The students were working on a math packet today, because there was a substitute teacher in class. This is an excerpt from one of the packets. The students were supposed to figure out when it says "8 tens" what the actual number was. Then the students were to complete the subtraction problem. Most students did fine on this worksheet, but this particular student would sometimes do addition instead of subtraction. Number four, for example, instead of subtracting ten from sixty, she would add it. Then in problem number 5, she subtracted. Again on problem six she subtracted again. I don't really understand why she alternated on some problems doing subtraction and addition. This student just seemed to be confused.
While I was working with her, she would ask me step by step how to do a few of the problems. She was not very confident while answer the problems. I have noticed a lot of the student in my placement class have this issue. They have a low confidence and then tend to get the problems wrong. Once I help them and give them positive feedback, they tend to get more problems right. I think that if my MT would spend more time walking around and looking at what each student struggles with individually, they might improve in their math skills.
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What are some questions that you might ask the students as they are working to see / probe further into what they are thinking? (even if you didn't have the opportunity to do this, it is an important practice to try to think of the important questions to ask the students to support their exploration of the task and to further your understanding of their thinking)
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