Integration?

One of the problems with math is that it's done in isolation.  Math is so language based and so easily ties into science, social studies, arts and physical education, yet we so often set it aside, or make the integration of it a special event.  In the real world, it's not a special event - math is everywhere, like it or not.  We don't jump up and down when the cashier at Tim Horton's gives us the correct change, or when we're able to calculate the tip at a restaurant, or the taxes on a piece of clothing we REALLY want to buy, but might not have enough cash for.  So, why is math so isolated at school?

I don't have an answer.  All I can guess is that somewhere along the way, while training children to work in factories in the 1800's, it was determined that learning in isolation was the easiest way to train people.  Yes, it does work - look at all of us - we can do it.  But that doesn't mean it's fine, or the best option.  I think we need to constantly look for more opportunities for those "special events" and make math a regular part of every other subject, just as language is the base of every other subject.

I've been to workshops on integrating math in gym, and have seen perfect examples of how to do it with social studies (data management! year calculation!) ... it's so well blended into science, but we're still scared to make that transition out of saying that it's time for math, then science, then language, into saying that it's time to think and learn.  Instead of integrating learning, why aren't we simply learning?

I'm still experimenting, and will be for a few years, but my goal is to layer not just math expectations together - I want to layer different strands of math into every other subject, and to run learning blocks instead of subjects.  

Here's one way I am starting to experiment with this (let me preface it by saying that I'm still new to it, and it isn't yet a regular thing - but when I do run things like this, it isn't a special event; it's just time to learn):

Students investigate their sunflower.

I was cleaning up the yard last week when I got looking at the sunflowers.  As I cut them down, I realized I could save a ton of money on seeds next year by harvesting these.  So I grabbed a few of the sunflower "heads" and got to work.  I was amazed at the textures inside of the plant, but also at the patterns I was seeing.  It hit me that this would be a great way to wrap up our focus on patterning as a problem solving strategy, since we had already completed the assessment piece anyway.

This group pulled out a ruler to do some measuring.

I filled a bag with enough heads to share with the groups, and I asked the class to first make some observations.  It was a bit of a mind bender at first - you want us to do what? But I don't see anything!  But eventually, as they started to make diagrams and count, math was working its way into my science lesson.  I call it a lesson, but let's call a spade a spade a spade - I didn't teach a darn thing.  They did all of the work.  When I asked them trade off sunflowers ... now that's when it got really interesting.  This was the engagement moment.  They were hooked.  They started comparing things.  They started going back to the last flower to observe things they'd missed.  They started turning the flowers over to find patterns in the leaves, and they pulled out seeds to look at patterns making up the seeds.  They looked at the numbers of seeds.

Look at how engaged these boys are.  3 kids working with one flower?  Success!

Was this challenging, mathematically, for my grade five students?  Quite frankly, no.  But they were using the language of math, and using their eyes and minds to make observations.  The dialogue was rolling.  That was my goal: see what they can see.  It was challenging for them to look at something with very little direction, and to find some learning.  To that end, I believe it was worth it.

When I asked them to tear the sunflowers apart, and make observations about the insides - well that was just fun.  Educational fun, of course. ;)

We harvested all of the seeds to plant in the spring.  We'll be able to refer back to these moments now for more problems and problem-building (yes, I believe in challenging the kids to make their own problems, but we'll get to that later).  We'll also be able to talk about the experience when we talk about accountable group work.

That's one happy mathlete! 

This student's observations were more scientific than mathematical.  Is that okay?  Yes!

I know that you are reading this blog for math ideas and questions, and maybe this entry isn't as focused as you might have expected.  But, I think it's important to address the reality that math isn't always going to be focused - it needs to be messy and abstract as much as it needs to be focused and finite.  The experience creates the culture, and in exposing the kids to something from their own worlds (in this case, sunflowers from my garden) and letting them take an hour (yep, we spent an hour on it) to indulge into some serious thinking and observing, we're making math worth their time.  I rarely hear kids say that they hate math or suck at math anymore.  That's something worth thinking about.