Reflecting on Engagement and Language Use in Mathematics

 It was our turn for the school news today, and I thought it was a really good opportunity for student voice to tell me how they felt about our new Maths programme this year. You can check out our video on our class blog here. 

I have children who really do struggle to tune into learning but have latched on to the Numicon resources. The overwhelming response from the children in my class in that they love Maths this year.

At the same time as creating my news item, I have student teacher in my classroom on full control. She is following the Numicon lesson plans as I have instructed her to, mindfully incorporating the target Maths vocabulary. It is really nice to sit back and watch the children build in confidence at understanding and then using themselves, the new vocabulary from each lesson. You can see the vocabulary features heavily alongside images of our learning, on our Maths group slides each week.

I will be on leave for much of the remainder of this term for family reasons. But I am thinking ahead to Term 3 and how to implement purposeful learning reflections to encourage target vocabulary use. I look forward to trying these ideas out in a fresh, new term!

Numicon Assessments!

 It has been really interesting undergoing the Numicon Milestone Assessment checks in the build up to report writing. There are a lot of gaps in the ‘higher level’ students’ mathematical understanding and concepts - such as using tens and ones to count large numbers quickly and accurately. I am really enjoying teaching using the Numicon programme now and can see the need for the deliberate teaching of vocabulary around such basic concepts as addition and subtraction. I am mindful of progressing towards the Pr1me programme as an end goal, but am currently just enjoying embedding Numicon in the classroom and making sure it is done to the best of my ability. As we started a term behind, I am also mindful of moving through the lessons at a brisk pace, to cover as much of the content before the year ends as I can - while maintaining understanding of the learning for the children. What has been reassuring for me, is that I am not ‘babying’ the learning for my top achievers. There are so many fundamental gaps in their knowledge base that I am actually really happy I didn’t put them on a separate Pr1me journey, although that could become a pathway I am open to later in the year.

A Snapshot of my Milestone Tracking Sheet so far!

Numicon in Room 13: 'Getting Started' before the Holidays!

 So, we are heading into the Term 1 Holidays, and I have only just finished the 'Getting Started' section of the Year 3 Numicon Planning. It is going to be interesting to see how much coverage of the programme I can complete before the end of the year, as I feel like I am already a term behind!

So far, I have to say I am enjoying teaching Numicon Maths. There is a clear purpose to each lesson and the materials relate well to the concepts being taught. At times, I am finding myself under prepared, because there are activities that require printing, cutting and laminating in advance, and if you don't read ahead carefully enough, this can catch you off guard.

The children are definitely engaged and enjoying discovering a 'new' way of learning Maths. I look forward to getting through some more areas of the curriculum over Term 2, and seeing how well their Number Knowledge sticks. There will be milestone assessments coming up, which I am looking forward to doing, as I feel they will be of more use than the traditional JAM assessments of the past.

Here are some photos to show some of what we have been doing in class this term!

My Vosaic Recording and Feedback

 Within our school, we have been asked to use vosaic.com, to record and analyse a lesson related to our Inquiry focus.

I have done one with a group of children, exploring the Numicon Shapes and the relationship between them and the numerals we write - Eg. 11 is 1 ten shape and a 1 shape. Unfortunately the audio recording was not of high quality, so I needed to rewrite much of the transcript and no student voice was picked up. This led my reflection to be on my own teaching as opposed to student voice (which I am much more interested in and will try to do next time)!

I entered the following prompt into the website:

"Does the teacher effectively explain and communicate the purpose of the lesson?" 

And this is what I got!

Screenshot from my Vosaic Recording.

Second CoL Meeting - Academic Readings

Unfortunately I was unwell and unable to attend our second CoL Meeting of the year today.

We were asked to do the following before we met:

And these were the quotes I prepared:

I found it interesting, particularly as I am inquiring into Maths already, the line about girls' self-perceptions in Mathematics being related to having higher verbal achievements, when so much discussion within my school has centred around the importance of understanding language to advance Mathematics achievement. It is definitely an area I am looking to purposefully build into my teaching - looking to bridge the gap between the two Mathematics programmes we are using; Numicon in Year 3 to Pr1me in Year 4. They both incorporate Mathematical language expectations for the children, but I need to look into how they are relate to each other across the programmes - as well as the vocabulary mentioned within the new Mathematics Curriculum itself.

I also really reflected on the statement about cultural value placed on Mathematics versus Sports for instance. It is naturally going to affect children, when families show a bias towards one area or another. I suppose as educators we need to balance that; not just favouring Mathematics, but showing how Sports and Mathematics can be equally valuable to the enrichment of our students' lives.

Numicon PD Today

 We had Numicon PD in our school today for the Junior School teachers from Years 1-3. It was really good to get together as a Junior team and start to figure out where to even start with this programme. It has been a little frustrating waiting for the hands on materials to arrive, but we should be able to hit the ground running on Monday apparently!

Numicon has come across as a more confusing system than the Pr1me Maths Programme, in terms of ease of getting stuck in and implementing it in the classroom. I have been more inclined to pursue the Pr1me programme for this reason, but after today I am starting to get excited about what Numicon has to offer.

A lot of the reticence I have felt about Numicon was finally laid to rest today and it really comes down to how to navigate the planning resources on their website. There are a lot of clicks and a lot of steps to even access your lesson (as you can see in the example I have prepared below):

I think I will need to organise the planning accessible from the website into my own planning slides, that I can either print and have hard copy, or at least be able to access from my own Google Drive, as I dislike the thought that I am reliant on internet access to be able to continue with my lessons in the moment. I would also like to see the whole lesson sequence in one glance, so that I can better manage the timing of each lesson component, especially while learning this new system.

I am going to launch into 'Getting Started' next week - which is really a focus on the children getting stuck into the materials and familiar with how to use them. I am hoping to start on the first lesson after Getting Started - 'Numbers and the Number System 1' before we get to the holidays, but we will see how we go!

First CoL Meeting of 2025

We had our first CoL meeting of the year today at Panmure Bridge School.

As we move into the first year of implementing a Structured Maths programme (or two!) into Pt England School, I have been mindful of the Manaiakalani kaupapa of Learn-Create-Share. How can we continue to implement this when following structured learning progressions, and a predetermined scope and sequence - particularly when considering programmes like Pr1me Mathematics, which are presented in textbook after textbook formats.

The CREATE seems a particular challenge to me - requiring a creative teacher to provide students with their own opportunities to create. 

So I am thinking of inquiring into my teaching practice with CREATE in mind.

On the 29th of January, our whole teaching staff had PD about the new Mathematics Curriculum in New Zealand. Something that resonated with me during this day, was the recurring language around the importance of Pattern Recognition.

Perhaps this can be a focus for CREATE tasks... and the direction for my Inquiry this year? 

In the meantime testing week is coming up! I am very interested to see where my data leads me...

2025 and Structured Mathematics!

Well it is a new year and I am fortunate enough to be reappointed as a CoL teacher in 2025. This year presents the opportunity for many Professional Learning insights as I continue to embed my BSLA learnings into my teaching practice, as New Zealand embarks on Structured Literacy programmes throughout the country. I am looking forward to the opportunity to follow this approach for a whole school year. It will be interesting to gauge the progress made over this time, while keeping in mind the need for focussed vocabulary and comprehension building. 

So, where to for 2025? It is very much as case of watch this space! 

Mathematics is the area in which I am going to need to invest the bulk of my time. We are diving into Structured Mathematics, with my school having picked up two programmes; one with a more Junior school, hands on manipulatives focus, and the other for Years 4 - 8, with textbooks and online content. As a teacher of Years 3 and 4 this year, I straddle the two levels and will need to gain a solid understanding of the planning and implementation of both programmes; Numicon and Pr1me.