Engaged, kinesthetic, real-life experiences in today’s math classrooms rarely outnumber paper and pencil, textbook-driven instruction. It’s hard to find the time this kind of delivery requires. However, Santa Barbara Middle School (SBMS) has found a way to make authentic learning opportunities the norm in its math classrooms.
Santa Barbara Middle School’s uniquely structured untethered math program places students in homogeneous math classes based on students’ competence and skill level, unlike the more traditional method, which typically groups students by grade level.
This structure, as well as the smaller class size, allows for math instruction that can pivot away from textbook instruction and take advantage of authentic problem-solving scenarios. SBMS students find themselves regularly engaged in hands-on math instruction that makes sense for their particular level of understanding.
In Erin Riley’s 7th grade math classes, students just completed an introductory unit on financial literacy. Learning to set and stay within a budget, decipher paycheck stubs, understand taxes, and investigate credit card interest rates are some of the skills students explored as they prepare to enter the workforce for the school’s upcoming Career Study Week.
During Career Study Week, teachers will remain on campus hosting student, teacher, parent conferences while SBMS students will learn the internal workings of the business and nonprofit communities. Students will enter the Career Study Week experience mathematically attuned.
Graphing linear equations recently took on the form of a human graph on the SBMS basketball court. By adding a layer of drone-video technology, students were able to “see” the pattern created by their t-tables literally come to life.
Asked about this approach to math instruction, Michael Jaeger, 8th-grade compaction math instructor, said, “This kind of experience creates a personal, concrete connection to the learning. It is learning in real time, and students are able to see instantly where they have made errors and can then self-correct.”
UCSB’s Math Circles is a graduate study program that explores abstract mathematical thinking for middle school-aged students. This year it is focused on “female-identified” middle school students.
Their mission is “to give the young women of Santa Barbara an opportunity to meet like-minded individuals who also share their love of math.” Their hope is to “build a community that will give these students role models and support the students’ desire to pursue mathematics in the future.”
The UCSB Math Circles group will host a team of SBMS girls for a second session next week. The first session had girls creatively exploring cryptology and codes; next week’s session will bring together students from all over the city to untangle the math and science behind game theory.
“Learning happens everywhere we go,” is a motto Santa Barbara Middle School upholds. An example of this is in their approach to active, real math instruction, both in the classroom and beyond.
— Sue Carmody for Santa Barbara Middle School.