Antoinette Fahie

Positive Impact on Student Learning Connected Lessons

A performance task titled Up , Up, and Away was my pre assessment for the
connected lesson on factors and divisibility. The class average for that assessment
was a 34%, so I knew I had my work cut out for me.
Factors and Divisibility was the content of my two day connected lesson. Day 1 my
objectives for the students were to
* Be able to discuss and justify their thinking with their peers using precise
mathematical vocabulary such as factors, multiples, divisibility.
* Be able to use patterns of divisibility to determine whether a number is a factor of
another number.
* Demonstrate their strategy using models to determine divisibility in solving word
problems
At the start of the lesson, students will draw a grid with 5 rows and 6 boxes in each
row. They will be given 5 minutes to construct math equations such as 5x6=30,
30/5=6,etc. This evidence will confirm the students mastery of factors and
multiples and division. Students evidence of learning on Day 1 will be an entry in
their math notebooks.
The prompt will be Prove how you know 18 is divisible by 6. Draw a model and
explain your thinking. This was their ticket out the door, which was my evidence
of learning for that day. That evidence was graded, and the class average was 55%,
an improvement of 21%. The data showed that my students were still having
difficulty with explaining their thinking.
By modeling the problem solving strategies for my students, I am giving them a
foundation, and setting an expectation of how to problem solve.
Day 2 was modified slightly. More time was spent on vocabulary to help the
students better prove their work. The first half of the lesson was spent grading the
previous nights homework, which proved to be very effective . It was new to the
class to have homework graded by peers. I feel that that process alone has helped
the students grasp the content of the lesson. Using accountable talk, the students
who were able to master the content were able to teach their peers. Since this is
student led, with a few prompts from the teacher, they all responded in a positive
way.

The remaining part of Day 2 was to instruct the students on finding strategies that
would help them problem solve with divisibility.

On the final summative Unit 5 test, the class average was still at 55%. I do believe
that my lessons had a positive impact on student learning. Looking at some
students individually , I noticed some minor gains in the content overall.
Looking back , I now know that I must keep the lessons engaging and encourage that
student led classroom. Direct instruction is great, but after a while, if the content is
not engaging, he students are lost. I will continue to develop my lesson plans so
they involve more student led activities, that is where I noticed the students were
the most engaged.
I have learned that data is extremely important to facilitate student learning.
Keeping that in mind, the data will drive instruction to where it will be more
effective for the students. I had Day 2 all planned out, until I graded the ticket out
the door. I modified my lesson to where I spent half the time reviewing Day 1
content before moving on. This way, I spent a little less time with direct instruction,
but I knew exactly where my students were, and it was more to the point.
I graphed my data, and it did show the gains after the student led instruction.
Although the summative average did not increase, it did not decrease either. I still
know where my students are at, and where they need to reach.