how do you make Maths really engaging for yr 7 students?

Answer 1

Best of Luck your teaching.... It is a rewarding though challenging career.

To make any subject engaging to any student you need to:
1) know your stuff
2) be ready to admit it when you do not know your stuff
3) be engaged with the subject at hand yourself
4) make it relevant. as a really broad generalisation: if you are dealing with students from an elite suburb with well to do parents then the relevance of maths will be about making money and keeping money, if you are dealing with students from a welfare suburb then the relevance may be in knowing when they are ripped off and when they got a fair deal.
5) teach with your heart as much as with your head
6) reward the students who are trying to learn every time you experience them trying, whether they succeed or fail, reward them for being interested and making an attempt
7) use all of the skills you were at the receiving end of from teachers who managed to engage you in any subject
8) listen, really listen to what the kids are saying. For many of them that alone will be a really new experience.
9) like what you are doing and remind yourself when things are a bit tough that do like doing this and tough times, just like good times do pass sooner or later
10) teach them how to learn for themselves, where to find the information, how to discern good information from bad. you may never know the far reaching effects of this skill is but I will tell you of my experience so you can hang on to this image in the moments you wonder is it all worth it...

In sixth class I had a wonderful teacher, Mr Jory, who in his final year of teaching had a class of misfits from a blue collar suburb, I was one of those misfits. Mr Jory announced at the start of the year he was not going to teach us a darn thing alll year long, rather he was going to show us how to teah ourselves.
He taught us how to work from our text books and try to figure out what the new topic was and then attempt to answer the first few questions, then we were instructed to go to the answer section of the text book and mar our own work. If we discovered we had made a mistake we were permitted to rub out the error and write in the correct answer, then we were encouraged to work backwards from the answer to the question to try and figure out how it was arrived at.
He introduced us to calculators (they were very very new at the time) and showed us how to get the answer we needed and allowed us to use the calculators in tests, then when we got a good many questions wrong in the test he was able to demonstrate why we needed to use our heads and not the calculators to double check our work.
he made us question him. if we questioned him and we were right and he was wrong he reward us by telling us how smart we were to not accept his answer simply because he was the teacher. he told us to question the text books, we found three mistakes in the text book that was standard issue that year and he rewarded us by telling us how clever we were to be smarter than the whole education departmenr to find those errors.
he held various competitions throughout the year that we were not required to participatte in but we could participate if we wanted to, those who didnt want to participate in the beginning did join in later because it was fun
he taught us to think for ouselves
he taught us to play chess and other various games and I am sure when we won against him it was because he let us but at the time we just knew we had beat him.
At the years end, Mr Jory retired, we all went off to enjoy our last smmer holiday before starting high school
in my second year of high school I was thrown out of home and lived in limbo for a year, then went to live with my father who said I didnt need an education because I was a girl. In fact he did whatever it took to prevent me from attending school.
I found a secret pile of text books he did not know about and in quiet moments away from him I set about teaching myself everything from the basics of chemistry, algebra, and whateever else was contained in those various text books. I used Mr Jorys method of trying, then getting the right answer and then working backwards and it worked. I gave myself the education I wanted and needed by using these text books.

So if you want to know what you need to do as a teacher I would say your number one lesson plan should be teach the kids to learn for themselves and to question you, question the text books, question everything.

Answer 2

I would make sure that the lessons/activities are relevant to the students- ie. make it meaningful. If they see that the work they are doing is useful and not just busy computations, it will encourage them to put some more effort into it.

Also just because they are in yr 7, don't stop allowing them to use manipulatives, etc. [If you don't have the "fancy ones", any kind of counters will do- I use bingo or poker chips- super cheap]. I also read picture books in maths class- there are a growing number of books out there that deal with geometry, sequence, time and money, etc. for several grades, not just primary.

You can also give math some game aspects- perhaps prizes to those that attempt or finish a challenge problem. I like to start each class with a "Huh?" question- like a logic problem to get their minds working. Sometimes it is super easy, other times there are tricks to it. I give them time to work on it either individually or with a trusted partner- the first ones to finish with a good response [an explaination of how they did it, not just the answer] get a prize of some sort [small candy or sticker]. We always go over the problem together afterwards. I also try to make sure that the problems I use do not favour particular students so that all of them have chances on solving a problem once and awhile- it would ruin the whole exercise if one or two students always solved it first!

Once and awhile, change up the maths class to include a group game or activities where students can work together. I like to use a lot of cooperative learning, and the students like to teach and learn from each other.

Hope that gives you some useful ideas!

Answer 3

What IQ level are your special education students? I would suggest use games (indoor) to cover all operations and other areas- geometry, number, etc. There are many on the Net and all appeal to competitiveness of this age level. All hands on work- eschew writing down for a couple of weeks until you have them eating out of your hand....then you can take them outdoors and show them how maths is connected to outdoor games too

Answer 4

Check the KUMON system -- the most effective, inventive one since sliced bread. Trust me. It works magic not only on math but on overall apprenticeship and learning abilities.

Answer 5

Have your kid practicing maths when you are shopping. Ask him or her to count your items. Then have him or her count at the cashier.

You can also play cards or board games like cribbage, backgamon..

Cook with him or her. Mesuring ingredients is maths!!

Just make it fun :)