PEBC BLOG
Wendy Ward Hoffer
Phenomenal Teaching
We are happy to introduce you to Wendy Ward Hoffer’s fifth book, Phenomenal Teaching, forthcoming from Heinemann in 2020. This book details the PEBC Teaching Framework (formerly known as our Continuum), providing a wide range of examples and ideas to foster phenomenal thinking and learning in classrooms at all levels. […]
Read MoreMath: Why doesn’t yours look like mine?
Dear Parents, I know you have been wondering why our math does not look like your math. When you and I were kids, accurate and quick fact fluency was enough to deliver A’s on our report cards. Math has moved on: now, instead of merely memorizing multiplication tables, students are […]
Read MoreAgency = Unstuck
How to Get Unstuck. This is one of the most important lessons we can teach in school. Because the truth is, we all get stuck, all the time. Life is like that. And when we know how to get unstuck, we can move forward. But if we get stuck and […]
Read MoreEmpowering Problem Solvers
Santi had some cookies. His mom baked him 9 more. Now he has 16. How many cookies did Santi have to start? I recently watched some first grade mathematicians share their problem solving around this question. After some independent work time, the group gathered on the rug, and Betsy came […]
Read MoreCry for Meaning: Making Sense of Math
A literacy teacher shared with me about a recent reading conference with one of her second graders: the little girl sat diligently by her side, accurately pronounced aloud all the sentences across three pages of a Magic Treehouse book and then burst into tears, proclaiming loudly, “I said all the […]
Read MoreAddress the Common Core Standards for Mathematical Practice within a Math Workshop
Wendy Ward Hoffer Encourage students to become “unstuck” by utilizing strategies from the Minds on Math Institute on March 7-8th, 2017. Strategies You Can Implement for Deeper Comprehension Middle school math teacher Deb Maruyama is a shining example of teaching students to “Make sense of problems and persevere in solving […]
Read MoreClassroom Agreements
How will we treat each other, ourselves, our equipment, our time as learners? Shared agreements build community. We can intentionally create a classroom culture of mutual respect and collaboration by establishing, modeling, and holding all participants accountable to supportive agreements about how we learn together. You may already have such […]
Read MoreFour Steps for Getting Unstuck
Distinguish Productive Struggle from Despair When we raise the bar and ask learners to rise up with greater effort, we need to remain vigilant to their levels of frustration: productive struggle is one thing, but despair is entirely another. They look different: learners engaged in productive struggle are leaning in, […]
Read MoreTeaching Math for Understanding
793 X 10 = 7,930 793 x 100 = 79,300 793 x 1000 = 793,000 What do you notice about the above expressions? What is happening to each of the digits of 793? Write the zero rule for multiplication as you understand it? Explain why the zero rule for […]
Read MoreEffective Vocabulary Instruction in a Few Minutes Per Day
Wendy Ward Hoffer Particularly helpful to learners are instructional strategies that take students beyond word-definition memorization to engage them more fully with the concepts behind the terms (Harmon, Hedrick, and Wood 2005). Yet, since there will never be time enough in any subject in school to directly teach students all […]
Read MoreWhy Teach Vocabulary in Math?
Wendy Ward Hoffer 1,025,109.8 According to the Global Language Monitor, this is how many words are in the English language as of January 1, 2014. (Now I am not sure how a language can include four-fifths of a word, but let’s leave that aside for now.) Consider the vastness of […]
Read MoreWhy Teach Reading in Math?
Wendy Ward Hoffer Math and Reading Need Each Other Historically, designers of secondary schools, authors of standards, test writers, and teachers have somehow created and perpetuated a misconception: that reading and math are entirely separate “subjects” having little to do with one another, that one ought not to have to […]
Read MoreCurriculum As A Smörgåsbord
When I talk with math teachers about shifting their instruction toward math workshop, one common concern arises: How do I cover everything if I dive into only one or two juicy problems a day and spend all this time talking about our thinking? My answer: You won’t. You won’t cover […]
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