We can build math confidence in intermediate students, writes 5th grade teacher Kathie Palmieri. It’s a gradual process that requires patience, encouragement, a supportive environment, and effective teaching strategies that break down complex concepts and foster a growth mindset.
Setting goals across all subject areas is an important practice that helps students at every grade level excel academically and nurtures essential life skills. Incorporating mindfulness into this process strengthens student focus and resilience, writes Kathleen Palmieri.
Delving into commonly held beliefs about learning math and discussing productive struggle and growth mindset are central to Lidia Gonzalez’s Bad at Math?, a thoughtful look into what can be done to make math accessible to all students, writes math teacher Kathleen Palmieri.
To move toward equitable mathematics education, Dr. Lidia Gonzalez shows how math teachers can help students see beyond harmful beliefs by answering 3 questions: “What is mathematics?”, “What does it mean to be good at math?” and “How do we see our math development over time?”
Learning focused schools have a collective growth mindset and a shared belief that every student can learn and grow. Education leaders Ron Williamson and Barbara Blackburn share six characteristics that define such schools and offer ideas about how to accomplish each one.
Teachers are feedback machines – “we do it all day long!” – writes classroom teacher and popular blogger Larry Ferlazzo. Here he focuses on ways to give feedback that’s particularly effective at enhancing students’ sense of competence and encouraging intrinsic motivation.
Do rewards help kids learn better? Motivation expert Dr. Debbie Silver argues instead for the effective use of positive, constructive feedback as the best means for fostering creativity, active involvement and intrinsic motivation. Included: How to make feedback effective.
School leader DeAnna Miller remembers the geometry class of her teens as an unwelcoming place with low expectations for most students. She agrees with Stanford’s Jo Boaler that math can be a more vital and engaging subject when teachers help students adopt growth mindsets.
The new edition of Debbie Silver’s Fall Down 7 Times, Get Up 8 is an essential handbook for adults who want to help kids become committed, continuous learners. NBCT Kathie Palmieri finds the book’s attention to self-motivation, ZPD and growth mindset particularly helpful. Highly recommended.
Using Historical Hypotheses, teachers never tell students what to think but instead “how to better think for themselves.” When students evaluate their own initial hypothesis and closely consider multiple viewpoints, they begin to develop a growth mindset, writes Jennifer Ingold.
