Ep. 7 Building Thinking Classrooms in Results Kindergarten- One Year Later

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Hello and welcome to Making Number Sense Makes Sense, a podcast for elementary teachers,

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specifically early elementary teachers, looking to really make an impact in the number sense

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of their students. If you are just following along or here for the first time, this video

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is all about my results from doing building thinking classrooms for an entire year with

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my kindergarten classroom. Now when I first started, I was a little bit skeptical because

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when you teach young kids and things are marked K to 12, you have to consider like is this really

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something that'll work for kindergarten and 12th grade students? And I'm here to tell you that it

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absolutely does. Seeing my kids grow this year as mathematicians and problem solvers has been

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incredible. It really, really has transformational, I would say. So what are some of my results? So

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let's hop right into it. What are some things that I saw these kids doing? My students became such

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great problem solvers. Like I'm so, so, so impressed. And I'm going to tell you a little bit about

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what's going on. If your school is anything like mine, they're all about data and such. And then

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the state that I'm in, we have to give the students a math assessment in the beginning of the year

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and at the end of the year. And we've given this assessment for a couple years now. And there are

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some questions on it that are technically like first grade questions are not for kindergarten. So

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I never really worried too much if the students could do it or not. Like I might have showed them

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similar questions. But if they weren't ready for it, they just weren't ready for it. And I wasn't

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too bothered if they understood them or not. And I just kind of let it go. And that was always kind

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of a tricky question, especially because it's really wordy. And it's not something the kids are

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used to doing. They're used to doing more straightforward questions. And let me tell you,

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the majority of my students were able to solve those questions, like no problem. No problem. Even

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my students who had a harder time learning their numbers, remembering what numbers look like and

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even counting one to one correspondence, they were still able to figure out how to solve this

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problem. And I was blown away. Another kind of example of my results was in 2020, I had created

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like a Jeopardy game and an escape room style game called the number of thief. And basically,

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all of them have some kind of question that the kids have to answer in pairs or individually,

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or in a group to see how they would do it. And if they could win a Jeopardy or find all of the

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numbers. And usually when I do these games, like, it's right, it was just about at the right level,

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like most kids like I wouldn't say, I don't know, 50, 60% of the kids could definitely understand it.

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For some of them was a stretch and for some of them, it was a little bit too difficult. When I

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tell you that these kids just breeze through these questions, they breeze through the questions. And

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I was like, maybe I needed to make them a little bit more challenging. And my group of students that

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I have this year, I would say, we're pretty, pretty typical in their number since coming in, you

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know, we have some students who had a lot of background knowledge, some students that didn't

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have a ton of background knowledge and had a lot of room for growth, but they weren't necessarily

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like starting at a really, really, really high place or really, really low place, who were just

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kind of typical for what I would see at the beginning of your kindergarten. And just the amount

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of growth and problem solving and logical thinking that I saw with these kids was really,

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really incredible. Something else I have been struggling with for a while is to really get my

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kids to solve problems, to stop and think about what is going on and try and solve the problems.

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And this year, more than any other year doing building thinking classrooms, I just saw no

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hesitation. I would present the problem in five minutes or less, usually with some kind of a story.

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They were excited to get their partner cards and just got right to it. And let me tell you,

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when they did, when I tell you they didn't ask me questions, they didn't ask me questions,

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even starting from the very, very first, like, it could be because they didn't have the background

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knowledge to know that, oh, if I ask the teacher a question, then they'll give me the answer. They

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hardly ever asked me questions, which was really, really amazing to see. Like, they weren't dependent

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on me for solving the problem. They knew that I wouldn't. They knew that I wasn't just going to give

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them the answer. But their first go to was to ask their partner or look around and get ideas from

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another group or just go over and ask another group, what are you doing? How are you solving it?

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And it was led to really rich discussions for the kindergarten level in math and problem solving.

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Something else that I wasn't expecting was how far above the curriculum and the standards these

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kids could work when they were in this problem solving mode. For example, one of my questions was,

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you know, it was around Easter. You know, if you celebrate Easter, but even if you don't celebrate

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Easter, you see the peeps everywhere and there's 10 peeps in the package. So I showed a picture of it

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and I said, if I want to share, you know, these peeps equally with my teaching assistant, how many

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would each of us get? And fair share is something that a lot of kids understand. They're like, oh,

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five easy, show their work and everything. So then I was like, okay, what if you want to share with

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three people? Or what if you want to share with four people with the slicing? And they got right

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to it. They're like, okay, I have to do this and have to do this. And then you figure out this way.

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And keep in mind, I hadn't really talked about fair share at all. This was before we even started

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our fractions unit. And where I am in Virginia, the standard is that they need to share equally with

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two or four equal shares. They had already gotten to three. When we went to the check your understanding,

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it was challenging. It was higher numbers could be that they have to cut something in half. And

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again, they took right to it, we're able to solve that problem and persisted through if they were

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struggling, which not a lot of them even were. And I was just like, wow, without any direct

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instruction, they were thinking through what they might do or what they had seen pulling their own

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background knowledge and applying it to the problem. And they applied it to most problems in any

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context that I gave it to, which was really cool, really cool to see. Now those are my results. And

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just kind of reflecting back and thinking back, I'm going to tell you about some things that I

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noticed that are just curious. That's interesting curiosities. And I don't know if anybody else

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has experienced this, or can relate to but something maybe to keep an eye out for the kids

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loved working in partners in any capacity. If we were doing something that was completely

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unrelated to BTC, they still wanted to work in partners that was kind of their choice to

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gravitate towards each other. And I realized that for standard and testing and that kind of

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thing, they're not going to be able to work in partners. But overall globally in life, they're

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going to have to work with other people. So the fact that they liked it so much, I feel like is a

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life skill that will serve them for the long haul. And they also really loved working on the

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whiteboards. I think if you have read the book, which I will link to below, if you've read the

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book, they talk about how maybe it's because it's easily erased, or something like that, the kids

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are less afraid to try new things and make a mistake. And I would definitely say that I saw

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the same. But whenever I gave the kids their check their understanding questions, they hardly ever

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chose to work on the board. And even if they did go over to where they were working before, they

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weren't actually using the board, they're just using like a flat surface by their board. And I

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don't really know. I don't know why that was. But just something interesting that I noticed.

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Another I'm noticing is students who would come in, that would be traditionally like higher students

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in the sense that they had a lot of background knowledge about numbers and number sense already.

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When they were paired up together, they weren't necessarily the strongest partnerships. They

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usually tried to make things more complicated than they needed to be that ended up slowing them down

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or giving them a little bit of trouble when they tried to solve a problem. And I'm not really sure

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why that is either. Usually the most successful partnerships I saw were ones that had like

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various abilities, like maybe somebody had a really good idea of how to solve the problem.

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But what was limiting them was how high they could count, or they didn't know how to write

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the number that they needed, whereas their partner might not have been as gung-ho in

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trying to throwing themselves in and solving the problem, but they could know the numbers or they

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knew how to write the number. So then together, they were able to solve the problem and record

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their answers. And those partnerships were chef's kiss. Amazing. This might just be unique to me,

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but one of my non-permanent surfaces was technically not vertical because he had a U-table that had

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dry rays on top of it and I didn't have enough vertical spaces. So the kids would be working,

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I had two groups working at the U-table and everybody else was at a vertical non-permanent

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surface. And I didn't really think about it too much, but that U-table was also used for, you know,

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mouth centers when we were doing other things. So it had chairs around it. And I didn't think

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anything of it. I was like, they have a whiteboard, they're working on it. And no matter which group

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was at that U-table, if they were sitting down, they were not as persistent, they

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were not as into trying the problem. And they were more likely to just kind of relax and chat

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versus trying the problem. So once I made sure to remove the chairs whenever we were doing a math

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task, it changed. And I thought that was so bizarre because it didn't matter who was over there.

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Like, motivated students, students who were not always as self-motivated, it didn't matter. They

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reverted to, I'm just going to sit here and relax instead of let's try to get to work. So if I were

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to do it again, I would make sure to always remove the chairs from that space when we were doing a

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math task. And that just leads me into kind of my next section where things that I would consider

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or try and tweak starting over for another year with a new group of students, I would spend more

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time developing their skill, their discussion skills about problem solving. Now, that's not to say

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it wasn't successful. It absolutely was. But I think that if more kids had the language to really

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discuss what was going on, some students who would participate less would be more comfortable kind of

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throwing in their ideas into the mix of problem solving. And some students would thought, well,

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oh, they're not saying anything. They don't know how to solve the problem. But that was rarely the

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case. Usually they might have just been shy or not sure how to express their ideas. But once given

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the opportunity, they absolutely could solve the problem, maybe even in a more efficient way than

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the partner who was doing most of the talking. So I would spend more time developing those

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conversational skills that would help them with their problem solving. I would also spend more

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time consolidating their learning and really kind of having them be more reflective on what was going

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on. By the time we finished our task and did our check your understanding, they were usually kind

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of done at that point. So I kind of moved on. But I would definitely make that more of a priority,

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really talking about the learning that we were doing for the next steps or for whatever we were

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doing next. And going along with check your understanding, I would really try and emphasize

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that the point of check your understanding is, as it says, it's for you to see if you understood

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what was going on during our problem solving session instead of just kind of some other thing else that the teacher wants me to do that I have to do. I would really make sure that they understood that that was for them and not for me. And finally, I would try to find a better balance between

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building, building, being classroom tasks and just general math things because I was so focused on it. I noticed that some kids, and this might just be a kindergarten issue because we're just learning our numbers some students, not all by any means but there was a group of students who really could have used more practice with like number identification and number writing like number formation like those kind of things. I feel like because it was focused on this I didn't spend as much time on that and some of those kids would have been more focused on that.

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Because it was focused on this I didn't spend as much time on that and some of those kids would have really benefited from more practice. So that's something else I really want to try and focus on for next time. If I haven't convinced you yet that this is definitely something you should try even with young young students. I want to invite you to try an example. So in the link in the description I have a freebie that I would love for you to give a try.

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So in this freebie there are Google slides like a few Google slides to go with the story of the task, task directions of building thinking classrooms term cheat sheet, the color partner cars that I used check your understandings in the mild, medium and spicy version and ideas for thin slicing for this task.

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So like I said grab that in the link in the description I would love for you to try and let me know how it goes. You can do that on Instagram you can send me an email I'd love to hear about it obviously it's something I'm passionate about love talking about it.

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And if you do I would love for you to share with a colleague and I'm going to sneak in a little bit of my experience sharing with one of my colleagues and how she really enjoyed it too.

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So about three quarters of the way through the year. I was like, man, you know, these kids are working so hard they're doing so well. I would hate for them to go to first grade and just have it all fall to the wayside.

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The main reason that I wanted to try this is because I wanted the kids to be good problem solvers in any context, not just rely on an algorithm as they get older to solve problem but really think about the problems that they're doing and be able to solve them in a way that makes sense to them.

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So I was like I've been working on it so hard I would hate for it to go unused I guess. So I talked to my colleague in first grade who would have a lot of my students next year.

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And I was like, is this something I showed her some pictures of some of the work that the kids are producing. I was like, is this something that you think you might be willing to try and she was like, yes.

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So I loaned her the book and she started with my students from last year. And last year students I feel like would have been great for it because they were just so chill.

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They were definitely a unicorn class like I didn't really have any behavior problems. They got along with each other. They were super kind to each other like that group would have done amazing in this context I feel and would have really thrived.

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So we got a lot of chance to discuss like what I was doing what she might be doing and since I had the benefit of knowing all of her students I was like, oh they might really do this well they might really do this well.

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And one student that I was concerned about academically who just was really struggling to find connections with math.

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He and the partner got paired together and she was telling me how those kids worked on it for a long time. They felt confident in their ability to solve problems and tried it and actually figured it out.

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And you know if you work with struggling I mean every I don't know a teacher who doesn't work with struggling students how hard it is to get them to engage and to try sometimes if they already feel like they don't know the answer.

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So hearing her tell me that just gave me chills. It's like oh my gosh like I wish I would have done it with my kids last year.

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So they would have been able to do it to and have that experience and it might have set them on a different trajectory for the next year but with her doing it with her kids and following up I'm really confident that these kids are going to continue to grow in their strength as problem solving.

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And I hope that your students do too if you choose to try building thinking classrooms.

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In the freebie I mentioned I have a link I have a page with some helpful links to other blogs I've written other videos I've done as well as a Facebook group specifically for K to 2 there's one for K to 2 3 to 5 middle school high school.

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General but the one that I'm going to link to specifically for K to 2 and they have some just amazing amazing teachers in that group who share their ideas share problems that they've done tasks that they've done.

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So that's something that you should definitely check out. Like I said before I would love to talk about it with you more DM me on Instagram send me an email and let me know how it goes and let me know if you have any questions.

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I will see you next time.