Culture-Building for the New School Year

How do you plan to transform the culture of math (teaching and learning) in your classroom or building this year?  Have you had a chance to think about this?  It can be easy to get caught-up in the content that will be covered and forget the importance of building strong mathematical communities in our classroom.  However, the time spent building your students into teammates in math will be worth it.  Go slow to go fast.

Let's think about Ron Ritchhart's Cultural Forces that Define a Classroom and how they can impact our building of a math community.

1.  Physical Environment:  Is your classroom arranged in a way to promote collaboration?  Are the spaces clear where students can gather? Have you thought about the places where students will be able to visually share thinking?

2.  Interactions & Relationships: What steps can you take to build a feeling of respect which will allow students to be confident enough to share their ideas and strategies?  What will you do to be sure all students and their ideas are valued in your classroom? How will you encourage collaborative inquiry for your students?  What methods will you employ to build  a growth mindset in students? How will emphasize growth and celebrate success?

• This sample chapter from Thinking Together: 9 Beliefs for Building a Mathematical Community by Rozlynn Dance and Tessa Kaplan supports these concepts.
• More ideas can be found in this sample chapter of Count Me In!: Including Learners with Special Needs in the Inclusive Classroom by Judy Storeygard.

3.  Expectations: What are the cornerstones for your mathematics community?  As your class determines the classroom norms, which ones do you feel MUST be part of the list? How will these be enforced?

• Youcubed article on setting up positive norms in your math classroom

4. Time:  How will time be structured during your workshop?  What will you put in place so that students don't feel pressure to work through concepts quickly? On the other hand, how will  you build efficient use of time for your students?  What will you do to be sure you offer enough thinking time for students?  In what ways will you support your students to show perseverance?

5. Language: What do you think is the key mathematical language for your students to learn during the year?  What will you do to build their mathematical discourse?  What language will be modeled for them to use when working with partners or small groups?  Will your classroom contain a word wall or other location where students can easily refer? What growth mindset language will you be sure to include?

• Scholastic blog post about math talk
• Sample Accountable Talk anchor chart
• Blog post focused on Number Talks

6.  Routines & Structure: What daily mathematical routines will you put into place, and how will they help build mathematical discourse in your classroom? How will your math block be structured?  What management routines will you have in place to help your classroom run smoothly?

• Dr. Nicki Newton's First 20 Days outline might help with some of these questions
• My blog page with links to best-practice routines

7.  Opportunities:  How will you regularly opportunities for all students to interact with rich math tasks? In what ways will students grow in the math practice standards as well as the mathematical content standards?  What types of explorations and problem-solving will you use in your classroom?  Will they promote perseverance in your students?  How will students be encouraged to find and explore their own mathematical questions? 

• My blog post on exploration resources

8.  Modeling:  How will you model creativity and risk-taking?  In what ways will you provide examples of collaborative talk and respectful debate? How will students know that this is a safe classroom to take risks? What will you do to share your own wonderings and questions with your students? How can you be intentional about modeling perseverance?

How can you take risks this year in order to grow as a math teacher?  What resources can you use to help you to learn more about best practices in mathematical instruction? Using these 8 ideas as a starting point should help you on your way!