TL6 How do I facilitate non-mathematical discussion in the maths classroom?
This vignette illustrates the approach taken and subsequent self-reflection of a maths teacher, unused to facilitating non-mathematical discussion in her maths classroom
I organised the pupils into groups of five – and told them that they would be working in these groups for the duration of the joey lessons.
To help develop the pupils’ understanding of the type of animal we were learning about, I asked them to think of ten Australian mammals, then as many marsupials and monotremes as possible. The class defined mammal, marsupial and monotreme – using prior knowledge and library books available in class. The group brainstorming was successful, but class discussion was not as smooth as I expected. Pupils did not seem to be listening to each group’s ideas and were becoming distracted.
I battled on, stopping the lesson at times, to get the pupils to remind themselves about what constitutes good listening. Perhaps the pupils were not focused, as they did not see the relevance of the lesson in a mathematical sense? I started to realize that though I knew where I wanted to go with this discussion, they probably did not.
I decided then to try to direct the discussion a little more in the next Task: What would you need to consider for caring for an orphaned roo? I used the whiteboard and drew ridiculous stick figure pictures of the scenario in a round flow chart format, telling the story as I went. My artwork captured the pupils’ interest. This visual presentation seemed to be easy to for the pupils to understand and they perhaps started to see the links. They were much more focused - perhaps as they were using eyes and ears rather than just ears. We then listed some ‘caring for joey’ Tasks – eg keep warm, feed, give water and get in touch with vet.
On reflection of this lesson (I was disappointed that discussion had not gone so well), I realized that I would need to give the pupils an overview of the five lessons ie the endpoint of the culminating activity. I decided to do this at the start of the next lesson and to use their list of ‘Caring for joey’ ideas to structure the next lesson – hopefully giving the pupils some ownership over the Task. I also thought that I would try to ensure that other ‘non-mathematical’ discussions were more structured, and provide more visuals with the discussion - which would mean that I would need to try to anticipate the questions or think on my feet.