May 3 2015

Aural Test – Statistics

Statistics My post on using mental tests for revision seems to have interested many readers so I thought I would follow this up. Having looked back in time to GCSE many years ago when an aural test was actually part of the exam (10%) I shall in future refer to these as Aural Tests. It was these tests that started me using the idea of an aural test on anything any time! They can be short and make ideal starters or plenaries or in the case of revision aural tests can last a lesson with lots of associated questions and discussion.

Looking through some old resources I came across a cassette (!) recording of myself reading the questions for a GCSE aural test I recorded for a correspondence college. I intend to transcribe that and will write a post on these old style tests in the near future.

Having successfully given my Year 13 students two aural tests on the Pure Mathematics C3 and C4 modules (after the first they requested the second) my wonderful colleague who teaches the group with me joined in the venture and gave them a third aural test on their Statistics module. We and our students feel we have done some really useful revision in their last lessons for all three modules on their Advanced Level course.

So this week I have my last lessons with Year 11 (UK age 15-16) who are preparing for their GCSE. I want to look at their Statistics unit with them and have decided that an aural test should work well. Looking at various papers I have extracted some diagrams and asked questions around those. These are topics that I feel my particular class needs; I want to review various statistical diagrams. In case this is of interest I have made all the resources available here. Students need the answer sheet only. The teacher reads the questions and they have to listen very carefully and answer the questions. They will need to write answers in their exercise books or on paper as well as using the answer sheet. With these longer revision aural tests it is sometimes appropriate to give feedback after each question as opposed to waiting till the end to mark all questions. I use both techniques.

Creating the solutions reminded me once again of how useful colour can be to make solutions clear.

I would be interested to hear from teachers who try aural tests with their students; I find them useful for all ages.

Feb 23 2014

ClassCharts

Class Charts – example student report

For behaviour management and seating plans an outstanding and easy to use system is Class Charts.

I have written previously on the system Year 7 and I are using for recording learning behaviours, my aim is to document their learning behaviours; it is absolutely not a traditional ‘reward’ system which I think can be a minefield! I want something accessible to all and is clear to us all that it is about each student being the best they can be. In deciding on the points we should have we had some excellent discussions on being a good learner. We have very few negative behaviours, just a few such as forgotten books / calculators and so on that we agreed will really not help learning.

Having used our system this year I would say it is essential that all understand when and how each behaviour point will be awarded. I have simplified our system slightly which I believe will help ensure consistency; in our enthusiasm I think we created a few too many points – some of which are hard to measure!

Thinking ahead to summer examinations I have created a Revision point but to earn that they have to answer some questions on their chosen topic to provide some evidence! In fact I want them to be generally proactive in letting me know what they are doing to help their own learning.

We have been using ClassDojo as you will see in my earlier posts; this works really well but I have found that a real strength of ClassCharts is that each student can log in to their own account and see their complete record (currently ClassDojo allows students to view just the current week and whilst it is possible for me to print a complete report for them I have decided I want them to have their own complete online record).

My own primary reason for using Class Charts is to record learning behaviours – I may well experiment with the seating plan aspect later.

To get started create a free account (note that upgrades refers to SIMS integration, all the functionality you need for recording behaviours and creating seating plans is completely free). You can then create classes and customise the learning behaviours to suit your needs.

In case it’s useful I made a note of some instructions here and there is plenty of help available on the website.

The following document provides a summary from Class Charts: class charts summary

Aug 24 2013

Highlighting is a Waste of Time

image courtesy of digitalart / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Highlighting is a waste of time according to a comprehensive report released on Jan 9th 2013 by the Association for Psychological Science. The authors, led by Kent State University professor John Dunlosky, looked at various learning tactics and rated each from high to low utility. You can read the full report by clicking on the above link or for a summary have a look at this article in Time.

The authors conclude that the most effective learning techniques are distributed study sessions (last minute cramming is not effective) and more practice testing, the use of flash cards can be very helpful with this, as the conclusion to the Time article states ‘ditch your highlighter and get busy with your flash cards’.

A TES user has uploaded an excellent resource: Effective learning/study techniques which summarizes the work well and provides some great ideas for the classroom. I really like the ‘Cup of questions’ idea – I’ll be trying that! In fact the ideas given are very much in line with my own thinking, I have said before that I have become convinced of the need for frequent recall, perhaps even more true in the UK now that students are assessed with linear exams. Something I do regularly and certainly plan to do in this coming academic year for all my classes from age 11 to 18 is ask them some questions at the beginning or end of a lesson to see if they can recall recent (or not so recent!) work. See this file for an example: Mini-test example. The questions are short and can just be read out for students to write responses in their exercise books (making this a great starter – no IT or resources required). The questions in my example here are just recall type questions on a variety of topics but could of course be a series of questions on just one topic. Questions requiring higher order thinking skills could also be used (see Rich Questions for ideas). I have added a new page to which I will add any mini-test resources.

I think this type of exercise is valuable at any time, not just at examination time and we should spend time regularly helping our students recall current or earlier work. If they have a basic ‘toolkit’ with which they are comfortable and secure they have a foundation to which they can link new learning to.

A really useful source of questions which can be used this way are the mental tests from CIMT; these are included with their resources for Years 7, 8 and 9 and also for GCSE. For Key Stage 3 (ages 11-14) scroll down this page for the Year 7, Year 8 and Year 9 course material, the resources include mental tests as part of the teacher support material. On the GCSE page scroll down to the teacher support material and note the mental tests available for most units, see this on Formulae for example.

Be imaginative with homework, it does’t have to be on the current topic – it could be on last week’s topic…or last month’s…or something you have not done yet!

The Collective Memory resources on TES are ideal in helping students understand and recall information and link ideas together. These can be used in a variety of ways which are fully described in the article. (A further set of resources is available here). Last year my GCSE students created several posters of their own which they found a very useful revision activity.

Bubbl'us diagram

Some students find mind maps helpful to recall information, I have seen students create some excellent diagrams with Bubbl’us for example. For some more online revision tools including some to make flashcards the resources mentioned here may be helpful

As I write I am reminded of a favourite quote from John von Neumann who said “Young man, in mathematics you don’t understand things. You just get used to them.” I know that for me, when I am more used to ideas I feel I understand them better. If we help our students recall all the basics – perhaps they will feel more secure – and confident.

Apr 21 2013

Hwb Resources….and more on Mini-Tests!

A collection of resources are available from Hwb (the all Wales Learning Platform, note this now includes all the material from the NGfL Wales website). Select Find and Use to explore the resources. The resources are also hosted on TES. (Note that the echalk resources such as the excellent transformations interactives are no longer free).

This on Developing Mathematical and Thinking Skills is authored by Melanie Blount. The resource can be used online or it is possible to download a zipped file. The concept cartoons would display very well on the interactive whiteboard and perhaps provide a useful starter activity.
Resources in this set I particularly like include Large Numbers and True Sometimes. Large numbers consists of a set of 20 questions (with the option to show answers) with big answers! With questions such as ‘How many mobile phones are in use in the world?’ this would make a very engaging lesson activity and would be ideal to use when teaching standard index form. The True Sometimes resource is a set of 10 statements; students must decide if the statements are always, sometimes or never true. (There are links to some Always / Sometimes / Never questions from other sources in the Rich Questions post.)

Week Thoughts
Mini-Tests
Last week, writing on revision I wrote about my use of ‘mini tests’. I have used several this week with a variety of classes, with Year 12 I started with some basic calculus in one lesson and trigonometric equations in another. Watching them mark and correct their work confirmed my belief that these mini-tests are very useful; concepts and ideas we may think of as basics are not always as secure as they might be. I have started making a note of questions to ask them as I notice any misconceptions.

Coming up to examinations I often use a timed exam question as a starter which could be just a few minutes, I work out the marks per minute rate for the exam for timing.

I recently set a homework for my Year 11s to look at some specific topics and let them know they would have 35 minutes in class to answer exam questions. We then went through the questions straight away, they marked the paper and I collected their work to see how they did; I always tell my classes I am looking at their careful marking and corrections as much as their original answers. I was amused to see that one of my students had headed her paper ‘Mini-Mock’.

I have started a new page under resources for these mini-tests in case they are useful – just four there at the moment but more to come.

WolframAlpha – Handwritten!

: WolframAlpha: Handwritten style plot y=(x-2)(x-1)(x+3)

Reading the WolframAlpha community newsletter recently I was amused by their April fool on the introduction of the WolframAlpha Handwritten Knowledge Engine. It seems this has proved rather popular so what was originally intended for an April fool has now been made generally available. I really like the look of these diagrams, I suspect they will appeal to students and teachers, look at this number line for example.

WolframAlpha: handwritten style number line

Apr 14 2013

Revision Time!

Craig Barton’s Collective memory resource – Angle Facts

This week it’s back to school after the Easter break and examination season is upon us. I need to help my students prepare; so, how to help them recall all the concepts and techniques they need for formal examinations? I have become convinced of the need for frequent recall; see this article on how highlighting is a waste of time – and note the conclusion to the Time article ‘ditch your highlighter and get busy with your flash cards’ and this from Science Daily on how short tests improved student retention on online courses (thanks to Earl Samuelson for pointing me in the direction of that article on Twitter).

Something I do regularly with all my classes is ask them some questions at the beginning or end of a lesson to see if they can recall recent (or not so recent!) work. See this file for an example: Mini-test example. The questions are short and can just be read out for students to write responses in their exercise books (making this a great starter – no IT or resources required). The questions in my example here are just recall type questions on a variety of topics but could of course be a series of questions on just one topic; questions requiring higher order thinking skills could also be used (see Rich Questions for ideas). I have added a new page to which I will add any mini-test resources.

I think this type of exercise is valuable at any time, not just at examination time and we should spend time regularly helping our students recall current or earlier work. A really useful source of questions which can be used this way are the mental tests from CIMT; these are included with their resources for Years 7, 8 and 9 and also for GCSE. For Key Stage 3 (ages 11-14) scroll down this page for the Year 7, Year 8 and Year 9 course material, the resources include mental tests as part of the teacher support material. On the GCSE page scroll down to the teacher support material and note the mental tests available for most units, see this on Formulae for example.

The Collective Memory resources on TES can make an excellent revision activity, students look at posters and then have to understand and recall that information. These can be used in a variety of ways which are fully described in the article. (A further set of resources is available here). Last year my GCSE students created several posters of their own which they found a very useful revision activity.