DMiC- Term 4
It’s going to be an exciting term. We had lots happening in Week One. The children were buzzing with excitement from day one. Team One children went on a school trip to the zoo. Prior to the trip, we discussed ‘Rules at the zoo’ and then children were looking at the zoo map tracking the animals, searching for the toilets and finding the rotunda where we were all going to meet up for lunch. This involved lots of conversation and rich vocabulary.
In the bus, on our way to the zoo, the children that I was sitting with were singing nursery rhymes. When they had enough of “The wheels on a bus go round and round” they did not know what to sing next. I looked around and saw some of the children in my class sitting close by. I said to him “ I have a problem for you. Will you help me solve it.
He looked wide-eyed all excited and said: “Yes, yes, so what's the problem?”
The problem is that: “There are 5 seats on the bus and if two children sit on each seat how many children are there altogether?
This sent a ripple effect to other children/parents sitting around us. I saw excitement, engagement, other children trying to listen, children explaining the problem to others, children popping their heads out and counting seats and children, I noticed some children using their fingers, and others just thinking. No classroom with- number charts, maths equipment, paper, and pens. Just us, sitting on a bus.
Everyone was engaged, trying to solve the problem with their buddies sitting next to them.
We could have solved about 3-4 problems before reaching the zoo.
We did more math problems on our way back home. This time it was a request from some children.
We did problems that involved doubling, counting in 2’s 5’s and 10’s.
It’s was a great day at the zoo seeing the animals but what really stood out for me was doing “DMiC on the bus”
The holiday drop off.
This affected half the children in my class. Week One was slow and painful. My priority learners struggled in all areas, Reading, Writing, and Maths. I thought that I could do some testing around maths knowledge but then gave up. Some children that have been learning over the holidays were able to continue with the learning from where we left off at the end of Term 3. Others struggled with their learning and behavior(tired, restless, grumpy) and I had to drop back a level.
What I plan to do over the next few weeks.
1. Do one DMiC lesson a week with everyone.
2. Have flexible groups and work on number knowledge- number identification, counting on, counting back, doubles, skip counting in 2’s up to 20 and arrays.
3. When children are not with me they will be doing follow up tasks consolidating on the learning from previous session- this could be on their iPads, in their books/worksheets and playing math’s games.
