As I entered the classroom ten years ago I was eager to meet my students and looking forward to the challenges I had ahead of me. I was going to be teaching CPM geometry, which I had never been trained in, and High School Math, a course for juniors and seniors that had not passed the CAHSEE; a course with no curriculum, just a list of standards that needed to be covered. I had a blurry vision of what I wanted my classroom to look like. I wanted to the students to be engaged in the content and each working on things that made sense for where there were with their math skills and their life interests. I wanted to build relationships with students and pass on my love of learning math. I had the basics of my vision with no idea or support on how to get there. As the first few years went by I continued to reflect and adjust my practice; however, I was still not getting my classroom much closer to my vision. After my fourth year of teaching our district decided to partner with LMU and change the way we taught math. I saw this as my opportunity to push my practice to the next level. I became a part of a program that had a continuous cycle of learning, support, data analysis, and collaboration. As I was reading the ACOT, it reminded me a lot of the program that I participated in. Myself along with one other math teacher at my site would engage in a very targeted professional development each month, this was followed by an observation by our mentor from LMU who would script the lesson and record active engagement numbers. Following the observation we would debrief/plan and then in a PLC we would analyze student data. I engaged in this process for four years. After the first two year I started taking courses at LMU and became a math teacher leader for my site, where I supported teachers at my site in this same process and eventually did a lot of district work. Being involved in this transformed the way I taught. Although I did not have access to much in the way of technology, my classroom became more collaborative, student centered, differentiated and reflective. I captured my work in my classroom, supporting teachers at my site and work at the district in this poster. Being part of this program and reading about the changes that teachers reported after taking part in the ACOT, I connected this to the book "The Flat World and Education" where Darling-Hammond sites so much data on the influence of teacher quality on student achievement. It seems very clear that as teachers go into teaching very few of them are truly prepared for the job, if they do not get very specific support or seak professional growth of some sort, they will not be as effective in supporting students reach the desired outcomes. Starting two years ago I embarked on a new challenge in my teaching career. I moved back home to Napa, where I got a job as an Academic Specialist at New Technology High School, a project based school. I was not very familiar with PBL and although I had supported math teachers, I was now in a position to support teachers in all content areas. This is a school where access to technology and the way of teaching is very different. I think the fact that students and teachers have access to technology at a different level has helped me move into the adaptation and appropriation stages. I am excited to continue learning and pushing myself to get to the innovation stage. I am still working on having a balance between context and content and what that looks like. I feel that it is important that we teach the content in a way that supports students in becoming critical thinkers, collaborators, communicators and allows them to be creative. With this I want students to be able to look at a problem that they have never seen before and use the 4 C's and prior knowledge to come up with a solution. I still struggle with shifting mindsets away from the procedures of math to the creativity with math; I would love to find more technology and strategies that would support this shift of mindset. Overall, I am excited to be a part of an innovative step that is going to take place at New Tech High. I plan to continue pushing myself both in the classroom with students and in my collaborations with colleagues. Case Study #2
2 Comments
Samuel Urena
3/5/2018 05:28:58 pm
As a Math teacher I can relate to a lot of what you say in terms of what you would like to have your students do in the classroom. One thing that caught my attention was how you want to move away from traditional way of doing Math to a way where you can present them with a problem and they will have to use prior knowledge and the 4C’s. I feel that as a new teacher I am trying to do the same because I was taught with a traditional teaching style in high school but with the kind of jobs a lot of students are going to have, they will have to use the 4C’s to do daily tasks. I am currently doing tasks in the classroom that have students collaborate, do critical thinking, be creative with their thinking and communicate verbally or on paper. But I am missing the technological piece. So that brings me to your questions is what tech tools are out there that we can implement into our classroom while making sure that we are hitting the 4C’s with our students as they work in our classroom? This is something that I am very excited to work on as our semester together plays on. But I am very excited to learn more about your journey with your DQ.
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Paula Sotiras Ayala
3/5/2018 09:26:48 pm
I agree with you that many teachers go into teaching and are not truly prepared for the job. Education is constantly evolving with technology being upgraded all the time. Once a teacher feels they have teaching under control, something new comes up and its time to innovate. I can't wait to see what types of technology you will bring into your classroom that involves the 4 c's.
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Kendra ParsonsAs a high school math teacher, I am passionate about bringing a joy of learning and of math to my students. Archives
April 2018
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