This week in math we discussed the importance of providing students with rich tasks rooted in mathematics. A rich task encourages students to think creatively, work logically, communicate ideas, synthesize their results, analyze different viewpoints, look for commonalities and evaluate findings.
San Jose Library. Group Work on Cards. July.1,2009. Retrieved from:
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For a task to be rich it must be engaging in the sense that it has the potential to engage students in mathematical thinking. It must also have a meaningful mathematical focus that connects to the mathematics curriculum, process and content expectations.
It is important to challenge students meaningfully through problem solving. A rich task will be grounded in problem solving and will encourage students to reason his/her way to new understanding. The student would accomplish this by using multiple math processes while the instructor would allow ample time for explanation, justification, and thinking time.
The task should also allow for opportunities for connections by being developmentally linked to concepts across strands and grades. This also helps the task to become differentiable, meaning students of varying abilities can help solve the problem from various entry points using multiple approaches to the solution.
The tools used to complete the task are important and should be a considering when providing students with a rich task. The task must be multi-representational and afford opportunities for the use of multiple forms of representation and tools. This includes a variety of visual, concrete and electronic learning tools to help students represent their thinking in a variety of ways.
Duy Pham Nat. _temp_. Aug.12,2013. Retrieved from:
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Most importantly it is imperative that the task supports positive attitudes towards mathematics. Students should feel comfortable making mistakes because this demonstrates that there is a productive struggle. Perseverance should always be a goal for students while reaching partial or full success. Collaboration also helps to provide students with help from their peers which may benefit the students' understanding. This also help to reinforce that math can be a community activity.
Ashley, I like that you focused on rich tasks in your blog. That part of our lecture really stood out for me as well. I realize the importance of putting a lot of thought into tasks so that they are meaningful and support positive attitudes towards math. Looking at the handout of guidelines for rich tasks in mathematics made me realize that a task has to be extremely purposeful. I hope to get better at this with experience since we are the key to many students' ability to learn mathematics. Again, the goal is always to help students develop a positive mindset. Incorporating rich tasks is definitely beneficial to building student confidence and understanding. Multiple solutions are valuable and I like the idea of using rich tasks to encourage students to think creativity.
ReplyDeleteGreat blog reflection!
Hi Ashley, great post! Like Matt mentioned, I liked that you focused on rich tasks. I feel that resource is going to be incredibly valuable for us in the future. It will guide us in creating tasks that are more valuable to the learning experience for students. Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteAshley,
ReplyDeleteGreat post! You seemed to summarize every thing very well on the topic of rich tasks. I particularly like how you mentioned the notion of "productive struggles". Upon first glance this may seem contradictory, but similarly to how we discussed the importance of mistakes last week - struggle shows fluidity. It proves that we are actively moving through a certain process. What better way to demonstrate our learning than through effort, and simply TRYING? Although the struggles can follow, I think it is wise to say that struggles are purposeful and always outcome-based (& therefore, productive!). I also like how you touched upon mathematics being a community activity. Too often it is seen as a frustrating subject that is completed individually. Through collaboration and group work, various perspectives will surface, and this will allow for deeper understanding and multiple approaches - all of which support a rich task.
Thanks for the insight!
Sorry I meant to say thinking creatively.
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