Maths isn't hard, it's a language!

I have heard students who think that Maths is hard. These students are either students who speak English as their second language (ESOL), or students who are not in favour of reading. 

I hope that this video would help teachers to encourage their learners not to think like that. Maths language sometimes is the one that discourages learners from believing that they can do Maths. ESOL learners are more likely to be the ones fall into this category so what can we, as teachers do? 

I listened to this video and have shared some ideas with teachers at my school. Maths Wall, using of TALK MOVES, Number Talk, Picture Books and using of Problem Solving Approach are practices we use currently to tackle this problem.


Do you have children who think like this?

What about you? 

What about your school? 

What are you doing? 

Talk Moves & ESOL students

Talk Moves is a tool that we use at our school to help increase student talk academically. It is a tool that I really like to use with ESOL students especially. Like I have mentioned before in my other posts, learning Maths language for ESOL students is learning ANOTHER language. It is a foreign language and us, teachers must use a tool that enables our learners (ESOL students) to talk more, think deeper, and explain their thinking with confident.

What is TALK MOVES

How to use Talk Moves and why?

Talk Moves is the only tool that I use in Maths because it goes along well with Problem Solving Approach in Maths. I have realised so many good reasons why using Talk Moves. One of them and I think it is important is learning from each other. Students are building their confidence when making mistakes. They learn to work collaboratively with a friend as part of this process.

At the end of this year, I believe my learners will:

- increase the ability to talk in Maths

- improve deeper thinking due to using of revoice, friendly disagree or agree and add-on.

- increase using of Maths language correctly

- work collaboratively with a friend and share ideas

Number Talk

Why NUMBER TALK

Jo Boaler talks about reasons for using Number Talk. Number Talks can be used at home by parents, too. It can be done in so many different ways for different reasons depending on what teachers need to achieve at the end.

At our schoool we did talk about this for a while and some classes have been doing it for a while. In my class, I spend 10 minutes everyday as part of my warm up doing Number Talk. Here are some of what my learners are doing as part of it. 

 Christian is explaing to the class what number seven looks like.

 Peiten is saying that the number after two is three. He is talking using his own experience and sometimes using others ideas to help him talk about our focused number. 

Everyone Can Learn Maths To The Highest Level.

This article have encouraged me to believe that every child in my class can learn Maths  to the highest level. It made me worked hard to see whether it is going to happen or not. The children are very young to understand the importance of Maths in their lives but it is my job to make them feel that they can be successful in Maths. I worked harder than ever, read lots of research looking for teaching approaches that may help students in my class. 

Term 1 - Focusing Inquiry