The Importance of beginning with a Number Talk.

Number Talks over the last few years have become very dear to me, for a few reasons. First of all this allows all of my students to try and participate. Even if they are unsure about their answer. They quickly learn there are many right answers to every question. This also opens up to our conversations about how mistakes are good because that is how we learn and grow. Working into the Social Emotional side of feeling good about learning math. Secondly, it allows my students time to think. To me, that makes this activity precious minutes well spent. During the day it is hard to find large blocks of time when someone doesn’t shout out the answer. This interruption of course takes away from that really good thinking time. The silence during this process is priceless as it allows uninterrupted learning time.

Why are they so quiet during a Number Talk?

I do practice silent signals during our Number Talks and my rules are simple. We raise our thumb when we have an answer. If we get our answer really fast we have to try and think of another way to answer. We then hold up a separate finger for each additional answer that we come up with. For each different answer we have to be able to explain our thinking to the class, (if called upon). If we agree with an answer another child has given, the symbol is, me too. This looks like thumb and pinky in the air, middle three fingers are down. Respectfully disagree is two hands wiping our shirts at the top simultaneously. The signals were not created by me but shown to me long ago by a colleague. They allow me quick feedback with continuous flow to our lesson. Sorry I’m not sure of the original source. The main rule is don’t speak until called upon so that we don’t interrupt others thinking time. This requires some practice but once they get it, it truly is a thing of beauty. I write down their names beside their answers on the board and then document each time with a quick photo. This really helps to individualize my report card comments and makes them feel really special.

For the Artist in all of us, I follow the Number talk with a song.

I try to throw in at least two counting songs each week to foster numeracy skills. I strongly believe in the importance of play. This particular quote has stuck with me as valuable throughout the years. “In fact, according to research by Dr. Karyn Purvis, scientists have discovered that it takes approximately 400 repetitions to create a new synapse in the brain, unless it is done in play, in which case it only takes 10 to 20 repetitions.” With this knowledge I draw upon the arts as integration through each subject block. Some of my favourites from YouTube are: Scratch Garden, Singing Walrus, Jack Hartmann and Numberock. They have a variety of really good and FUN math songs that will fit perfectly into your curriculum expectations. Allowing the children consistency of routine through both music and dance.

Moving on to the big kid tasks. Worksheet time.

I don’t love worksheets nor do I think they need to be done each day but I have learned that students love doing them. If they are short and set up for their success. It also really helps with the transition from Grade One to Grade Two. Tara West from Little Minds at Work has an amazing series of quick, achievable worksheets that I love to draw from. Her firstie math and intervention programs have made the perfect worksheet easy. The kids love it because they are not overly complex and when they are finished they get to date stamp and glue them into their math journals. Who feels like a big kid? This class. At the beginning of the year I usually have them complete one each day. It gets them into a nice routine and then as we progress I often intermittently switch out the math sheet for math games so they are getting a good combination of both activities throughout the week.

Last but not least – Early Finishers earn Centres.

Everyone earns at least of few minutes of daily centres. I try to keep my pacing as such that even my struggling students get five to seven minutes a day. They stay happy and motivated and understand that they have to become focused and on task to get the play time they all are wanting. My highest achieving students may finish very quickly and the result is the same. Highly motivated kids because the best reward is centre time. I have a series of Stem Bins that I have created for individual use available. They use these with or without task cards that I keep available for challenges and extensions for my highest learners. Math manipulative’s are just out on the shelves in buckets for open ended learning skills development. I have a sensory table with measurement tools out daily and I also allow access to our classroom grocery store. I try to limit screen time but they do have the opportunity to practice coding in small groups. Using apps such as: coding with Scratch Jr or Codepilliar or everyone’s favourite Prodigy math.

Why this works for consistency and routine…

Number talks can really hit on any curriculum expectation that you want to cover. Our board purchased Mathup last year and the beautiful graphics are worth asking your admin to purchase. If not any question posed to the class to make the kids think about your curriculum expectation of choice, works. Just rephrase the answer you want them to have posed as a question. Your songs can change to strategically fit the curriculum expectations. You can also slide into your overall numeracy goals this way, we love our counting songs. The worksheets can change as well of course and your centre’s can incorporate it all.

When the pandemic hit and we had to have math marks and comments from March in June… It really got me thinking about the scope and sequence we used. It didn’t work well cyclically. I only had comments for patterning and numeracy because that was as far as we had gone before the shut down’s. I wanted to do better, so I started to cycle my expectations more regularly. We began working though a week at a time rather then a month long unit and doing it on repeat. What I found was kids were retaining more and also the engagement was at an all time high. I truly recommend this approach. If you haven’t tried it yet give it a go and let me know.

With Love, C.