The Faces of Math Talks
Examining perspectives of mathematical
discussions
Facilitators: Rachel Restani & Leslie Banes
Session 4: 10:00am – 11:20am Sunday January 20,
2013 Room 325
Goals
 To collaborate with other teachers about strategies to
engage students in meaningful class discussions.
 Develop understanding of how mathematical learning is
mediated through our identities, beliefs and classroom
environment.
 Encourage students, teachers and parents to accept
effort, risk-taking and making mistakes as values that
support the discussion of mathematical concepts.
 To create a contact and resource list of teachers,
parents and students who are interested in continuing
to share thoughts and ideas.
Activities
 Adaptive School norms
 Each Teach and Paired Square - Bishop and Boaler
 What is your math identity (Mathography)?
 Group reading summary and poster presentations
 Individual reflection
7 Norms of Collaboration
 With a partner, decide who will be partner A and who will be
partner B.
 Both partners silently read the first norm.
 After both partners are finished reading, partner A will
paraphrase the norm. Partner B will then give an example of a
time when the norm was used or an example of what
happened when the norm wasn’t used.
 Switch roles and repeat with the next norm.
 Continue until you’ve covered all 7 norms.
 Be prepared to share with the larger group an application of a
norm or how it might benefit collaboration.
The Norms of Collaboration
1.Pausing
2.Paraphrasing
3.Posing Questions
4.Putting Ideas on the Table
5.Providing Data
6.Paying Attention to Self and
Others
7.Presuming Positive Intentions
Each Teach and Paired
Square
Each Teach
• Form pairs
• One person in the pair will read Bishop– the other
person will read Boaler.
• After reading, each partner teaches the essential
points to the other partner using the visual organizer
(Ways of Talking).
Pair Squared
• Once you have completed the above – join up with
another pair (Pair Squared) and share what you are
learning and understanding
Ways of Talking
 What – increase our understanding of the relationship
between discourse and identity in the context of math
classrooms.
 Why – so we understand the relationship between
discourse and identity. How we say things and how we
listen are important in how we learn - about ourselves
and about mathematics.
 How – by reading about the research done by Bishop
and Boaler and by using Each Teach and Paired Square
Mathographies
 Write your mathography at the top of the paper.
 Pass to next person so that he/she can write a
reaction/response.
 Then pass again so that another person can
comment/argue.
 Here are some of the autobiographies, I only did my 3rd period Alg 1
Support class, which is a tiny class (10 students) but one of my more
difficult. Just a note on the students. One student only speaks Spanish, I'm
not sure when she came here but she's only in ELD 1. One student is hard of
hearing and refuses to wear hearing aids, one student is legally blind and
has to use a special magnifier to see the board. One of the students spent a
week in Juvenile hall right after Thanksgiving for stealing a car. There's also
2 other students who have been suspended multiple times this year for
behavior. So small class, but a very interesting study. On a side note, one
thing about the autobiographies that caught my attention is the
communication they brought. It might be because it's the middle of the year
and they already know me, but having them do this opened up many
different channels of communication. Some of the kids were much more
willing to talk about their experiences but didn't want to write them down,
so you'll see my handwriting on some of them, but I wrote what the
students said. We ended up having conversations about what a good teacher
is, what a good student is etc. And then we started talking about racism,
their experiences with authority/police, and how they felt about all of it.
Not much math was accomplished but I felt the conversations were good.
There isn't a lot of detail in the writing, because they were resistant but
talking about it was helpful. One of the common themes among them was
"the teacher didn't like me" which led into a discussion of what they did,
why they felt like that etc.
Group reading summary and
poster presentations
 Split into 3 groups:
 #1 Read Moschkovitch (1999), #2 read Martin et al.
(2012), #3 Cobb (2009)
 Discuss what the teacher did to support math talk and
relate to practices being implemented in teachers’
classrooms.
 Write framework on sentence strips
 Present to large group
Say Something
Read silently to the designated stopping point
• When each member is ready, stop and each will say
something:
The something might be a question, a key point,
an interesting idea or a personal connection
• Continue the process until you have completed the
reading
Individual reflection
 What is identity? What does it have to do with
math and how students learn?
 How can we promote risk-taking in math, among
ourselves and others?
 How can we encourage people to share their
thinking?
 How can we encourage making mistakes?
 What structures were used? What frameworks were
included? What was the role of the facilitator?
What was the role of the participants?