What do you think is the single most important change in your students?
In some ways perhaps the most trivial one: the fact that I know now that my students have learned. Perhaps they haven’t learned everything we were hoping for, but there is a profound moment when a student, who would not previously draw a reasonable picture of one third, casually and correctly identifies something as three-fourths of a square. Before we began to do this work, I could tell – time and again- that the “skills” I thought I had taught to my students in Math 099 had just been regurgitated in the short term without making any lasting impact: when they were in Math 102, they continued to make the same “mistakes” that I had “corrected” the previous quarter.
Instructor, Community College
For my students, once they understand their role in this new and different (student-centered) environment, I find them to be far more confident, less intimidated by mathematics, and beginning to believe that they really can learn mathematics. They are excited about learning and about their newfound abilities. They have come to believe that mistakes should be viewed as an opportunity to learn rather than as their failure as a student and something that should be feared.
Instructor, Community College
The most important change I see in my students is the natural curiosity around math and numbers coming back to life! No more do my students see math as a series of questions that lead to an answer, but rather questions that lead to new wonderings about connections and that often come from a desire to generalize. They no longer see me as the authority or answer book in the classroom. Instead, they see themselves and each other as capable of verifying outcomes with evidence and their classmates as fellow travels down the many pathways they walk to construct new ideas.
RMST, Middle School Teacher
My students no longer think there is one correct strategy. They know that they can make sense of the problem as best fits their needs. Because of this, students take risks and no longer try to read my mind.
RMST, Middle School Teacher
Perseverance until things make sense.
RMST, Middle School Teacher
Most important change in my students is that THEY want to solve the problems and they don’t want to be told the answer. I was absent one day and came back to my classroom and all 6 classes gave me the same message: That substitute “robbed us of our thinking”… he told us the answers before we had time to think about how we would solve it.
RMST, Middle School Teacher
The most important change in my students is that they persevere longer in trying to solve challenging problems. At the beginning of the school year, students would see something difficult and give up. Now, they are willing to talk through the problem and try to figure it out.
RMST, Elementary Teacher
My students are teachers and we have too little time together. They have embraced the growth mindset piece.
RMST, Middle School Teacher
There is an enthusiasm for mathematics. There is engagement. There is sense-making.
RMST, Elementary Teacher