BCAMT Reads

Is it to talk about the successes and challenges of implementing practical ideas in your classroom? Or, is it to broaden your philosophical understanding of or personal relationship with mathematics? Is it both? Is it something else?

Some titles, such as Becoming the Math Teacher You Wish You’d Had and Necessary Conditions, are all-encompassing and, as such, will need to be discussed over many months. Others, like Number Sense Routines and Open Middle are more narrowly focussed and lend themselves to shorter “learning sprints.” Decide how often you will come together. Try to find your team’s “Goldilocks” schedule: enough time for each member to read the next chapter, but not so much time that the momentum of the group is lost.

Book clubs are successful when participants follow mutually agreed upon expectations. Beyond social norms, these might include reading the designated section prior to each meeting, trying a task or practice from a previous chapter, or sharing samples of students’ mathematical thinking related to the reading.

If possible, take turns serving as the “host” of each meeting. Organizing and leading every meeting can be a bit too much to ask of a single–already busy–colleague.

Most professional learning titles contain reflection or discussion questions, either within the book itself or through a companion website. Choose one or two questions; there won’t be time to answer them all! Alternatively, pose one of the following sets of questions (and don’t shy away from repeating them at different meetings):

• What did you try from this chapter? What did you learn–about your students as mathematicians or about yourself as a mathematics teacher–from this experience?
• What’s one quote that popped out to you? Is this something with which you agree, with which you might argue, or to which you aspire? What are some connections you are making between this quote and your practice?