"Um Eugene, there are other kids in a different Google Meet..."
Bother.
Last week I thought I would try to run a DMIC maths lesson through a Google Meet. My previous meets had all been to check in with student wellbeing and make sure everyone was safe and happy. We played games, shared arts and crafts, and met pets. As the Covid-19 Lockdown continued I decided that I needed to run a maths lesson, if only for myself to see if it can be done.
My TimeLine:
- Create a Google Form for students to sign into the lesson
- Make sure responses are emailed to me too
- Use the banner function on our class site to advertise the lesson this time
- include a button that links the Google Form
- Await responses
- Plan lesson
- most respondents were Year 6 students, so I planned a level 3 multiplication lesson
- Prepare Google Meet Breakaway spaces for groups
- Prepare a Google Slide for sharing key information
- Prepare a Jamboard for collaboration
- Host lesson
- Split-screen Google Meet and Jamboard
- Record with Quicktime
So what happened?
Nine students signed up for my maths lesson. I was hoping for twelve. On the day only six arrived, and two of those were students who asked if they could join during my earlier wellbeing Google Meet.
I had created the Hangout in my Calendar to be organised. However, I had also given out a nickname for this Google Meet. This created two separate video conference. This was a fortunate accident. The boys all ended up in the Meet from the calendar, and the girls all used the nickname Meet. I found that I could participate in both, however, the girls could not hear the boys and visa versa.
I shared the Jamboard and gave the students a chance to play. One student got very silly so we quickly moved on to the lesson expectations and norms. This is connected to the DMIC Mathematical Practices and Communication Framework. My silly student quickly settled. One of the norms my students did not mention was to share their thinking. I have to remember this for the next lesson.
We moved on to the question:
One day during lockdown Molly started to count cars driving down Marine Parade. She counted 13 cars in the morning, and 28 cars in the afternoon. How many wheels were on the cars she counted altogether?
One student (there is always one), very vocally started to solve the problem. He was reminded to let everyone have a chance to work out the problem.
During a normal DMIC lesson, we would spend time unpacking the question. I would get students to revoice parts of the story, and then others to repeat it. When I tried to get students to tell me the story they went silent. Eventually, two were able to state what the numbers were and what they had to work out. I did all the repeating because the two groups could not hear each other.
Each group then had a page from the Jamboard to work out the problem. Again there was silence. I noticed that many were using paper to solve it individually. After about 3-5 minutes of silence, the students started to share their thinking. One boy was very good at getting his buddy to add detail, asking questions and making him think. Two girls had a similar strategy and could connect them.
We regrouped and made connections to our thinking. I noticed that both groups had used repeated addition (41+41+41+41, 82+82, 82+41+41), but they could also connect multiplication to the problem.
Reflection
- Classroom norms and digital norms about communication and expectations are very different
- These students were not very forthcoming initially - how to get them to converse and share during the Google Meet? Is it just practice and the students need to become more comfortable? Do they forget that other people are there and that they are expected to speak?
- Is Google Meet the best format for a digital lesson like this? I know Zoom has breakout spaces but has security issues. Today's breakout spaces were a happy accident.
- I used Quicktime to record my screen so I would have a record of this, but it did not work. Is there a time limit to recordings? This is frustrating because every time I want to record a Google Meet my computer crashes or fails.
Here is our Jamboard for the lesson:
Also, here is a recent painting. This is the moon rise on Brighton Beach before a storm.
