This week and last week, our professor introduced a very interesting idea surrounding gallery walks.
I have heard about them, but never thought about them in the math context. Our class worked in groups to solve problems. We then had the opportunity to see other group’s work and make comments on their solutions. I think this strategy can be very useful in the mathematics context. I think that if students are stuck or struggling, then seeing how others solved it may open their eyes to other ideas and ways of thinking. I think something that I am going to promote in my class is the entry phase and having my students do this every time before they solve a problem. Then when the galley walk occurs, students can see how their peers completed the entry phase which may have them think about thoughts and ideas that they did not.
Something that I took away from this lesson was how to do a gallery walk virtually! Since everything is online right now, our classes are having to adapt to doing activities like this online. The way my professor did it was very cool and I had definitely not thought about it before! We used a google document for each group, but had the links for the other 2 groups. Once we were done and completed out solutions on the google doc, we could then use the other links and look at other groups solutions, and add comments! It is definitely a great way to do this activity virtually!
This week we did a problem solving problem again! This week’s problem felt different for me though. I for once didn’t start with thinking how I could make a formula to solve the problem, which is where my brain usually jumps. This week the first thing I did before anything else was solely focus on the entry phase. I took a few minutes to write down what I knew from reading the question and broke down what I was trying to find out. This made the question much more clear to me and I was able to solve the problem a lot easier. I am usually so quick to jump to the ATTACK/problem solving phase, but this week really showed me how important it is to take a few moments at the beginning to really break down the question and take it one step at a time.
One thing I noticed while looking at all my problem solving solutions was that I typically approach the problem in the same way. I usually write down different patterns without drawing diagrams. I think I am going to challenge myself for the next problems to try and include a diagram and visual to help further my understanding and to think about the question in a different way.
This week I learned a lot about my learning and how I problem solve, but also about different strategies I can incorporate them in the classroom. I look forward to learning about more strategies I can use to ensure I am the best teacher possible!
-Sydney
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