![]() The first five years of a child’s life are considered the most critical for development, but learning opportunities lag for many children, particularly those from low-income households, said Robin Jacob, research associate professor and founder of U-M’s Youth Policy Lab. “So we had almost all kids on grade level before they left us, which was amazing,” she said. One year later, 70% of the students were performing at grade level. The hands-on, small-group program is being implemented for kindergartners and first graders at Randall and Myers schools in Taylor.īiddle said that results from the 2017-18 school year indicated that 50% of Randall’s kindergarten students were scoring at grade level by the end of the year. Liz Biddle, a school improvement coordinator for the Taylor School District in Wayne County, was the first to suggest trying High 5s, a math enrichment program developed by the University of Michigan to help close the achievement gap. “I’m really good at stinky socks,” said Colten McClure, 7. If they pull a stinky sock card, all the cards come down and the game begins again. Playing the game really helps me find out more math problems and, it’s really fun,” said Kendall Goins, 7.Īnother game the kids call stinky socks involves children hanging numbers on a clothesline in order from 1 to 20. After they answer, the teacher tells them to feed the card to the monster face attached to a plastic jar. “How did you know that?” the teacher asks. One young girl reads out her cards “10 plus five equals 15.” ![]() The cards feature chocolate chips that the kids count and then write their sums on a blank card. And the kids at Randall Elementary School in Taylor love it. It’s the educational equivalent of hiding vegetables in the macaroni and cheese. ![]() ![]() They’re playing “Chocolate Chip Count,” a game that will teach them basic math skills almost without them knowing it. TAYLOR-While groups of first graders work in clusters at pods around the classroom, four children face their teacher at a U-shaped desk, backs straight and eyes alert as she deals cards to each of them. So we’re gonna take that learning from the lower grades and continue to spread it up through so that it is building wide across the grades. This year, we have moved it into our first grade classes. It’s definitely given me a different tool in my toolbox. High Fives has definitely supported new thinking in the way that I teach math now. I’m really good at math, and I like the hard kind of questions.Īfter implementing the High 5s math program, Randall Elementary’s kindergarten math scores improved by 15% over the previous yearĪnd the University of Michigan is providing an opportunity to strengthen teacher efficacy in meeting students where they are and, most importantly, giving students the opportunity to own their learning. Through the High Fives program, I have seen our students show confidence in what they have learned. When a teacher asks a child to explain their mathematical thinking and to describe the strategy they used to solve a problem, that tells a child that their thinking is valued here in the math classroom, that their ideas matter. The string is actually kind of like a number line. So I think High Fives have really geared them to have that mathematical thinking and language. They like to explain their thinking now, they like to show me like, Hey, I did this and this is how I 1:37 lc both the “a” as shownĭid it, and this is why I did it, and this is how I got to this answer. It allows the teacher to really understand what children know and don’t know.Īndrew, you came up with that answer so fast. Small group work is really, really powerful. And if you get the stinky socks, you take all of them off. If you pick the even number, you hang it on the clothesline. There was these cards, there was dots on them, and we were pretending that they were chocolate chips to feed to the monster. We kind of get to sneak that in, and they have fun, they’re engaged. And so when they are learning, they don’t feel like they’re learning. And it is often taught in a way that makes kids feel anxious and not inspired, and so we wanted to have their early first experiences with math be something that was really joyful and exciting.Ĭhildren at this age love games. ![]() When I play math games with my teacher, they’re really, really fun and they help me learn. University of Michigan education researchers have developed a game-based program called “High 5s Math” that is helping teachers better understand each student’s needs and instill a lifelong love of math When kindergarteners aren’t successful, then you have academic and behavioral struggles. In Michigan, large class sizes can make it challenging for teachers to meet each child’s individual math learning needs ![]()
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