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From Reading to Math, Grades K-5: How Best Practices in Literacy Can Make You a Better Math Teacher
Are your students engaged and motivated to read and write but hesitant during math instruction? Do you want your students to be as excited about math as they are about literacy? This unique resource explores how best practices for teaching reading and writing can help you become a better math teacher. Drawing on the work of such educators as Richard Allington, Carl Anderson, Marilyn Burns, Cathy Fosnot, Stephanie Harvey, Heidi Hayes Jacobs, Ellin Keene, and Diane Snowball, the author describes strategies that work in teaching literacy and how to successfully implement them in the math class.
- GenresMathematicsEducation
168 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2009
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
June 13, 2015
This book would be appropriate for those new to teaching math (or reading), but it just didn't contain much for me. Not a bad book, just basic.
November 30, 2019
Interesting concept but not enough practical information.
Chapters: 1) The role of the teacher; 2) Decoding, fluency, and vocabulary; 3) Teaching comprehension, 4) Organizing the classroom, 5) The workshop model, 6) Assessment, 7) Supporting struggling learners
I did like the organization of the book and all the reflection questions.
For grades K-5 teachers who already know how to teach literacy well.
Mathematics as a sense-making activity instead of something to be tested on a standardized test
54-55: Discussion of how teachers who are so good at making literacy instruction a natural part of each day fail to do that with math
39: “Think about how we listen...When you ask, ‘What is seven plus seven?’ you are listening for fourteen. In contrast, when you ask ‘How did you solve seven plus seven?’ you have no idea what a child is going to say, and hence you must listen more closely.”
23: “Fluency plays an important role in mathematics as well. Though it is not sufficient to be able to compute quickly or rapidly recall facts, it is hard to get down to the business of thinking mathematically when you are struggling with computation and facts…When students are really computationally fluent, they can quickly arrive at a solution and decide on their own if it is reasonable…[T]o become truly fluent, students need to have an expectation that the math they are doing rapidly will make sense to them. Lack of fluency, then, is the bad marriage of weak basic skills and poor attention to meaning.”—followed by chart regarding addressing fluency in mathematics
But I find the chart and the information in the book to be generic and not specific to how to actually get these things accomplished, especially for upper elementary teachers whose students may be entering with skills a couple of years behind grade level expectations. Here is the information from that chart (pages 23-24):
“Help students to know what good understanding means. Just as Lamar needed to know that reading should be at least as rewarding an experience as watching TV, he needs to know that the math he is doing should make sense, and that he should get that satisfying payoff of doing math with understanding…Make sure students have the opportunity to do work that is challenging, but not too hard. Students build fluency (and the corresponding confidence) when they meet challenges successfully, again and again…Address serious problems in basic understandings. In literacy, students need strong working knowledge of sound-symbol correspondence and good sight vocabulary. In math, students need good sense of number and quick recall of basic facts.”
Chapters: 1) The role of the teacher; 2) Decoding, fluency, and vocabulary; 3) Teaching comprehension, 4) Organizing the classroom, 5) The workshop model, 6) Assessment, 7) Supporting struggling learners
I did like the organization of the book and all the reflection questions.
For grades K-5 teachers who already know how to teach literacy well.
Mathematics as a sense-making activity instead of something to be tested on a standardized test
54-55: Discussion of how teachers who are so good at making literacy instruction a natural part of each day fail to do that with math
39: “Think about how we listen...When you ask, ‘What is seven plus seven?’ you are listening for fourteen. In contrast, when you ask ‘How did you solve seven plus seven?’ you have no idea what a child is going to say, and hence you must listen more closely.”
23: “Fluency plays an important role in mathematics as well. Though it is not sufficient to be able to compute quickly or rapidly recall facts, it is hard to get down to the business of thinking mathematically when you are struggling with computation and facts…When students are really computationally fluent, they can quickly arrive at a solution and decide on their own if it is reasonable…[T]o become truly fluent, students need to have an expectation that the math they are doing rapidly will make sense to them. Lack of fluency, then, is the bad marriage of weak basic skills and poor attention to meaning.”—followed by chart regarding addressing fluency in mathematics
But I find the chart and the information in the book to be generic and not specific to how to actually get these things accomplished, especially for upper elementary teachers whose students may be entering with skills a couple of years behind grade level expectations. Here is the information from that chart (pages 23-24):
“Help students to know what good understanding means. Just as Lamar needed to know that reading should be at least as rewarding an experience as watching TV, he needs to know that the math he is doing should make sense, and that he should get that satisfying payoff of doing math with understanding…Make sure students have the opportunity to do work that is challenging, but not too hard. Students build fluency (and the corresponding confidence) when they meet challenges successfully, again and again…Address serious problems in basic understandings. In literacy, students need strong working knowledge of sound-symbol correspondence and good sight vocabulary. In math, students need good sense of number and quick recall of basic facts.”
July 22, 2020
How to apply reading strategies including the workshop model into your mathematics classroom. Great examples of T and S interaction. Appreciate the parallel in each chapter between reading, math. Gained insight on reading classroom structure. Would recommend especially if you've only ever taught one of the two subjects.
December 4, 2011
We teach best when we see ourselves as learners. #edchat
August 19, 2015
This book gave me a lot of ideas to implement in my math workshop; there were a few areas, though, where it did not go as deep as I would have liked.
April 15, 2017
I wish that I had read this ages ago. It would have made me understand teaching math. It compares math workshop to reading workshop which as a former librarian and reading specialist, I understand perfectly. If I had made that connection prior to now, I would have been a much better math teacher. It compares each part of the math workshop to its counterpart in the reading workshop model.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews