Participation in the Classroom

[JasMath33]

I am teaching summer school this year in math. Our summer school is only 12 days and is only available to students who have failed the class. When looking at the requirements for teachers this year, I noticed one thing was each teacher is going to be required to add in a participation grade. I asked around about this and it is based on your own guidelines. I am planning on flipping this classroom a little bit. I am going to have the students take a pretest. From this, I am going to be able to determine what they already know and what they still need help with. I am then going to set up a daily schedule for them with what they need to accomplish and a quiz at the end of each day for me to use as guidance on if they need more practice or not. I have come up with this little rubric to use and would love to have some advice on what others may have used or what I could possibly do to make it better.

Here is what I was working on:

5 – Did all required work correctly
4 – Attempted all required work but all was not done correctly
3 – Attempted the work, but did not complete 1 topic
2 – Attempted the work, but did not complete 2 topics
1 – Attempted the work, but did not complete any of the topics
0 – Did none of the required work

On a given day they will have anywhere from 2 or more topics. They only have 12 days to cover the whole year and are with me for 4 hours a day. They will be given a little individual lesson and then will be set out to work on some examples. I will then come back and check the work. I will give it back for them to correct if mistakes. They will be able to ask any questions on the lessons and practice problems. I was thinking this could be my participation scale because I will already be checking the work.

 

[ProfuselyQuarky]

That's pretty much what my math teachers all use as participation. The only other difference is that participation also includes arriving at class on time. If the syllabus says that the class begins as 9:00, then 9:01 is considered late. Also, full homework credit is still given as long as the students set up their problems properly and show that they understand the subject matter. If there's a mistake because of calculation error (e.g. mistake in the side addition or multiplication), we still get full credit. Of course, the solutions do matter during end-of-chapter tests, midterms, finals, etc. Math is a bit different than science/English/foreign language classes, I think, because there's nothing really hands-on (class participation) to do other than solving problems on paper/white board.

12 days to complete a years worth of math? That's crazy! And I thought completing a year's worth of math in six weeks was bad. That's way too much learning in such a little amount of time. What math is it?

 

[Andy Resnick]

Our summer school is only 12 days <snip>

Is that a typo? You are describing something more like "boot camp" than summer school. How many students will you have? Is the participation component a separate grade, or a percentage of the total possible points? Your flipped classroom approach is good and your rubric is reasonable. It may be possible to make some of the day's assignments 'small group work' and have groups present their material on the board for everyone else.

Good luck...

 

[ProfuselyQuarky]

Is that a typo?

I thought so, too, but he wrote the same thing twice.

 

[JasMath33]

That's pretty much what my math teachers all use as participation. The only other difference is that participation also includes arriving at class on time. If the syllabus says that the class begins as 9:00, then 9:01 is considered late. Also, full homework credit is still given as long as the students set up their problems properly and show that they understand the subject matter. If there's a mistake because of calculation error (e.g. mistake in the side addition or multiplication), we still get full credit. Of course, the solutions do matter during end-of-chapter tests, midterms, finals, etc. Math is a bit different than science/English/foreign language classes, I think, because there's nothing really hands-on (class participation) to do other than solving problems on paper/white board.

12 days to complete a years worth of math? That's crazy! And I thought completing a year's worth of math in six weeks was bad. That's way too much learning in such a little amount of time. What math is it?

Well there is four different math classes I could teach. I could teach Algebra 1, Geometry, Algebra 2, and a Pre-Algebra 2 class. I am teaching the Pre-Algebra 2 class which is geared towards students who need more help with algebra skills needed in Algebra 2. We use to do 4 weeks, but this year my school wanted to try having 2 sessions so students could get more recovery credits, so they cut the time in half and did 2 sessions where students could take classes. So I will be teaching 2 different sessions with different students in each.

 

[JasMath33]

Is that a typo? You are describing something more like "boot camp" than summer school. How many students will you have? Is the participation component a separate grade, or a percentage of the total possible points? Your flipped classroom approach is good and your rubric is reasonable. It may be possible to make some of the day's assignments 'small group work' and have groups present their material on the board for everyone else.

Good luck...

No it is not a typo. Our schools summer school use to only be 4 weeks, but this year they are trying something different. Students will have 12 days to learn a class they previously failed and after those 12 days they can take another course to hopefully get they credits recovered. I think it is short too. I will have 5 in my first 12 days and then 3 in my second 12 days. Participation will only be a percentage of the total possible points. I am going to have daily topics we will get through and have the students work on the components of them they struggle with. I will then go student to student working on what they need a lesson on and then having them work on the material. If someone else is working on it, I am going to allow them to work with someone else to help them if they want. At the end of class, the students will then take a quiz to give me another look into what they know or don't know yet.

 

[Andy Resnick]

No it is not a typo. Our schools summer school use to only be 4 weeks, but this year they are trying something different. Students will have 12 days to learn a class they previously failed and after those 12 days they can take another course to hopefully get they credits recovered. I think it is short too. I will have 5 in my first 12 days and then 3 in my second 12 days. Participation will only be a percentage of the total possible points. I am going to have daily topics we will get through and have the students work on the components of them they struggle with. I will then go student to student working on what they need a lesson on and then having them work on the material. If someone else is working on it, I am going to allow them to work with someone else to help them if they want. At the end of class, the students will then take a quiz to give me another look into what they know or don't know yet.

Ok.. sort of like an intensive tutoring program? Do you have something like a syllabus and if so, was it given to you or did you have freedom to pick the topics? If a student is particularly struggling with something, can you give them the time to master it, or do you have to keep shepherding them along?

5 and 3 students is very manageable, but given the extreme brevity and intensity, make sure you take extra effort to create a positive classroom environment as soon as possible- if the students don't know each other, taking a few minutes for everyone to get to know each other will be very useful. I'm not sure if students working quietly by themselves is optimal, try doing some regular group work, maybe some kind of extended problem where they each have a piece and need to work together to fit all the pieces.

I like the pre-test an post-test approach, that's good assessment technique.

 

[JasMath33]

Ok.. sort of like an intensive tutoring program? Do you have something like a syllabus and if so, was it given to you or did you have freedom to pick the topics? If a student is particularly struggling with something, can you give them the time to master it, or do you have to keep shepherding them along?

5 and 3 students is very manageable, but given the extreme brevity and intensity, make sure you take extra effort to create a positive classroom environment as soon as possible- if the students don't know each other, taking a few minutes for everyone to get to know each other will be very useful. I'm not sure if students working quietly by themselves is optimal, try doing some regular group work, maybe some kind of extended problem where they each have a piece and need to work together to fit all the pieces.

I like the pre-test an post-test approach, that's good assessment technique.

I was able to create a syllabus, but I do have to cover the topics taught in the regular class throughout the school year. I am doing he pre-test so I only have to cover the topics the students need. I don't want them to have to work on a topic they already know. Each student will be getting different topics based on their individual needs. If students are working on the same thing, they will be able to work together and help each other out. I was thinking of creating a problem of the day for each day and the students have to work together to answer it. It will be a topic they already were taught or that days topic and each person will have a problem to solve. The first persons answer will go in a blank for the second and then the second persons answer will go in the third persons blank and then at the end they will have to solve a final problem and use the finals persons answer in the blank. Then as long as they see the answer on the door and it is correct, I thought I could tell them they could leave. Use it as an exit slip idea.

 

[Mark44]

Also, full homework credit is still given as long as the students set up their problems properly and show that they understand the subject matter. If there's a mistake because of calculation error (e.g. mistake in the side addition or multiplication), we still get full credit.

I was harder on my students than this. I gave them partial credit if they made a calculation error, but otherwise seemed to have a good grip on things, but I never gave full credit for an incorrect answer. One instructor I had in college was even more hard-nosed, saying that he gave credit for correct answers, and zero credit for incorrect answers.

12 days to complete a years worth of math? That's crazy! And I thought completing a year's worth of math in six weeks was bad.

I agree. This doesn't sound to me like a recipe for success for most of the students. If a student passed the first semester, but not the second (which is probably more likely than the reverse scenario), he or she would have to compress 18 weeks of material into 12 days. If you "do the math" that's 1.5 weeks of material per day for 12 days straight.

 

[ProfuselyQuarky]

I was harder on my students than this. I gave them partial credit if they made a calculation error, but otherwise seemed to have a good grip on things, but I never gave full credit for an incorrect answer. One instructor I had in college was even more hard-nosed, saying that he gave credit for correct answers, and zero credit for incorrect answers.

Good for me that you're not my teacher, then . To be mildly fair, though, our midterms and finals add up to 60% of our final grade so a bunch of students really depend on homework credit. When math teachers notice that a student isn't doing so well with their homework, they make them come to math support for (usually) one-on-one tutoring.

Partial credit is very fair, I think. That's what my physics teacher did. He only gave full credit if the problems were done 100% correct. Zero credit for answers...I've never encountered that (disregarding multiple choice tests), but I'm still in high school, so that doesn't really count.

I agree. This doesn't sound to me like a recipe for success for most of the students. If a student passed the first semester, but not the second (which is probably more likely than the reverse scenario), he or she would have to compress 18 weeks of material into 12 days. If you "do the math" that's 1.5 weeks of material per day for 12 days straight.

Well, when I took Algebra 2 in the summer last year (in an effort to meet the prerequisite for physics the following year) it was 36 weeks into 6 weeks. That's pretty much doing a week's worth of math daily, six days a week for about two months.

I'd say that a 12 day trimester is unhealthy, too.