Interactive Monday -- Check your work

This is always a sore point for us teachers every year -- how to get the kids to actually check their work after a test. They know they're supposed to. They know that they should. They just don't want to. It's a lot like getting them to SHOW their work at the beginning of the year, but the struggle lasts a lot longer.

Before we take a test, I always ask the kids, "And what do you do when you're finished?" And they all respond, in full-on zombie mode, "Check your work." All this means to them is that when they raise their hand to tell me that they are done, that they need to add the phrase, "and I checked it,"-- in much the same way they feel the need to cover their nose with both hands when asking for a kleenex, or start doing the pee pee dance when asking to use the restroom.

This past week, I had kids insisting that they had checked their work carefully, yet when I glanced at it, not only were blatant errors obvious, but in some cases, there were whole problems that had not even been done!!

I'm tempted to tell the kid that Stevie Wonder could have done a better job of checking this test -- but then I realize that these kids have no idea who Stevie Wonder is.

Anyway, I'm trying something new this week. I have graded their tests from Friday, but I haven't put any marks on it. I am going to give the tests back to the kids and tell them that there are mistakes. I will not tell them which problems they got wrong. They are responsible for checking carefully and finding those mistakes, and then circling the problem number that they corrected.

It should be very interesting to see what this experiment yields. My HOPE is that the kids will find their mistakes and realize that this is what checking your work is really all about -- finding the mistakes and fixing them BEFORE turning the test in to be graded.

My FEAR is that I will get papers back where the student has changed a formerly correct answer to an incorrect one.

So my question to you is, what do YOU do to convince your kids to check their work carefully?

You're entitled to your opinion

Last Friday, I gave a Fact vs. Opinion test, and in my ever so humble opinion, there are several kids who just don't get it -- and that's a fact!

Apparently, "Broccoli tastes nasty!" is a fact to some. As is, "John Cena is awesome!"

Conversely, it is merely one's opinion that "One yard equals three feet," or that "There are 50 states in the USA."

Any Language Arts teachers out there have a great way of teaching fact vs opinion?

You have GOT to be kidding me

Yesterday, we gave an Objective 1 math test. Objective 1 covers most of the basics of mathematics -- all 4 operations, place value, putting numbers in order, rounding, counting money, and fractions.

There were 21 questions on the test. We did absolutely nothing else during class all day. We started the test as soon as the kids sat down. Some kids even worked on the test outside during our Friday recess time.

Still, I had 7 kids who did not finish the test. 2 of them only completed the first 14 questions.

I certainly do not want my kids to race recklessly through a test, answering without thinking, and trying to get done as quickly as possible. However, 2 and a half hours is more than enough time to complete 21 rather basic math questions. In each class, after 1 hour, I made an announcement that people not on at least question 10 were working too slowly and spending too much time on problems, and that they needed to work a little faster to finish on time. I then went around and cajoled individuals who were still on question 4 or 5. I announced a half hour remaining. I announced 20 minutes and then 10 minutes remaining. Did it speed these kids up? No, of course not.

Now, I find myself very torn on what to do. I am sorely tempted to count the unfinished problems incorrect and move on with Monday's plans. However, in addition to making for extremely low grades for those kids who did not finish, I also don't get a true feel for whether or not they actually CAN answer some of those later questions. But, if I devote class time on Monday to finishing, I have no doubt that the kids who only did 14 questions in 2 and a half hours will take the entire class time on Monday to finish -- if then!!

Anybody ever have this kind of experience? What do you do??

Bars, and Pictures, and Tallies, oh my!

We just ended the 2nd six weeks' grading period, and the last topic of research was graphs. Bar graphs, tally charts, pictographs, you name it.

It was a pretty fun topic to teach AND practice, and the kids seemed to be getting it pretty well. They really had no problem identifying the numbers that went with the bars, and little to no problem skip counting by whatever the key said on pictographs. Even early on, most seemed able to take some data and create their own graphs!

But then came the test yesterday. Despite the fact that we had looked at graph after graph, created graph after graph, made up question after question ABOUT said graphs, I still thought the results of the test were pretty disappointing.

Year after year, there is a question that merely asks "Sebastian had 16 of which type of coin?" Year after year, every single child correctly labels the bars on this graph -- 12 on the bar for quarters, 8 on the bar for dimes, 10 on the bar for nickels, and 16 on the bar for pennies. Year after year, more than a handful of kids choose quarters as their answer. Nevermind the fact that they themselves have written a "16" above the penny.

SO FRUSTRATING!!!

The last question of the test was a pictograph with pictures of boxes of pet food. The key stated that each picture represented 5 pets. Every child in my class correctly labelled the pictograph to show 45 dogs, 35 cats, etc, etc.

The question below asked "What is the total number of dogs that are pets in Juan and Carl's classroom?"

Almost 10 kids totally ignored the fact that they had written 45 next to the line for dogs and picked the answer "9" -- the number of pictures.

SO FRUSTRATING!!!

On the flip side, our 6-weeks' project was fun. The kids created a survey, polled other students, and then used that data to create charts and graphs. The end result was a large piece of construction paper divided into four sections. The first section was their original tally chart showing their topic ("Favorite _________") and the four choices, the second section was that data represented in bar graph form, the third section was the data in pictograph form, and the last section was three student-created questions about the data.

As per usual, the few kids who chose "Favorite Movies" as their topic chose 4 of the worst movies imaginable to survey fellow third-graders about. Movies like Saw IV, Halloween, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, etc. But other topics were fun, such as "Favorite book we've read," "Favorite Food," and "Favorite Teacher."

The graphs were good for the most part. But I was impressed with a lot of the questions being generated. Things like, "What is the difference in the number of blue and red?" And "How many kids were surveyed in all?"

Then, there were some questions that weren't exactly what I was looking for. One boy who had chosen "Favorite Cars" had these 3 questions:
1) How come everybody chose lamborginis?
2) Why didn't they choose the mustangs?
3) Nobody likes Cadillacs.

Hey, at least he was commenting on the data, right?