Why should educators care about cultivating a positive math mindset through inquiry in mathematics? There are many reasons. Having a positive math mindset not only helps student become more confident in math, it also allows them to prime their brains to think more effectively (Sparks, Sarah D., 2015). Increasing each child’s math mindset will make my entire unit of study more effective. Inquiry will lead to greater student understanding, and prepare students to successfully engage in the “4 Cs”: Creativity, Collaboration, Communication, and Critical Thinking. When students have a deeper level of discussion, they can make discoveries while talking about their thought process in solving problems which increases their understanding for how to solve problems ( James, Lorie, 2016). This is why it is important study how inquiry based instruction will help develop a positive math mindset and increase student performance on Bridges math assessments.
I will be doing this study with the students in my fourth grade classroom. I anticipate that my students will develop deeper inquiry skills when taught questioning strategies in mathematics. I predict that each child's math mindset will increase through teaching with positive math mindset principles, verbiage, and strategies. I anticipate that focusing on inquiry and a positive math mindset will increase student performance levels in the math curriculum Bridges, which is used by my school district (Napa Valley Unified). I intend to give my students a series of formal and informal assessments over a five week period. I will give different assessments at the beginning and end of this study. I will administer a math mindset survey, an inquiry assessment on levels of questioning, and a student performance pre-test and post-test from the Bridges math curriculum. I will compare the pre-tests and post-tests scores to evaluate if these methods of instruction were effective.
2 Comments
Tess Giner
10/27/2018 08:03:43 pm
It looks like you have done a lot of thinking around your subject. I'm excited for you. I think you'll be very pleased with all the hard work you're putting into research.
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Rafael Garcia Avila
10/28/2018 01:55:53 pm
Jennifer,
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