Woodland Park Elementary 23-24

Our focus at Woodland Park is to foster number sense in our learners. Over time, we have noticed that students aren't always able to connect their understanding of what numbers mean to what numbers represent. Some of our intermediate staff focused on "number sense" with all of the students in their classroom this year. This became our school-wide inquiry project.

Their inquiry question was:

Can student number sense be improved with daily numeracy routines?

• Are students building crucial mathematical thinking habits?
• Can daily routines reach all learners?

Daily Numeracy Routines:

How do daily routines increase number sense and improve student ability to communicate their thinking?

Daily numeracy routines allow students to have a sense of predictability and comfort in their classroom. Students learn what to expect for each numeracy task so they are able to focus on the learning as opposed to the steps of the routine. 

Routines help with:

• organization 
• classroom management 
• smooth transitions
• creating a community of learners 
• students taking responsibility for their own learning 

In our classrooms, this looked like:

1) Mystery numbers: using clues related to concepts such as: place value, factors, multiples, odd/even to predict and identify the mystery number 

2) Today's number is: using a particular number, students work through tasks such as writing the number in expanded form, deciding if it is odd or even, finding factors and multiples of the number, and writing word problems based on the number 

3) Estimation mysteries: an image is presented and students are invited to estimate how many objects are in the picture. Clues appear that will allow the students to use math concepts to narrow the set of possibilities until they reach a final estimate  

4) Patterning tasks:  students look at visual growing patterns and discuss, describe and extend the pattern

5) Which one doesn't belong:  four options are provided and students are invited to rationalize which of the four options doesn't belong using mathematical thinking and vocabulary                                                                                                                                                                                               

Teachers followed students at varying levels in numeracy so we could document the growth of student learning over time. Learning was recorded through observations during individual and group work, conferencing, and student reflections. Students at Woodland Park focused on critical thinking, talking about numbers, and using mathematical vocabulary.

At the beginning of the year,  our students were initially reluctant to talk about their mathematical thinking: 

"my brain hurts"

"this is too hard"

"no one has ever asked me to think like this before."

Over time, by the end of the year, our intermediate students have become more comfortable and confident discussing numbers with their peers. Students are becoming more and more excited to share their thinking and learning in numeracy. When posed with challenging tasks, they are more enthusiastic to try and are starting to develop a growth mindset.

"solving these number mysteries is fun "

"I now know why we learn divisibility rules"

"hearing how other people solve math problems is interesting when it is a different way than my own"

We interviewed three teachers about their experience explicitly teaching "number sense" this year. We asked them to reflect on their teaching and student learning by answering our original inquiry questions:

Can student number sense be improved with daily numeracy routines?

Inquiry Question #1: 

Are students building crucial mathematical thinking habits?

"I saw improvements from doing things like esti-mysteries where in the beginning of doing routines, estimates weren’t reasonable. By the end of the year, they were so strong at it and were making reasonable estimates." - Teacher #1

"Which one doesn’t belong. At first, they were just looking at the numbers. By the end they were adding digits together, ones and tens, odd and even, patterns and multiples. Two answers in the beginning to twenty answers in the end. Flexibility in the way they saw numbers improved dramatically. There was complexity in their answers. Deeper thinking and deeper understanding of numbers." - Teacher #2

"I think their overall ability to use mathematical language when they are discussing any of the daily tasks has improved dramatically throughout the year." - Teacher #3

Inquiry Question #2:

Can daily routines reach all learners?

"Absolutely. For me the tasks at the boards are already inclusive of all learners. The reasoning being is that the tasks are leveled with basic understanding so everyone can engage and slowly increases in complexity from that. A student who may have been struggling will be able to get where they need to go. The students who can engage further -- they go as far as they can. In terms of building blocks of numeracy, student endurance  improved. They didn’t want to stop. They begged me to keep going with a hard task to deepen their understanding." - Teacher #1

"Yes they can. I thought it was nice because I found that my students who were extending their thinking were challenged to explain their answers deeply, but in a way that other students could understand what they were seeing. From there, the others in the class began to see numbers more flexibly from the extending students. My beginning level students were able to focus on where they were at, focusing on odd numbers, even numbers, and which numbers were smallest or largest. There was always an entry point for everyone." - Teacher #2

"Yes. All students of all ability levels always had an access point. Although some were reluctant to participate at first, over time they became more comfortable with sharing their ideas. By mid-year, some students that minimally participated in the beginning were able to share reasons for their thinking, such as “that number won’t work as it is not a multiple of 5.” The increase in their confidence was amazing to see!" - Teacher #3

Based on the student growth we witnessed this year, our staff would like to continue diving deeper into exploring number sense with an increasing number of students. We believe that building a strong number sense in the elementary years is crucial for success in secondary school. 

For the 2024/2025 school year, we will be focusing on number sense at our admin planning day on September 23, 2024. We will be showcasing student learning and growth from this year, and making plans to expand our reach to include a larger cross-section of students next year. We will continue to host lunch & learn sessions with Chris Hunter, one of our district numeracy helping teachers. We will also continue to align our learning resources to focus on numeracy.