When I first started this project, I approached it close-mindedly and had no hope of it being change in any way. It caused me a lot of frustration. As my project progressed, my thoughts changed. Now, changes are actually being made to the math lab.
For the last three Wednesdays, I’ve been meeting with Mr. Payeur. We’ve been discussing the math lab. In the most recent meeting, we discussed the changes they’ve planned to apply to the math lab after February break. These changes included:
- Incomplete grades will go away
- A new buddy system, with a go to person for each student when a teacher is unavailable
- Direct instruction for IMP 1, 2 and 3
- IMP 1 on one side of the room and IMP 2 and IMP 3 on the other side of the room
- Community activity when class first starts
- A daily entrance task
- Last 5 -10 mins closing activity
Mr Payeur had told me that lately he’d been talking to the administration about trying to find a way for us to get credit for what we did last semester. Hopefully, credit will be earned based on the amount of submissions a student has completed.
Math lab was made to be flexible, so it is easy to change. There are several reasons why they changed the math program. One reason is because they wanted to build a community of math learners another reason is that they wanted and create a place where students can work at an appropriate pace for their own needs.
For many, math lab doesn’t seem like a community workspace because students usually stay in their own world at their tables don’t converse with others. The purpose of the community activity when class first begins and the buddy system is to help build that community of math learners that the teachers want to see. The community activity is to help brings us together so we feel more comfortable with each other. As of now, most students I have interviewed said that it’s awkward going up to students they don’t usually talk with. Most of the time they don’t like bugging others and making them go back to previous activities they’ve already completed. Again ,community activities should help to bring us together and fix these problems.
Student voice is finally somewhat being heard. They are at least trying something different from what they’ve been doing and, hopefully, it works better than how it was working before, because many students, including myself, are struggling and were not making progress in our math work.
Keep leaving your thoughts about the math lab in the comments, I need them to make the full changes to the math lab that I want to see. A change is happening! Students need to keep speaking up! We do have a voice!
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