Taking on Second : Book Study

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Guided Math Book Study Chapter 9

This was the final chapter to our Guided Math Book Study. I enjoyed reading this book. It was especially nice to see how others felt about the chapters too. I gained a lot of knowledge that I didn't have before about math in general. I learned about the concept of guided math.

While I do guided reading on a daily basis, I never thought math could be done in such a way. I guess I was making it harder then it really is (I usually do this)! Now that I am finished with this book, what professional book should I read next? Any great ideas?

A lot of changes are going to take place this upcoming school year with my math block.

1. First, I will continue to use Envision Math because this is what our school adopted. However, I will use our daily topic as a mini-lesson that leads into independent work, math stations, and guided math.

2. I have found math stations centered around Laney's ideas for independent or math station work. My work stations will be: math facts, math journals, math investigations, math center activities, math games, problem solving, and technology.

3. I have taken the above topics and used them with The Primary Gal's Bubble Page

You can buy these from her teacher pay teacher store here for $1.00. They are well worth the money if you are looking to differentiate instruction during work time.

4. I am going to have guided math time with the teacher. I am going to use many forms of assessments (checklists, rubrics, notes, formal assessments) to keep track of data and progress. I will provide instruction during these math groups based on the results of the data from the assessments.

5. I am creating a math bulletin board and focus wall in my classroom. I can't wait to use it next year.

6. I have purchase the book Math Stretches by Laney Sammons to use during my instruction

6. Finally, I will do more math warm-ups in the morning! We have great pages with our Envision Series to do just that! I will make packets for the kids to complete when they come in, in the mornings.

What does your guided math block look like? What resources do you find helpful for math instruction? Does anyone reading this use Envision Math? What are your thoughts about it? How do you incorporate this series into Guided Math and Math Groups?

I hope you enjoyed all of the posts and blogs related to Guided Math. Have fun trying out new math ideas, concepts, and teaching methods in your class! I can't wait to see how it is going! We will be doing a follow up soon! Stay tuned.....

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Guided Math Book Study Chapter 8

After taking a break for a week because I was on a family vacation (we didn't have internet and barely any cell service where we were), I am back. My family and I traveled to Table Rock Lake just outside of Branson, Missouri. It was a well needed and deserved trip for us.

Now back to the book study. This week's chapter was all about math assessments. I'm going to be honest. The only assessment I use during math is the assessment that comes with our math series. I give the chapter test at the end and then move on to the next chapter and topic. This chapter is helpful when listing several other types of assessments that could be used during guided math instruction.

Types of Assessments

Checklist
Rubric
Formative Assessment

No matter what type of assessment is chosen, descriptive feedback should be given to the students promptly.

One issue that the chapter discusses is that there really isn't a way to assess Guided Math Groups. However, some teachers use checklists and rubrics for the groups as well. How do you assess work completed in your math groups? Do you assess or grade work completed in math groups?

Finally, how much assessment do you do during math time? What types of assessments do you use?

Enjoy Chapter 8! One more chapter to go.......

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Guided Math Book Study Chapter 5

This weeks topic of study was on small group instruction. Something I want to go smoothly in my classroom. I know what I want and can vision it, I just have a hard time figuring out how to put it into action. My problem with doing small group instruction is combining it with math independent group time.

Last year was the first year that I tried out Math groups and small group instruction in my classroom. I did math groups similar to Daily 5. Aimee and I sat down before the start of last school year and decided what we wanted our Daily Math groups to be. We decided that one of the rotations would be Math with the Teacher. This worked out great except that when the students came to work with me, I found that our time would always run over. Therefore, I couldn't meet with all the groups everyday. On top of that, during my small group instruction was when the students completed the math practice portion of the daily lesson. We use Envision Math. I teach one lesson per day generally. Does anyone else use Envision Math and teach one lesson per day (in second grade). Even teaching one lesson per day, I can't teach every chapter.

After a year of always running behind and trying to figure out how I was going to meet with four groups a day, I knew I needed to do something else next year. Now comes new planning time with Aimee and I. We actually just sat down and talked about how we want our math group instruction to flow. While we still don't have all of the answers, and haven't even tested it out to see if our ideas will work, we both are thinking along the same lines, and trying to come up with a plan.

We are trying to figure out when to do the practice part of the worksheet (lesson) for the day. Does anyone else use Envision along with Math groups? If so, I would love to hear from you. How do you fit it all in, what does your schedule look like, etc.?

We think we are going to try and combine The Primary Gal's Differentiation Workstation Plan,

The Daily 5 (Math), and small group instruction to do our group work and workstation rotation next year (more info to come about this). We still are uncertain of what we are going to teach during our small group instruction. However, we visualize doing differentiation during this time. You can find a link to the Primary Gal's Blog Post on Small Group Instruction and Differentiation here.

Last year when deciding what groups to place the students in, I gave a STAR Math Assessment. I place my students into small group instruction time based on their level from this assessment. It worked out great, because I can spend more time with my lower level students, and less time with my higher level students. The one thing I want to do next year, is take my higher level students to another level by challenging them during small group instruction time. Any ideas or thoughts?

I look forward to reading everyone else's blog posts about Small Group Instruction. You can check them out below and enter a giveaway! Enjoy!

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Guided Math Book Study Chapter 4

Chapter 4 of our book study was all about whole-class lessons. How do you teach math using whole group lessons? In this chapter, the author Laney Sammons discusses what can happen during whole group math lessons. Whole-group lessons can provide a chance for teachers to present mini-lessons, students engaged in activating strategies, teachers reading aloud math related literature, setting the stage for the math workshop, conducting a Math Huddle, providing practice and review, or formal testing and assessments.

During Mini-Lessons, teachers should make a connection (from yesterday's lesson, with the ongoing unit of study, with the student's work, or with an experience outside of school), provide a teaching point (present and demonstrate), allow for active engagement (students try out a skill or strategy, students watch, students plan out loud,), and teachers link the lesson to ongoing student work (students turn to their own work and apply the teaching point).

1 point of interest from this chapter is students can complete KWL charts for math. I haven't ever used a KWL chart for math that I can remember. Have you? Instead of the traditional KWL chart (K for what you know, W for what you want to know, and L for what you learned), in math it can be adapted. The First Column can be: what do you know for sure, the second column can be: what are you trying to find out, and finally the third column can be Are there any special conditions in the problem?

Of course, you can come up with a name for this chart if you would like. Any ideas or suggestions? Maybe KFC Chart?

2nd Point of interest from this chapter is a topic of Word Splashes! I really like this idea. It is kind of like making a list of vocabulary terms related to the concept of study. Teachers can put the list on the board as a preview for the lesson or unit of study. Students can also use the word splashes as a review of concepts learned.

During my math whole group lesson, I use a video to introduce the concept. Before using the video, we do a quick review of the concept we are learning. The video generally comes from BrainPop or our math series Envision. After watching the video and demonstrating the skill, students practice a bit with me during the whole-group lesson practice time. After practicing together, the students have a few minutes to work independently on the task for practice. During this time, I walk around and assist or make notes of how students are doing. After our mini-lesson and independent practice, students participate in independent work. During this time, I pull out small groups.

How do you teach whole group math lessons in your classroom? Do you have a math series? Do you like your math series for whole group instruction?

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Guided Math Book Study Chapter 3

Chapter 3 is all about using math-warm ups during Guided Math. Math Warm-Ups are simple 20-30 minute math activities that students can do when entering the classroom in the morning. These simple math warm-ups can be review of skills learned, enrichment skills for higher level students, or practice of skills working on during guided math.

At our school, we adopted Envison Math. Do you use Envison Math? How do you use the program? We generally make a packet of the chapter's daily spiral review and problem of the day. Each day, the students come in, they complete the daily spiral review and problem of the day from the previous day's math lesson. This keeps the students engaged and on target to review skills learned and get ready for our new math lesson.

On days that we don't have a math problem of the day or daily spiral review, I love to use Sunny Day's Second Grade Common Core Math Magic Sheets.

These review all second grade skills that should be taught during math instruction. I find that some of them are challenging for my lower level students, but together we review the skills.

Daily Math Stretches: Math stretches are simple one question problems that can get the kids thinking and focused on math. The book recommends doing a different type of math stretch each day.

Monday: Number of the Day (ways to make the number ...)

Tuesday: What's Next (patterning)

Wednesday: How Did My Family Use Math Last Night? or other math questions

Thursday: ___________ Makes me think of.... (put a math concept in the blank such as fractions)

Friday: Data Collection (such as graphing or yes/no questions)

Mathematical Current Events: To make your classroom a numeracy math rich environment, adding newspaper articles, magazine clippings, etc. about the topic of math is a great way to show students that math is all around us. Do you ever do this? Have you thought of doing this? I guess I don't read enough newspapers or magazines to know about math in the current events. However, I do read! Lots of books!

Mathematics-Related Classroom Responsibilities: Do you have classroom jobs? Is of on them attendance taker or lunch count? These are great ways to get students involved with math related jobs.

Calendar Board: The board can contain a preview of concepts or review previously learned concepts. The calendar board can contain mathematical concepts such as estimation, graphing, place value, number lines, addition subtraction (days left). The calendar itself can also lend a hand to patterning with the days of the month.

From this list, there are several things I need to work on. One: My calendar is pretty boring. My student of the day puts up the calendar and writes on our whiteboard. However, we don't really do much with calendar time. One thing that I find difficult is the time restrictions we have in our classroom. It seems like I just can't fit it all in. Does anyone else have this same issue? Aimee was really good about using our interactive whiteboard to do calendar time and make it interactive. The students loved it. I felt like it took forever! I gave up on it after about 2 months. Maybe I need to try harder next year.

I also want to keep a math board of some sort with terms, pictures, articles, examples of the concepts we are learning about. This will give the students a visual of the concepts at hand. I also need to do more math stretches in my room. I am thinking this could be a simple activity done after recess! Any thoughts on how and when you use math stretches?

Now on to Chapter 4!

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Guided Math Chapter 2

Chapter 2 discusses the importance of student seating and arrangements, material organization, student calendars or agendas, numeracy-rich environment, manipulatives, problem of the day, math journals, math vocabulary, graphic organizers, and math related literacy during guided math time.

Student Seating: Often Times, I keep my desks in groups or tables because I love doing group work and having my students work together. I have a rolling 5 drawer cart at each table group for storage of art supplies, pencils, materials, etc. This helps quickly when we need to find things. Also, I have a meeting area with a while board and carpet for mini-lessons and whole group instruction. During small group instruction, I have a small group table that I use to meet with my students. I would show pictures, but because it is the end of the year all materials and desks have been put away for the summer.

Material Organization and Manipulatives: I keep all of my materials stored in small tubs that can be purchased at the Dollar Tree or Walmart. They are really inexpensive and easy to store. My problem is that I don't have enough storage space for all of my tubs. I need to be creative in how I store these tubs. Any ideas?

Small Group Area: Students sit at a horseshoe shaped table for my small group math lesson. During my math group when the students come to me, I have a 5 drawer rolling cart. This cart contains all of the materials I will need for my guided math groups for the week. I also have one of these carts for my guided reading groups as well. They work out great, because they are on wheels and can be easily rolled.

Large Group Meeting Area: Students sit on a carpeted area by the Promethean Board. We do our whole group lesson with either our Envision Math lesson video, or a BrainPop video, or both. Does anyone else use Envision that does Math groups? I am eager to see what you do whole-class lesson and small-group lessons using this series.

Rotation: Students typically go to 4 stations a day. Sometimes, we might not get through all of the stations and have to pick up the next day. My group signs are in a pocket chart and say group 1, group 2, group 3, and group 4. I tried to actually give the groups a name such as with teacher, at the computer, on Ipad, hands on, etc. But I found that when I wanted to change things, the kids got so confused on what to do. So to keep it generic and simple I do group 1, group 2, group 3, and group 4. I put up on a dry erase moving white board (with wheels) what the students need to do at each group. They rotate through stations. They spend about 15 to 20 minutes at a station.

Things that I need to work on after reading this chapter are: having a math board, calendar time, and math journals. I have already starting purchasing interactive math journals, and hope to make some as well. I am going to make one of my math groups next year a journal group. I am still trying to figure out how to do calendar and math board. Any ideas?

Do you have anything to add about how you do math groups in your classroom?

Now on to Chapter 3?

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Guided Math Chapter 1

Have you heard of the book Guided Math: A Framework for Mathematics Instruction by Laney Sammons?

If you haven't I would recommend this book. Thanks to The Primary Gal, I am now participating in this book study. Thus far, I am enjoying learning and reading about Guided Math.

This book is about how to successfully conduct guided math in a classroom. If you are not familiar with guided math, it is similar to guided reading. Guided reading and guided math allow for teacher lead instruction, small group instruction, individual practice, and assessment. Guided Lessons follow the I Do (teacher), We Do (teacher and student), and You Do (student) release of responsibility.

Chapter 1 of this text, describes the components that make up a guided math lesson in the classroom. These components include: numeracy, morning warm-ups and calendar, whole-class instruction, guided math instruction with small groups, math workshops, individual conferences, and assessment.

This year, I started doing some guided math in my classroom. I decided to create my own Daily Math (Similar to the Daily 5). I do our math mini-lesson (the math lesson for the day), then we practice together. Finally, the students go into groups while I pull out students. I need to work on a few of the areas such as numeracy and calendar activities. However, my students have loved doing our Daily Math. I am going to change a few things next year to make it even more successful. Now on to Chapter 2!

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