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Howdy fellow educators! We hope you will be joining us in San Antonio for the NCTM conference next week, April 6th-8th . If you’re going, make sure these thought-provoking sessions with our authors and professional learning experts make it onto your schedule. Visit our booth #1125 for fun activities and delicious treats, and take a moment to enter our raffles—you could win some special prizes, including Amazon’s Echo Dot! Check out our sessions below, or click here to go to a complete schedule of our week at NCTM/NCSM.
Thursday, April 6th
Looking at Upside-Down Classrooms
11AM-12PM
Speaker: Cathy Seeley, Author of Smarter Than We Think and Faster Isn’t Smarter
Location: NCTM Exhibitor Workshop Area || Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center, 210AB
One way to engage students in constructive struggle is to turn teaching upside down. Instead of teaching a procedure and then giving problems, consider giving a good problem and using students’ struggle and discourse to set the stage for learning. We will use videos from across the grades to discuss how real teachers do this in their classrooms.
Visual Tools: When, Where and How to Help Students Achieve Number Sense
1:30-2:45PM
Speakers: Lisa Rogers
Location: Convention Center, 005
This hands-on session will unravel the sequence of many teaching tools that can be used to support young students in learning number sense. Activities will be explored as we take a look at a variety of tools including ten-frames, 100s charts, number paths, and lines. The progression is designed to deepen mathematical understanding and reasoning.
Unraveling Whole Numbers and Fractions on the Number Line
2-3PM
Speaker: Julie McNamara, Author of Beyond Pizzas & Pies and Beyond Invert & Multiply
Location: Convention Center 301
Learn four strategies to make successful, targeted number line lessons that bridge the gap between concrete and abstract. Use free online tools and cheap household items to build number sense in fractions and whole numbers operations. The presenters have analyzed hundreds of number line activities and will share practical classroom strategies.
Author Meet & Greet
3-4PM
Location: Math Solutions Booth #1125
Meet our Math Solutions authors in person at our Author Meet & Greet! We will also be hosting Facebook Live interviews with our authors during this time. Feel free to stop by and ask a question and say hello!
Friday, April 7th
Middle School Number Talks: Shifting The Classroom Culture
11AM-12PM
Speakers: Sherry Parrish & Ann Dominick, Authors of Number Talks: Fractions, Decimal, and Percentages
Locations: Convention Center 221
Number talks as a vehicle for changing the middle school classroom culture will be discussed. We will look at how this routine impacts student engagement, discourse, and mathematical mindsets. Video of middle school classrooms number talks will be used to analyze number talk strings and shifts in the classroom culture.
The Answer Still Matters…Eventually
12:30-1:30PM
Speakers: Cathy Seeley, Author of Smarter Than We Think and Faster Isn’t Smarter
Location: Bowie A/B/C
Effective teachers engage students in productive struggle as a way to develop mathematical thinking and learn new content. We sometimes say, “It’s not the answer that matters, it’s the process.” But the answer does matter, even as we focus on the struggle. How can we slow down the race to answers and use the journey as a vehicle for learning?
Noticing the Numbers: Students Using Computation Strategies Based on Reasoning
12:30-1:30PM
Speakers: Patricia Clark and Mary Mitchell
Location: Convention Center 214B
Research indicates that engagement with multiple computation strategies increases conceptual understanding and student achievement. But how do we move students toward efficient use of strategies? In this session, participants consider instructional decisions that move students toward efficiency based on reasoning about the numbers at hand.
Algebra Experiments: Engaging Students through Exciting Applications of Exponential Functions
1:30-2:45PM
Speakers: Amy Herman and Connie Horgan
Location: Grand Hyatt San Antonio, Texas Ballroom D
Are you looking for some hands-on activities to help your algebra students understand exponential functions? Come to this workshop and engage in experiments that simulate real-world situations. You will collect data, convert the data into multiple representations, and analyze the results. Questions that promote student discourse will be considered.
I’m Game! Are You?
1:30-2:45PM
Speakers: Diane Reynolds and Sandra Coulson
Location: Convention Center, 305
Helping students construct meaning, develop strategies, and incorporate reasoning and discourse can be challenging. Games have proven to be an effective way to teach concepts while engaging students and differentiating instruction. Join us to learn more: I’m game! Are you?
Saturday, April 8th
The HeART of Coaching: Asking Purposeful Questions Coaches/Leaders/Teacher Educators’ Session
8AM-9AM
Speakers: Mary Mitchell and Brenda Konicke
Location: Grand Hyatt, Lonestar Ballroom F
NCTM’s Principles to Actions states, “Effective teaching of mathematics uses purposeful questions to assess and advance students’ reasoning and sense making about important mathematical ideas and relationships.” This principle connects directly to the heart of coaching. During this session, math coaches use a process for asking purposeful questions.
Math Workshop: Guided Math & Beyond
8AM-9AM
Speaker: Jennifer Lempp, Author
Location: Grand Hyatt, Lonestar Ballroom F
Participants will learn WHY Math Workshop is a valuable model for instruction and HOW to establish routines and procedures that help get differentiated guided groups & learning stations up and running. Participants will gain a solid understanding of the different structures within Math Workshop and be able to see how it fits into a K–5 math class.
Set Your Sights High: Teaching Arithmetic with an Algebra Lens
11 AM-12PM
Speakers: Amy Mayfield and Lu Ann Weynand
Location: Grand Hyatt, Ballroom F
Algebra readiness is a hot topic. This session supports teachers in developing ways of thinking that underlie both arithmetic and algebra. Experience how to engage your students in exploring the laws of arithmetic with numbers and representations. While focusing on core content, you can optimize students’ learning and foster algebra readiness.
I Asked a Question—Now What?
11AM-12PM
Speakers: Genni Steele and Mary Mitchell
Location: Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center, 301
What our students know and don’t know is often left uncovered. Students today are required to construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others. In this session, strategies for uncovering student understanding through the use of academically productive discourse as well as tasks that allow for discourse are explored.
If you can’t make it to San Antonio in person, don’t worry, we’ll still have plenty of NCTM fun and activities you can enjoy online! Stay tuned on the Math Solutions blog— on Monday we will post our online-only NCTM giveaways. We’ll also be streaming Facebook Live author interviews, so check back on our Facebook page for a live NCTM experience!
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