As my school year is inching ever closer to the halfway point, the to-do lists are long and the days are short. I have to keep reminding myself of my mission: to help students improve their relationship with math and see themselves as capable of doing math. I want them to enjoy coming to math class and therefore enjoy math a little more than when they started.
Math is so much more than performing operations and calculating values - as so many of my students believe. Math has the potential to teach us perseverance, evaluating claims, responding to mistakes and frustration, collaboration, and communicating clearly. It is the communicating clearly idea I want to discuss today.
I recognize that the math content I am required to teach may have little impact on my students’ adult life - many will not need to solve quadratic equations or graph functions as a part of their future jobs, but they will have to read AND write. There are so many ways to communicate mathematics - graphs and charts, lists and steps, diagrams, equations, and computations. One skill is necessary to truly communicate clearly: writing. Yes, math teachers are writing teachers too.
Over the last 14 years, I have worked to implement writing in my classroom in ways that are meaningful and engaging. There are two important aspects to consider when implementing writing: 1) What are authentic ways students can write? and 2) How will you provide feedback? To address these questions I set up an formative assessment system in which students would answer content questions (multiple, choice, fill in the blank, multiple answer etc.) and the last question was always a written response item. I used anywhere from 1 - 2 of these formative assessments a week.
Authentic Writing
There are two main types of writing prompts I give students in these formative assessments: content based and reflection based. For my content based prompts I ask students 3 main styles: analyze, explain, or defend. My expectations for answering any of these prompts is to use complete sentences to answer the prompt fully and to use correct and accurate math vocabulary.
One of my favorite finds on TPT is from Scaffolded Math & Science. She put together 40 prompts for Algebra 2. If you teach Algebra 2, Pre-Cal, Math 3, or Math 4, you can definitely find something in this bundle. It is seriously amazing.
I feel I have developed my content prompts well, but one thing I want to improve is my reflective prompts. Jo Boaler to the rescue again. In Math-ish she listed 6 different prompts. My plan is to incorporate at least one reflection based prompt per unit and give students choice on which prompt they would like to answer.
My students frequently engage in formative assessment prompts and reflection prompts, but I also have students participate in larger writing assignments through projects. One of my favorites happens in my Math 4 statistics unit, in which students gather data about a topic that is interesting to them and write a full blown study. Students work in pairs to collect data and complete all the components of a statistical study including, the abstract, background information, data analysis, and conclusion. Before we get to this point, students analyze at least two studies to see the format and how information is presented.
Feedback
It is a universal truth that we cannot improve without feedback. When I grade the written responses I use a rubric that outlines what I am looking for: answering the prompt and using evidence to support claims. Since these formative assessments are delivered online, not only is it easy to upload the rubric into the assessment platform (I use Formative), I can provide justification for why students received the score they earned as well as offer suggestions for improvement.
In my 14 years of education, teaching writing in my math classroom and offering opportunities to have students practice writing has greatly improved. I am always on the hunt to find new, engaging activities for students to practice writing in authentic ways as well as improve my expertise in providing feedback. I hope this inspires you to examine your writing practices as well as give you ideas to implement in your classroom.
