WMS Visit #8

Today the students at WMS were learning how to divide fractions. Building on their learning from last week, the teacher decided to create a “Do Now” worksheets focusing on problems the students struggled the most with during the previous week. The two main sources of confusion for the students revolved around changing mixed numbers to improper fractions and further multiplying, as well as dividing fractions with mixed numbers. The teacher allowed students to have some private think time to develop some ideas on how to respond to the two questions on the paper, but it was clear that the students were still very confused. The teacher ended their think time, and began going over some algorithms and corresponding diagrams for the problems. However, the overall confusion of the students persisted. It was not until the teacher used visual materials and fraction magnets from around the room that the students really became engaged in their learning, and began to understand the mathematics behind multiplying and dividing fractions.

The teacher ended up relating the problem (where the students were dividing fractions) to baking. She explained that in order to make this batch of cookies she would need 1¼ cups of flour, but she only had a ½ cup for measuring. Thus, she asked how many half cups would she need to measure 1¼ cups of flour. She used beakers and a bowl to demonstrate the problem which proved to be a good visual but not entirely effective for the students’ understanding. She then shifted to using equivalent size fraction magnets. The magnets are rectangles and signify equivalent fractions. There is a 1 associated with the largest magnet, and underneath this magnet are two ½ magnets which when combined are equivalent to the 1 (or the whole) magnet. The magnets went all the way down to 16 little 1/16 magnets which when added together equal the entire 1 magnet. When she placed the ½ magnets underneath the 1¼ magnets, it was clear that a light bulb went off in each of the students heads as they began to understand the concepts.

The utilization of visuals is sometimes completely essential for success within a classroom and corresponding topics. The students had diagrams, charts, and algorithms on their papers, but they still were not fully grasping the concepts. However, the beaker visual combined with the fractional magnets proved to be an extremely beneficial visual for the students. It allowed me to witness a teacher persevering through a very challenging lesson with low student engagement and understanding, but persisting nevertheless and utilizing many teaching methods to arrive at a teaching style that was effective to the students understanding of the topic. This taught me not only to utilize a variety of resources and teaching methods within the classroom, but also to never give up when teaching because there is always a way to break through to the students and further their understanding!