Learning Goals in Math - Update!

Today I went to school and I told my students about the debate I had on the weekend about whether or not we should be posting Learning Goals in Math before the lesson or during the Consolidation.

I asked them their opinion, thinking (of course), that they would agree with me because in the past they had told me how much they appreciate having those learning goals.  I was quite surprised by their responses.

One of my students confessed that he didn't think the learning goals helped him at all, he stated he never pays attention to them.  But the other students felt very strongly about those goals, and they said that they felt it would be better to post them during the Consolidation, or in their words - "in the middle, when we've figured out the Math."

One of my students said, "We may not figure out the learning goal that you wanted us to have, but that is okay.  We will still learn something, and this way you'll find out what we learnt."  I love the way they teach me how to be a better teacher every day!

So that is what we did for our Math class today, mind you, we were learning about adding fractions, so we weren't very far into our Minds On when they told me that they knew what the learning goal was.

One thing that I've really learnt this year is how important it is to give my students a voice.  They often amaze me with what they have to say.

Before our School Effectiveness Review, my principal asked us to ask the students what they thought about Learning Goals, Success Criteria and Descriptive Feedback.  Here are a few of their responses: