Monday, March 18, 2019

Knowledge Gaps

Last calendar week I watched a pupil instructor explicate two-way tables to a Year vii class. She gathered information from the pupils too drew a tabular array on the board. The immediate reaction from a break of students was to cry out, 'It's a Carroll diagram'. The instructor looked to me for confirmation - she'd never heard the term Carroll diagram earlier too therefore she didn't know how to respond.

The same matter happened to me inwards my NQT year. I introduced two-way tables to Year vii too a pupil said 'Miss, that's only a Carroll diagram. We learnt these at principal school'. I'd never heard of them, too therefore I googled the Definition inwards front end of the class. I found that Carroll diagrams are a type of two-way table. They organise information inwards the same way, but they exhibit the private pieces of data, rather than frequencies.
Neither Venn nor Carroll diagrams are specifically mentioned inwards the current Primary National Curriculum but it's probable that most children volition accept seen them at Key Stage 2. Students are required to "interpret too nowadays information using bar charts, pictograms too tables" too it seems that Carroll diagrams are usually taught here. But afterwards Key Stage 2 they are never seen again. I await that students notice it a fleck strange when their maths teachers aren't familiar amongst maths they've learnt at principal school. I wondered if there's anything else that gets lost inwards the primary-secondary transition.

Arrays
Last calendar week I delivered my start fortnightly 'More Able Maths' session at a local principal school. Initially I was expecting to live on working amongst Year 6, but instead I was assigned to a grouping of Year iii children, followed yesteryear a grouping of Year 4s. At start I wasn't certain what variety of matter to prepare, but I had approximately useful input from Twitter, summation my real helpful principal instructor friend Helen gave me loads of information, including her school's 'Pitch too Expectations' documents for Year iii too 4.

During my start session I was leading a give-and-take most foursquare too cube numbers when ane kid got stuck trying to think nine x 9. I asked if anyone could advise a expert means of working it out. One kid suggested drawing an array. Ah, an array... Now I know that arrays are all the rage inwards the U.S.A. of America because I run into them mentioned on Twitter quite often, but of a abrupt I wished I'd paid to a greater extent than attention. I think he meant that drawing nine rows of nine dots too counting them would live on ane means of working out nine x 9. We discussed to a greater extent than efficient alternatives, such equally nine x 10 - 9.

Back at school, I chatted to my colleagues most arrays. Arrays are used at principal schoolhouse equally a means of explaining the concepts of multiplication too division. Most of us don't role them at secondary schoolhouse because that agreement is good established yesteryear the fourth dimension students acquire to us, too to a greater extent than efficient methods accept been introduced. Even though it's unlikely I volition start using arrays inwards my teaching, I would produce goodness from finding out to a greater extent than most how they are used.
CPD Priorities
Realising that I accept gaps inwards my noesis of pre-secondary marking mathematics confirmed what I already knew - that I would produce goodness from spending fourth dimension at a principal school, observing too getting involved inwards the pedagogy of younger children. I'm certain this would live on beneficial to most secondary teachers, but our pedagogy commitments don't permit us the chance for this variety of CPD. Our timetables are such that nosotros rarely accept fourth dimension to educate our agreement of how children larn too what they learn. When nosotros produce acquire fourth dimension for dependent area noesis development, our priorities ofttimes prevarication elsewhere - for illustration I'm currently focusing on learning FP2 (which I'm pedagogy for the start fourth dimension this week) too learning to a greater extent than most the novel GCSE qualification. I'm lucky that my ain immature lady starts principal schoolhouse inwards September - I'm looking frontwards to seeing how she learns maths, I think it volition live on fascinating.