Introducing Growth Mindset in Math

This year, before we dive into our first math unit, we're setting up for a successful year by examining our growth mindset in math.

The very first day, I started with a math engagement survey, to see what my students' attitudes were about math and their learning (you can grab a free copy of this survey HERE). It was pretty awesome to see that most of my students already have a pretty positive attitude about math - that's definitely a testament to the amazing teachers I work with at my school.

This summer I discovered Stanford University's YouCubed site by Joanne Boaler - full of amazing math lessons and activities that are designed to foster a math mindset in students. I instantly knew I was going to start the year with this.

As I was reading more about the activities during my prep period on the second day of school, I came across

this fun video made at a youcubed summer camp. As I was watching it, I saw an image of this quote: "In this class, mistakes are expected, inspected, and respected." Perfection. I pulled my big binder of bulletin board letters of my shelf and set to work. By the time my students came in from recess, there was a new quote to look at on our wall. When I posted the picture of this quote on my facebook page, a few people had mentioned they had seen this quote with the word "corrected" added (such a great addition ... but I have no more wall space to add the word - lol). When my students and I discussed this quote to examine what it means, we all agreed that corrected is an integral part of inspected - when we inspect our mistakes, we are not only trying to determine where we went wrong, but also how we can use teacher and peer feedback to correct it.

One of our first tasks (suggested on youcubed) was to brainstorm what makes a successful math group, as so much of our learning and inquiry will be done in groups. We did a think, pair, share activity and came up with this great anchor chart to remind us of the norms while we are working. It hangs right below our "mistakes are" quote - and together they are exactly what we need to remember as we start our math year.

On Monday we our going to start our Interactive Math Journals, and our first entry is going to be my Growth Mindset in Math entry - the perfect start to our math journals. You can read more about this entry in a blog post HERE. From there, we will finish off our week with more great math inquiry lessons from youcubed.

With all of this, I am so excited to begin our year exploring math. We're going to have a great year!