Read the summary that outlines what a typical lesson is like in Illustrative Math. Then select one of the lessons to watch. The lesson plans are also linked below in case you want to reference them as you are watching the lesson.
- Summary of a Typical Lesson
- Sample Lesson Videos:
- Corresponding Lesson Plans:
Consider
- What is rolling around in your head about this lesson design?
- What caused you to pause and think?
- What math experiences from your own classroom came to mind as you were watching and reading?
Respond and Interact
Please post your response to one {or more} of the prompts above. Read our colleagues' reflections. Feel free to respond to someone by sharing a comment, insight or interesting possibility.
Please post your response to one {or more} of the prompts above. Read our colleagues' reflections. Feel free to respond to someone by sharing a comment, insight or interesting possibility.
I enjoyed reading about the structure of a lesson. Starting with a warm-up is great. I love seeing and hearing their thinking with different strategies. This is crucial to strengthen their number sense. The Instructional Activities seem to be the “meat” of the lesson with the specific skill that is being taught that day. I like that they used the phrase “provide experience with a new context”. This reminds me that the teachers role is not to stand in front of the classroom and model the skill. The students are learning through an experience or a hands on activity. Identifying common mistakes is also during this part of the lesson and I like that students will be able to be cautious of these. The lesson synthesis and cool-down seem like great ways to wrap up the daily lesson. These will be intentional for the lesson and I feel like currently, teachers are making this up on our own. This curriculum seems to provide everything that the teacher will need in order to provide a successful lesson and I love that. I am so eager to get my hands on it!
ReplyDeleteI am grateful for your optimism! 💛 Change is hard and there will be some swears along the way, but I do believe that our students will have a deeper understanding of math concepts if we trust this program.
DeleteI loved watching the teacher teach the lesson and referring back to the lesson plan. It really helped me to understand the language in the lesson and provide the immediate visual for what it looks like in the classroom! The structure of the lesson is so powerful in creating thinkers (rather than mimickers). I watched the first grade lesson and to hear the students talk about their understanding of halves and fourths after cutting the shapes and comparing them to their partner's was powerful. The students came up with their explanation of why fourths is smaller than halves, this will stick with them much better than the teacher simply showing them through a drawing.
ReplyDeleteI watched the first grade lesson and was excited to get a little sneak peek at a lesson I will be teaching later this year. It was fun to see how another teacher teaches the IM lessons and comparing it to how I teach them. I really enjoy the structure of each lesson learning target -> warm up -> activities -> lesson synthesis. I also like that at the end of each activity there is a synthesis. This is a great way to check in with the students and reinforce the teaching points and the learning target. I also have really been enjoying the warmups as they are very engaging and get students thinking about the lesson.
ReplyDeleteI watched the 4th grade video on lines of symmetry. I have to be honest, going into this lesson I thought how is she going to be able to complete the lesson in 45 minutes. The pacing was fantastic and the class really went from one activity to the next pretty seamlessly. I loved how it was not just the teacher showing how to do the task, it was the students examples. This is so different from the watch me do it and then you can try! I'm still worried about some of my more involved concept in 6th grade math and seeing how they can be taught this way, but I am ready to try other ways. I have been finding lately that my kids don't often try or "risk take" when it comes to solving a new problem. They seem to be waiting for me to show them how to do it. I think that if they try and experience it first they will have more experience and a kind of buy in to the concept. I have been so frustrated lately with teacher a skill whole class and then having them work independently or with groups and finding that many of them had stopped listening or paying attention. I then have to spend time going over what I have already done. The lesson plan made it look pretty easy to start and begin teaching this way so I'm going to try some of these strategies in my class this week.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed watching the sample lesson and getting an even clearer picture of what an IM lesson looks and sounds like. I recently went to the online platform training so it had me thinking about what pieces from the platform (like the slides) I would be using. One thing I noticed is that a great chunk of the lesson included students exploring. This supports the reversal of the typical I do, we do, you do model. The first activity acted as a “you do” activity and it had students exploring equal parts. After the activity the teacher asked students what they noticed and wondered which I like to do in my class to get students talking. I really enjoyed seeing the synthesizing part to see how it “flows” after the activity. I think the student exploration part is so important and although it will be a different structure of a lesson, I am excited to try it!
ReplyDeleteAfter exploring a number of other curriculum options with the IMC and hearing our math lead's perspective serving as an early IM implementer this year, it was refreshing (and assuring) to see a lesson taught from start to finish. Even before watching the fourth grade lesson on lines of symmetry (Lesson 5), I could track the progression of the lesson plan with ease as it is clean, free of extraneous information that detracts from advancing student learning, and provides realistic question prompts and responses to stretch student thinking. Both the video of the lesson and the written plan emphasize a sensed of shared learning during the lesson and seek to honor the voice of the students. The lesson is structured to allow for inquiry and organic discovery, rather than frontloading students with formulas, definitions, or rigid expectations. Many of the lessons I previewed at the IM Platform Training shifted the focus to students right away, after the warm-up, by asking them to develop their own definition, draw a representation of their initial thoughts about a topic, or engage in conversation with their peers. With this lesson design, the locus of control derives from the teacher who provides the space, time, and patience for students to "play" with math but the locus of "doing" rests with the students. When it comes to math and most everything, my students are often far more creative with their thinking and problem-solving than I am, and this lesson structure truly allows them to shine and share what otherwise may be left unsaid.
ReplyDeleteI have begun to think through how the actual implementation of this lesson might look like now that we will have our projector and the new flat panel (mine is being delivered at the end of the week!). It will serve as another vertical surface, but I want to seek out the best ways to enhance and extend the way students access their learning and work through the concepts presented in each IM lesson. I suppose I won't know until I try! Embracing change in the service of our students is always worth our effort.
Excited to hear how you will use your flat panel as another vertical surface for student thinking...Yay YOU!
DeleteI loved watching the first grade lesson! It was really cool to see her fit in ALL the things that I am struggling to do within my own time frame. I would love to see a kindergarten lesson as I am struggling with doing the warm-up, the activities, math centers, and the synthesis. A lot of the times the synthesis is left off because we run out of time, but I know that this activity is so valuable. So a challenge for me this year and going into next year is figuring out how to fit in all of the pieces.
ReplyDeleteI like how the lesson plan is laid out, it's easy to see navigate and find the information you need with the headings/sections; rather than paragraphs of reading. I thrilled with the student learning goal language - very appropriate for the age. I'm anxious to get a jump on preparing for the first unit and getting materials ready. I watched the 3rd grade, lesson 2 video, the lesson kept a good pace and it was good to see that it IS possible to get through everything. Watching her, you can see that she was prepared and knew the lesson well. Our team math lead has said many times that being prepared and familiar with the lessons is critical, every minute counts! I made a note that I should probably get a parent volunteer next year to help with material prep!
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed watching the sample of fourth grade lesson using IM curriculum. I started with going through corresponding lesson plan first and I was little concern how the teacher can fit all those activities, warm up, lesson synthesis, and actually students exploring new concept, instead of teacher do it, with such a short time. I was glad that during introduction it was pointed that it is video of real classroom and participants are real students, because I moved my head few times during watching it in disbelieve. It was perfect thinking classroom. It was also my first time watching in full how lesson looks like using IM and I loved it.
ReplyDelete