What do you NOTICE? What do you WONDER?
Courtney LaRoche
Wayzata Public Schools; MCTM VP Middle School
Our brains are wired to notice and wonder. What we notice and wonder about comes from our experiences and perspective.
Our students notice and wonder about mathematics constantly! But do they realize it? Do we realize it as teachers? Try asking them two powerful questions:
- What do you NOTICE?
- What do you WONDER?
How do your students respond? How is their thinking revealed?
Check out how Annie Fetter from The Math Forum uses a Scenario problem to reveal student thinking by asking them to NOTICE and WONDER.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFvYZDR4OeY
After watching this clip, I was reminded of the on-going battle many math teachers have when we ask students to show their work.
What happens when you ask students to “Show your work”? Do you ever get these responses?
“I used my brain”
“I just knew how to do it”
“I used my calculator”
What if students:
- Pause to notice and wonder
- Share what they notice and wonder
- Compare what they notice and wonder to others.
How does their thinking become visible? Does the battle around “show your work” disappear?
The video clip was great – gave me lot of ideas. How simple noticing and wondering would be at any grade level! I’m trying it in Kindergarten next week – I did the noticing part this week but didn’t take it to the wondering level. Thanks for sharing this.
And I thought I was the sensible one. Thanks for setting me stitaghr.