All students make growth in Numeracy -number.

To progress our teaching in Mathematics that will ultimately support learners to progress, this week we engaged in a three hour twilight meeting with a Mathematics focus.

Our visitin

g expert Russell McCartney led the first hour with the teachers engaging in the MAKE, SAY, WRITE and DO model. The new resource - bead strings – were the manipulatives of the lesson.

To begin we were given the challenge of ‘First to 60.’ We used the five pattern bead strings. The rules of the game were to add in increments of five or ten only, taking turns to each decide what each would add.  We were then challenged to work out if there were ‘trap’ numbers, numbers that trapped your opponent, resulting in a win for yourself.  

What was the point of the exercise? One learning experience can provide access and continued learning for all students. What does this mean you might see in a classroom? You may see the same resource and game being used over a period of a week. With one learning experience the students have mastered the rules and understandings of the game and the mathematical learning occurs. You may have experienced a new card game and the first time you play is about learning the game and rules, after that the thinking and strategy can occur. The learning experiences we provide at St Patrick’s are of a similar thinking. A lot of mathematical thinking and processing can occur when the mechanics of the process are taken care of.

Learning continued with opportunities to engage in the work of mathematicians as we ask our students to do each day. Followed by the continued process of refining our mathematics policy for St Pat’s known as the Agreed Practice in Mathematics.

I encourage you to make bead strings with your child at home. You can use a long shoelace and coloured beads. Simply thread five of one colour and five of another coloured beads on the shoe lace, continue until you have a total of 80. We will be using this resource across the school in the coming weeks and your child will be able to ‘play’ some maths games at home and show you their growing mathematical thinking at the same time.