Building Conceptual Understanding in Mathematicians & Saving Instructional Time in Literacy Groups

School:: Dune Lakes Elementary School
Subject:: Teaching Quality
Teacher:: Elisabeth Kinsinger
Students Impacted:: 19
Grade:: 1
Date:: October 8, 2021

Investor

Thank you to the following investor for funding this grant.

The Alys Foundation - $542.95

Impact to My Classroom

# of Students Impacted: 19

The fulfillment of the materials requested in my grant changed my math instruction this year. The resources provided challenged me as a teacher to develop deeper, more conceptual math thinkers in my classroom. I was able to read the research and provide rich opportunities for my students to engage in discourse, perservere through challenging problems, and deepen their conceptual understanding of math. During an observation, my principal even commented on how impressed she was with my students' problem solving ability and their ability to verbalize their reasoning! I will continue to use the materials in my classroom next year, and I will share the book and strategies I learned with other teachers. Thank you so much to the investors who chose to invest in my students and me!

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Students leading number string routine and engagin

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Snapshot of our dot talk routine, which encourages

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Students working with an open ended coin combinati

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This might have been my favorite and most eye open

Original Grant Overview

Goal

My goal is to foster a love and deeper understanding of mathematics in my students. Along with the mathematics goal, I am striving to save instructional time in reading small groups by organizing the student materials better and making it more easily accessible.

What will be done with my students

I want you to think back to your math classes growing up. For me, math was an anxiety-producing subject full of memorization and abstract methods of solving problems. I never understood the "why" in math; I just thought that my brain didn't work that way.
My reason for this grant is to break the cycle of math just being black and white. Math isn't just about getting the problems correct. I want my students to be able to reason and explain why, make connections, ask questions, take risks, and persevere in problem solving.
With the purchase of this tool kit, I'll be able to help develop a deeper, conceptual understanding of mathematics, while also engaging my students in thinking routines. The kit includes resources such as number talks, image cards, purposeful games, and manipulatives. These materials can be used in whole group instruction to facilitate meaningful discourse. These materials can also be used in small group instruction to help guide my students through their understandings. Research has shown that the concept of "Concrete-Representational-Abstract" allows students to connect the levels of understanding. This approach is broken down by "concrete", which is the physical manipulation of objects to solve problems, "representational", which is representing using pictures, and finally the "abstract" stage, which is solving using the algorithm.
These activities will take place during our math block. We would begin our math lesson with one of the routines (number talks, dot talks, image cards, etc.). I envision the fluency games in small groups while students work with me, or work together in pairs. These activities are also things that we would use throughout the year to foster our mathematical thinking!
The book listed goes along with the tool kit and includes ideas and strategies for teaching mathematics. This would be something that I ready and study and then bring to life those ideas/strategies in my classroom.

The last set of items that I'm requesting is a set of seat sacks for the back of my small group table chairs. I'd like to maximize instructional time in small groups by having the materials on the back of the students chairs at the table. With this, I wouldn't be having them waste time grabbing things from their seats or trying to get out 6 sets of materials myself; the materials would already be in the sacks on their chair. In the sacks, we would put their dry-erase markers, white boards, manipulatives, notebooks, pencils, crayons, etc. for the small group.

Benefits to my students

With the math tool kit, my students will become deeper thinkers and problem solvers. My students will be able to engage in discourse with others, develop understanding, build confidence in their reasoning, and solve problems better and more efficiently. We will be able to foster an environment of meaningful discussion where students can explore and take risks in math.

With the small group seat sacks, my students will benefit from the organization and use of instructional time. Time is wasted when we have to grab materials from their desks, or my shelves. This way, the materials would be prepared and stay in one place, maximizing instructional time.