Friday, 18 August 2023

Profiling my target learners

My target learners for this teaching as inquiry are at different achievement levels for maths. My class is split into two mixed ability groups for maths. I had to move some students into the group I will be focussing on to make this target group. I have based my selection of my target learners on my observations in the attitude of students towards maths, strengths and challenges in learning maths. There are some students in this target group who I have noticed are often absent. It would be interesting if this teaching as inquiry would change the attendance of these students. 

The assessment data for the students supports that they are all at different achievement levels for maths. I have collected data from PAT Maths and Gloss as those are the assessments we carry out for maths in our school. I have indicated next to the students' name their year levels as well. Looking at the summative data, I have identified some students did well in the Gloss test such as RL Y8, but this particular student did not pass the PAT Maths test scoring only 12/41. None of the Year 7s in my target group passed the PAT Maths test. 

Student voice is also another form of profiling I have conducted of my target group. I used a google form for this and the data I collated from the google form is really interesting. Below are the responses from the students. 






The question which really stood out for me in this data collection were the responses from the students about their friends being better in maths than themselves. This is emphasising the hunch that I have, that students do not identify themselves as confident in maths and often highlight the strengths of their friends instead. I was also surprised when I collated the responses in the same google form, where students listed who they thought were good mathematicians in the class. Many of the students listed by their peers did not identify themselves as being confident in maths. 

I am questioning if the students are being modest about their abilities or if they truly believe they are not achieving well in maths. This also highlights the question if I am giving the students enough feedback to inform them of their progress in maths. 

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