Wall of Math Knowledge: Letting Students Take Responsibility of Their Math Learning

Every year it is documented that the gap in math learning is widening (National Center for Education Statistics, 2021). Students and teachers too often state they do not like math or that they are bad at it. During parent-teacher conferences, parents put the blame on themselves passing on the “bad math gene” to their children by saying, “I was bad at math, so I see why my child is bad at it, too.” Sometimes, students just don’t understand what they are learning and how it builds off itself and this causes an issue with teachers needing students to put in effort to learn the material.

However, math is not a genetic attribute passed on from generation to generation. Science has not found a “math gene” that makes students struggle with math. How then can teachers teach this material to students while helping them be a part of their own learning? For starters, students need to understand what they are learning and make sense of it. 

Students as Partners in Their Math Learning

Through my dissertation research, I found that to ensure students are involved in their own learning as collaborative partners with their teachers, they must be able to understand what they are learning, why they are learning, and how it fits into the grand scheme of things. I created the Wall of Math Knowledge as a visual to help students see how math works and what their jobs are for the school year. There are other similar visuals that describe the mathematics data in collegian terms, yet it is difficult for students, and even some parents, to understand what it means. 

This Wall of Math Knowledge allows students to understand the foundational needs of math and how the lessons fit into the entirety of their math learning. My explanation to them is this, when constructing a brick wall, each brick is crucial to the overall learning of math. When a brick is missing, the foundation of the wall is unstable. The more bricks that are missing, the less stable the wall is. By starting from the foundational level of math learning, students can take responsibility of their own learning by ensuring they have mastered each area, or brick, prior to moving along.

Struggling Students 

Students struggling to fill a brick would be able to be identified rapidly using this visual and provided necessary support to do so. In consideration of students with learning disabilities, this could also be a great tool to help special education teachers with Individualized Educational Plans (IEPs) to support student math growth. Special Education Teachers could use this graphic to plan IEP math goals to fill in the missing bricks and help their students bridge the math gap. Some students will struggle with foundational math which could cause them to fall behind their same aged peers. However, accommodations such as calculators and/or multiplication tables could fill in the area the student is struggling with, or the missing brick, to allow the student to move on to multi-step equations or more complex math problems. Remember, just because a student is struggling with multi-digit multiplication or long division does not mean they are unable to perform higher level math problems like linear equations and functions. The Wall of Math Knowledge is a fun and inclusive way for all to work together to bridge the math gap.

Teaching students to take part and visualize their wall of math knowledge is part of the involvement of students in their own learning. In the beginning of the school year, every student can receive a white sheet of paper with the wall printed on it. The students can be assessed by the teachers to see what math skills they have mastered and as they master the skill, they color in the brick. This now delineates the next skill students need to work on while allowing the teachers to create small groups, as needed, or focus on specific skills most students may need help with. This is also a great way for teachers to see what tools or accommodations struggling students may need to support them in filling in a brick. Students can write these accommodations in this brick so they know they can use these tools to solve math problems. This format worked well with my students but there are many ways this visual can create a partnership in learning and bridging the math gap for all.

References

National Center for Education Statistics. (2021, February 10). NCES blog | New international data show large and widening gaps between high- and Low-Performing U.S. 4th- and 8th-Graders in mathematics and science. NCES.

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Ruth Reynoso is a high school Autism math and science teacher in Las Vegas, NV and recently successfully defended her dissertation as a student in Concordia's Ed. D. Leadership program.