth Summer Internship Program (YSIP) Interview Day (February 16, 2004)
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were creative and often humorous, but strayed from the games true intent. 2. When students did attempt to describe game terms using the academic context, they would often use related (but incorrect) terms. For example, when describing the term isosceles triangle from the Geometry version, students would give clues like "this is a triangle with only two congruent sides". Students would then shout "Scalene ... equilateral ... ISOSCELES!" After I saw this approach repeatedly, I began to humorously call it the Right Church, Wrong Pew method. 3. Students would be distracted from the game's didactic intent by the lure of competition. Beating their opponent often overshadowed learning the terms the game attempted to reinforce. No matter what I tried (incentives, penalties, smaller teams, extended time), the games would often become wayward due to the above observations. I became frustrated, and retired the game for almost a year to allow time to refresh my perspective and redirect my approach. This coincided with my promotion to school administration, so my new role complemented my need for a design break.
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Copyright 2011 Derrick Brown (derrick.s.brown@att.net) and KnowledgeBase, Inc. All Rights Reserved. See our TpT product catalog at http://bit.ly/tpt_db
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This new approach allowed me to model the proper way to play "Talk To Me" for students by giving clues in the appropriate context using simple, illustrative examples that would help to teach them the terms in a given game version at the beginning of a unit of instruction. We would then play the game using that version at the end of the instruction unit, which would allow time for students to rely on the illustrative example to help them generate the appropriate words to describe terms. This new approach was the missing element I needed to motivate me to start using Talk To Me as a formal teaching tool that could catalyze improvement in student achievement.
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grade. The test was given to 25 students entering our school during our one-week Summer Orientation Camp. Early statistical results of the test indicated a remarkably low level of math language proficiency: 1. Less than 10% of the students tested were able to define terms like square, volume, sum, and circumference. 2. None of the students were able to define terms like addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, area, line, circle, diameter, principal, and interest. 3. One frustrated student put it best as she scribbled the following message at the top of her test: "Some words I could not define because I cannot explain, but I know how to do them". I left our school at the end of the year without having been able to make deeper inquiries into my idea that math language deficiencies were the root cause of math achievement deficiencies. I left, though, knowing that Talk To Me was a solution approach whose time would soon come.
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Robert Moses' Algebra Project Transition (6th-7th-Grade) And High School Algebra & Geometry Curricula
In June 2007, I began to study the work of MacArthur Foundation "genius" grant winner Robert Moses through his organization "The Algebra Project" (http://www.algebra.org). The Algebra Project is a vehicle for implementing the standards of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) such as "Mathematics as Problem Solving", "Mathematics as Communication", and "Mathematics as Reasoning". Transition Curriculum In particular, I studied their Transition Curriculum. Designed for use in 6th or 7th grade classrooms, the Transition Curriculum helps students make the shift in their conceptual thinking from arithmetic to algebra. It catalyzes this shift by engaging students in the construction of mathematical concepts. The curriculum helps students build their
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understanding of mathematical concepts through a five-step curricular process that begins with familiar concrete experiences and progresses to abstract mathematics: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Participate in a physical event. Make pictorial (graphic) representations or models of the event. Discuss and write about the event in intuitive language(s). Discuss and write about the event in structured language (identify key features). Develop symbolic representations for the key features of the event, make presentations to the class and apply these representations.
High School Algebra and Geometry Curricula Per my research in June 2007, The Algebra Project was producing a high school curriculum with funding from the National Science Foundation's Instructional Materials Development, and the GE Foundations Fund for Math Excellence. The curriculum's empirical learning methods and careful analysis of participant's language ground it solidly in recent instructional research. The curriculum has improved student scores on traditional state-administered standardized tests. During the first year trial at Lanier High School in Jackson, MS, 55% of the students following this curriculum passed the Mississippi Algebra I Examination in their first sitting, compared with the 40% of students following the regular course. Examples of materials can be seen at http://www.math.siu.edu/budzban/TripLine.html.
A Program For Raising The Level Of Student Achievement In Secondary School Mathematics (Professor Frank B. Allen)
In April 1996, Professor Frank B. Allen (Professor Emeritus of Mathematics, Elmhurst College, and Former President, National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM)) published a position paper entitled "A Program For Raising The Level Of Student Achievement In Secondary School Mathematics". The paper presented an eight-point improvement strategy (omitted here for brevity's sake) that included the following recommendation ... "The teaching of mathematics should be regarded as an extension of the teaching of
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language, in which facility in two-way translation between language and mathematical symbolism is emphasized. Efforts to develop an awareness of the intimate relationship which exists between grammar, mathematics and logic should begin with games of "How do we know" in the early grades, continue with the introduction of formal proof not later than grade nine and culminate in the ability to read and write valid essay proofs not later than grade twelve."
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1 2
See the section entitled What Are Talk To Mes Rules? See the section entitled Back To The Drawing Board.
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The following pages present an executive summary of the TTMMC and the aforementioned outcomes. Feel free to share this with your school leaders to engage their support of the project! I would love to work with a group of schools to make this happen!
Talk To Me Presented at 2010 Georgia Council of Teachers of Mathematics (GCTM) Conference (See demonstration videos at http://bit.ly/yt_gctm)
KILOGRAM (KG)
Definition: A metric unit for measuring mass.
ISOSCELES (TRIANGLE)
Definition: A triangle with at least two congruent sides.
Talk To Me
Copyright 2011 Derrick Brown & KnowledgeBase, Inc.
Talk To Me
Copyright 2011 Derrick Brown & KnowledgeBase, Inc.
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1) Problem solving skills. Students should learn how to solve problems by (but not limited to): a. Using content This project will improve student achievement in math by knowledge to design or developing students' language skills (the ability to know and improve a product, demonstrate the meaning of words). service, or system to meet an identified need; b. Planning and Each participating school will host a Talk To Me Tournament, organizing an event or and will be responsible for planning, organizing, and hosting the activity from concept to event. completion; c. Teaching a skill or This project will improve student achievement in math by planning a sequence of developing students' language skills (the ability to know and learning activities; and/or demonstrate the meaning of words). d. Satisfying a clients The client (i.e., the school) needs to improve student needs. achievement in math. The client will sponsor these school-level tournaments. 2) Communication skills and techniques. Students should learn how to apply communication tools and techniques by (but not limited to): a. Making oral Students will prepare and present written and oral funding presentations; proposals and followup reports for their TTMMCs. b. Preparing written Students will prepare and present written and oral funding reports; and/or proposals and followup reports for their TTMMCs. c. Translating Students will prepare and present written and oral funding information from one proposals and followup reports for their TTMMCs. format to another. 3) Self-management skills. Students will learn how to manage and direct their own learning by (but not limited to): a. Participating and/or leading teams; b. Taking responsibility for the evaluation of ones own work; and/or c. Planning and managing ones work activities. Students will lead and participate in the TTMMC organizing committee, as well as the TTMMC competition. Students will manage and evaluate the activities of the TTMMC organizing committee, as well as their TTMMC competition teams. Students will plan and manage their school's TTMMC organizing committee, as well as their TTMMC competition teams.
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Name
Grade Level
Description Talk To Me" is a game show (in the tradition of Taboo and Pictionary) that requires teams of contestants to build language and discourse skills by guessing vocabulary terms from verbal and/or pictorial clues presented by a single teammate. NOTE: This product is aligned to Holt Geometry (2004 Teacher's Edition). SEE Talk To Me (General Math Edition)
Talk To Me (General Math Edition) Talk To Me (Geometry Edition) - Teach the Language of Math!
7-12
7-12
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Name Talk To Me (Grades 1-2 Math Edition) - Teach the Language of Math! Talk To Me (3rd-Grade Math Edition) - Teach the Language of Math!
Grade Level
Subject / Skill Focus Math, Balanced Literacy Math, Balanced Literacy Character Education, Balanced Literacy, Critical Thinking Balanced Literacy, Character Education
Description
1-12
NOTE: Grades 1-2 are the MINIMUM grade levels. These terms actually challenge high school students! SEE Talk To Me (General Math Edition) NOTE: 3rd Grade is the MINIMUM grade level. These terms actually challenge high school students! SEE Talk To Me (General Math Edition)
3-12
6-12
Teach the language of character! Our students will exhibit these words in their daily lives once they are challenged to think critically about them! SEE Talk To Me (Character Education Edition) This version of the game "Talk To Me" is based on "Reach - Then Teach", a 25-page ebook challenges students to think critically about life, freedom, and the pursuit of success and happiness by introducing them to fundamental principles that define their character. SEE Talk To Me (General Math Edition)
6-12
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