Miss M's Learning Space

As part of the Affiliate Federation Day (sponsored by OECTA) I had the privilege of attending the ' ICanyet Student Driven Student Portfolios ' workshop. The idea behind the workshop was to learn about the power of having a growth mindset in all subject areas and creating a student portfolio in order to monitor progress. The workshop was packed full of information and resources from Dan Montanaro (@mrm1mr), so I've selected my top 3 take-aways to share here. Student Driven Portfolios in Student-Led Conferences I've heard about student-led conferences before, but only briefly and not in great detail. The idea is that students take ownership of their work and behaviours in order to share with their parents in place of traditional parent-teacher interviews. Dan's method was having students save all of their work through the term in a portfolio and then curate the key pieces they think shows their growth as a student to share in a presentation to their parents. ...

One of my biggest pet-peeves is when teachers test the speed student's can complete a math problem. Being fast at math has nothing to do with how well someone knows math. For example, I consider myself fairly competent at math and I enjoy solving math problems. However, I don't have my times tables memorized and it takes me time to solve questions. I find that whenever I'm tested on speed and compared to my peers I get really stressed and completely shut down. This is a great concept to both encourage students to realize as well as practice (i.e. don't have timed activities and/or tests). Another great point that was raised this week was a discussion around making mistakes. According to research, when students make mistakes in math more synapsis in the brain fire and allow the brain to grow. Below is a video that summarizes this concept.

I'm sure we've all heard about growth mindsets before by now. Generally, a growth mindset is one where you embrace challenge and believe you can accomplis anything you set your mind to. A fixed mindset, on the other hand, is one where you believe your mind is 'fixed' and you can't learn something you don't know naturally. It's summarized in the following graphic. Retrieved from: http://big-change.org/growth-mindset/  In math, especially, they're important. As discussed briefly last week, there is not a great attitude towards math in our schools. Part of addressing that, is breaking the idea that only some people are good at math and those who aren't never will be. We need to praise students for effort and encourage them to continuously seek challenges and opportunities for growth. The following video discusses this idea as it relates to math. This idea of not praising students for being 'smart' is new to me, but I can immediatel...

The title of this video is a little harsh, but the message is worth listening to.