Learning Success; How You Approach the Task

Today during math students will participate in a "floor to ceiling" task, and their success and learning will depend on the approach they take.

I'll begin the class with this comment, "Today's learning depends on you, and how you approach the task. What approaches to a learning task will lead to success?"

I'll give students a chance to share their ideas. I imagine they'll list almost all the elements of a positive learning approach that I can imagine including the following:

• Read the directions carefully.
• Work together.
• Listen to each other.
• Take a logical approach.
• Use good process
• Keep your work organized.
• Chart your work using a list and/or notes.
• Ask questions when you don't understand
• Stay focused.
• A positive, can-do attitude.
• Goal setting.

Then I'll introduce the task, assign partners and work spaces, and tell them that I'll be walking around looking for evidence of the attributes of a positive learning approach..

Next I'll give students a few minutes to get started, and then I'll walk around the room writing down examples of successful approaches.

At the end of the lesson, rather than share the learning which we'll do tomorrow, I'll share the elements of a positive learning approach that I witnessed. I'll also ask students which learning approach elements helped them the most.

We'll complete a lot of "floor to ceiling" learning explorations in the days ahead and I want to support the best possible mindsets, activity, and learning possible. Today we'll begin that learning progression as we start a month of fraction exploration and study.