Hegarty Maths and active dialogue

I have to admit when I was told that we were getting Hegarty Maths and we all had to do it, I was a little resistant. Initial thoughts were, not another thing I have to do! I already do so much! I will also fight tooth and nail to protect my learners from additional work too. I was not on board with this new Hegarty Maths! After speaking to Mr Hegarty himself, I began to see the benefit for the learner and for me. This blog post is about Hegarty but it can be about any platform that marks student work, you will see! 

When I started teaching we set all student homework on My Maths. It was great they did a little online worksheet, it told me who got the highest so that I could give them a good comment on SIMS, and who didn’t do it on time so that I could give them a bad comment on SIMS, and those that didn’t do very well on it. These learners would either have taken less than 2 mintues to complete or they were genuinely struggling and you could pick this up with them in class. It was great, no books to mark on the weekend at home! Perfect!

Hegarty Maths can be used in a similar way. Learners log in, see the tasks that I have set them, watch a video to explain the topic to them and attempt a quiz on the topic. It gives them a mark, I can view the class as a whole, see who has done it, who hasn’t, how long they spent doing it and so on. I still don’t have any books to mark at home! Perfect!

Yet as I have progressed through my career I have realised that these platforms have the opportunity to provide so much more! The benefit for the learner is that instant gratification from getting it correct. The opportunity for them to further research the topic by going to the video before or after to either re-cover the basics or extend their knowledge. A bank of videos for all topics so if they want to pre-teach themselves something they think they may struggle with is a great tool as well.

The benefit to me is that I don’t have lots of marking, but I do have lots of opportunities for feedback! For me, my purpose is to have an active dialogue with my learners, to engage and enthuse them. See my post on feedback. Hegarty Maths is great for promoting an active dialogue. Learners can leave me comments as they progress through tasks. One student left me 57 comments one week. I read every single one. I will give you a small flavour of what she wrote:

“Don’t get this”

“I tried to put 5 but it wouldn’t let me”

“I see I should have times it first”

“Think I know where I went wrong”

“Nope not getting it”

I like this as an example because as a teacher I can see what she went on during the task. She had to overcome that initial frustration at the task, then she followed some of it, still getting it wrong. Then she lost it again.  I can respond to each of these comments individually or as an overall feedback. Ultimately what I want to say to her is well done for getting stuck in, it must have been hard. I want to say well done for keeping going even though she was getting it wrong. I want to spend some time with her going over it again to show her where she went wrong. I want to set her the previous topic as a refresher before she comes back in and we go over this task again together in class. This was my reply:

“Wow! What a journey you went on, well done for sticking with it! I think we need to take another look at this together to make sure we have it solidly in our memory bank. Can you take a look at task 87 (I have set it for you now) then bring your notes in for this and task 87 and we can go back over it together. Thank you for giving 100% to this”

Yes it is brilliant that Hegarty Maths and other online platforms take away the tick and flick element for me but time saving they are not. Nor should they be, it is our job to educate and converse with learners and help shape their learning together through an active dialogue.

Google Forms

In my quest to be better at giving feedback I am willing to give anything a try! I make no apologies I am a Google Certified Trainer so Google is my thing. You can recreate this in Microsoft Forms I am sure but Google is what I know. I wanted my learners to go over what they had done wrong in an exam independently. I had a class of 30 with 3 papers to go through and a variety of questions answered incorrectly across the board. I decided to go down the route of Google Forms to get feedback and next steps all done in one lesson. 

I chose 3 key questions from each paper, 9 in total. I marked the papers at home, entered them into my analysis grid and chose my 9 questions that were fairly red on the analysis grid. I had in my mind a choose your own ending scenario, like the Goosebumps books from my childhood! The form starts with instructions, assumptions are the enemy of a teacher. The instructions ask the learner to have the 3 papers, some paper to make notes, headphones etc. Question 1 asks “Did you achieve 5 marks for question 14 on paper 1?” The options are yes or no. The question was 5 marks for drawing a pie chart and a comparison between a pie chart and a bar chart. If the student answers no on the Google Form it takes them to a video on You Tube (Corbett maths) covering drawing pie charts. This is achieved with the After This Section Move to (‘After section’) part of Google Forms. If a student did get 5 marks on the question the form would take them to another section with a video on interpreting pie charts. After those videos the learner is given a question on what they have watched on the video, the question self marks as it is written as a multiple choice. The learners are then reunited on the Google Form and it asks again about another of my 9 questions, again with a yes or a no route. 

There are a few things I learnt through this process. First 9 questions was too much and too long. The next time I used a Google Form for feedback I only chose 3 questions and it ran smoother. Second thing that I learnt was that learners will sit quite happily watching videos about the topics. I wanted a way to harness this and assess them more robustly during their peak engagement with the videos. I discovered EdPuzzle, you can read more about it my experiences with EdPuzzle in my next blog. Third thing that I learnt is learners enjoyed the experience and that they could go back over things at their own pace.

I am never a fan of doing something for the sake of it. At the time of writing this Esports is everywhere and I am yet to see the benefit to my learners so I am not on board, for now! A while back QR codes were everywhere, Every worksheet, poster, display and staircase, yes staircase! I was a little late to the QR code game, it took me a while to find a place that was meaningful for me and my learners! A really nice way I found was to use it in a feedback sheet. I took the idea that students liked watching videos and were willing to work at their own pace via this medium. I created a table with the 9 questions and added 2 QR codes. One linking the learner to the video drawing pie charts and the other QR code linking learners to the video on interpreting pie charts. The point of Google Forms and the QR code sheet is to engage the learner with taking next steps or guiding them to recover topics they need to look back over. Both ways were successful in this aim. Successful in students making progress?, I have no clear answer but we try these things and build on them, I am still building!

Another use of Google Forms I have used in maths is as mini assessments. I was tasked with reducing the marking workload of the maths teachers for a LARGE number maths learners. The team wanted a 30 minute assessment on the topics covered to far that was robust and akin to GCSE. I cut and paste images from Exam Wizard and Exam Pro (both exam boards were used so I ended up making 2 assessments!) I would then make 4 choices on a multiple choice question. I was fascinated by Mr Barton’s Diagnostic Questions and the idea that you can diagnose a misconception. An example would be an averages question asking for the median of a data set. Option 1 would be correct, option 2 would be the mode, option 3 would be the mean, option 4 would be the median but using unordered data. The aim being that if the learner chose the mode or the mean you can assume the learner doesn’t know the difference between the 4 types of averages. The learner who chooses option 4 knows the median is the middle value but forgot to order the data. They need teaching differently to the learner who can calculate averages correctly. One needs practise on the language of the question, the other needs to practise median. This is a very crude example but I hope I make my point.

In my 30 minute assessment using Google Forms I made all the questions multiple choice. I enjoyed finding misconceptions. Using the incorrect trigonometry ratio, listing a highest common factor when we were looking for a lowest common multiple, it was great fun! Once the responses are in the Google Form you can direct them to a Google Sheets. From here we can mark them correct or incorrect using IF formulas. We can then RAG rate the student’s work. Staff appreciated the reduced marking, but challenged the use of multiple choices. Ideally free text would have been better but I couldn’t see a way to mark it automatically this way. If the answer was vertically opposite angles are equal learners could have made spelling mistakes that would have been marked correct if the spelling was logical. In a later blog I will talk about Equatio, a potential solution to this.

The advantages of using Google Forms in this way was that we could batch upload student results to our student data system. When it came to assessment time again 6 weeks later we could see progress within the areas assessed. Problems arose when staff got ahead or fell behind the scheme of work. Students felt under prepared. Nothing will ever be perfect but we are making strides in the right direction. If this has peaked your interest and you want to know more about my use of Google Forms, please get in touch. My plan is to write an ebook at some point about them in great detail...

Analysis Grids

I make no apologies I LOVE an analysis grid! I love it per question, I love it per topic, I love it conditional formatted.  Love it RAG rated. I love it all. 

This is a snapshot of a number assessment for one of my groups. I can instantly see I need to go over dividing fractions for a few of them and maybe adding fractions as a starter as well. We have been using these in departments since I began teaching. The revelation of Google Sheets and that everyone can be on the same document together avoiding the need for you to wait for Miss Haans to input her results before she sends the Excel sheet to you has been transformational. I encourage all of my student teachers to use an analysis grid regularly, it easily informs your teaching at a glance. If you are looking for a start activity, check out your most recent analysis grid and it will tell you an amber topic for most that may need recovering. Likewise if someone comes to see you teach, and they ask how do you know what they need to cover the analysis grid shows them.

Great, we as teachers have a lovely coloured sheet that informs our teaching. Sorted! What about our learners? Is it just for us? Is it a secret? I give my learners their analysis grids too! They can quickly see where they need to put their revision efforts. Obviously I don’t share the whole class grid with individuals. I will add in some QR codes to Corbett maths videos as well so that learners can watch a video on a topic that they need to work on. Learners can see their grid, see their amber areas and search the topic on Hegarty Maths and give it a go. 

One of the biggest challenges I face around revision time is helping learners understand what the topic is called. They see it as a tiling the wall problem whereas we know it as a percentage discount and area with money problem. Do we expect them to know that? Do we tell them that is what they would look up if they wanted to revise it? The analysis grid does. Especially the ones made by the exam board. It gives them the complicated long name that we are very used to as staff. It gets learners used to seeing what we are looking for in their answers. 

An analysis grid is not the only opportunity for this. I like to (like is a bit strong, I do it because I believe it benefits my learners, I don’t like doing it!) cut and paste the title of the topic from the analysis grid into a text box in the exam paper so that as the learner completes the exam paper they can see what the topic is that they are being assessed on and research it if necessary. This takes a long time, especially with a question with parts a,b,c,d,e and f! But I think it genuinely benefits learners by allowing them to be a bit more independent in their revision and think about what topics they want to learn more about.

EdPuzzle

I moved into an Ed tech role 2 years ago. I am not an expert in ed tech and actually a lot of my maths lessons are dull and very non techy, I think that’s what makes my colleagues willing to listen to me when I come and show them some new glittery tech. I am acutely aware that time is precious. I am proud that I will only show staff a tech idea if I see a real benefit. It has been very unsuccessful when we have been asked to ‘push’ tech out to staff! I was reflecting on the Google Forms for Feedback using videos and thought, I need to assess them part way through these videos, otherwise we may end up with more misconceptions. I stumbled upon EdPuzzle.

EdPuzzle is fantastic, I am not ‘pushing’ it to you merely telling you the benefits it has given my learners and other staff’s groups. EdPuzzle allows you to insert questions into a video that you can either set as free text or multiple choice. In maths I use it inside Corbett maths videos. When Mr Corbett uses a GCSE question for a second example I will pause the video and insert a question using EdPuzzle. My learners enjoy it. They say it keeps them watching. It reminds them to make notes! I have tried it will my 16-18 learners who enjoy the speediness of it, they like that they have to do something rather than just watching the video. My adult learners, 19+ enjoy it because it gives them time to take in what has happened so far in the video. Here is a quote from a student who is in his late 60’s:

“It is hard to get the video to play but I like that it pauses it, I can think about what has gone before. I can watch some more and enjoy the explanation”

I take the point, it turned out that EdPuzzle when on an Apple iOs device needs the EdPuzzle app downloading rather than watching it in a browser. That part is hard to explain to students (and staff) that some need an app and others don’t. The power of the tool regardless of this initial barrier to accessing the tool makes it worthwhile. Once the learners have watched the video you can get a RAG rated sheet of their marks, timings etc. Evidence of progress over time as they work through tasks. You can lock videos down so that the learners can’t skip until they answer the question. Sometimes I enable this and sometimes I don’t depending on my group.

I knew the power of the tool and was slowly working my way into embedding it naturally in my lessons when I decided to share it with another department. I took it to the English as a second language, ESOL department. I demonstrated it to the staff, my hope was that the staff would see the benefit to them that their learners could listen to the English spoken language and then answer questions based on what they had heard. I was right, they loved it. One teacher took it to heart, it instantly became her go to method for assessing topics. She insisted on using her own videos rather than inserting questions into existing You Tube videos as I had been doing. The level of effort she put into this cannot be underestimated. 

What transpired was a brilliant display of dedication and commitment by this teacher to her ESOL learners. They could watch a video on their phone as they're were waiting for a bus and practise the language that they needed for the journey. The teacher had evidence of progress over time using the tracking produced by EdPuzzle. She could show starting points, hours spent learning and improvement in the quiz scores. In my lessons my learners felt that it brought Corbett maths to life. As brilliant as Hegarty maths is, the students appreciated a different voice and a different method of assessment. As I set it to multiple choice in the Corbettmaths videos, I didn't need to mark the work. I used misconceptions for my incorrect answers. See my post on misconceptions in my Google Forms blog. Then the video progressed and Mr Corbett answered the question in much more detail than I ever would so if the learners had misunderstood or made a mistake they could identify where they had gone wrong. Finally to end I would I sent another multiple choice question with an image of a GCSE exam question to see if there had been any progress. It looks a little like this: 

The video pauses before the second example by Mr Corbett. I have used the incorrect angle fact of angles on a straight line add up to 180o to give the incorrect options of 85 and 100 degrees. I have also listed 45o as an incorrect option to diagnose the misconception of opposite angles being equal applying here. The video then resumes after the learners answer the question and Mr Corbett goes through in great detail how and why the correct answer is 140o. I really like this as an independent learning assessment tool. I am all for something that gives learners independence, stretches them, reduces my workload and evidences progress, I think EdPuzzle is a great tool that hits this brief!

Equatio and Read & Write

I have sat for years listening to CPD that was absolutely brilliant with a voice in my head going "not possible in a maths classroom though. " I have tried to fight it, shushing my inner voice, willing things to be possible. But we have to hold our hands up and say maths is a different subject, we can't ask students to expand or share an opinion on someone else's correct answer. 

Imagine sitting in a CPD session on Read and Write from Texthelp. Read and Write can read aloud text to learners, look up words in a picture dictionary and allow learners to speak in and it types for them. (it does a LOT more but I'm trying not to waffle!) it's brilliant, what a powerful tool for our learners. Amazing. Now how do you embed that into a maths lesson? Possible, thankfully, but not a perfect fit. Can it read complex formulae or calculations? Does it have pictures in its dictionary for density? No? Boo! I was gutted when I first came across it. I thought, argh it's so close but it's still not for me. 

A short while later I was sat down again to be talked at, sorry I mean, I was sat down in a CPD session, and this time it was on Equatio. Which is a pain to blog about because Google thinks I mean Equation, so if Google auto corrects and I miss it I apologise, I am talking about Equatio! Hold on to your seats if you've not heard of Equatio before and if you are a maths or science teacher this will blow your mind!

Equatio is a toolbar that allows you to speak in maths work. You say 2x bracket x add 4 bracket and it will write 2x(x+4) with curly xs. Equatio will let you type in fractions and curly xs and all the other niggly things we battle with typing as maths teachers with ease. If you have a touchscreen device you can freehand your maths and it will type it up for you. Hurrah, at last we have something amazing for maths, whoop! I was so excited and got straight on it, fractions were now a breeze to write, my work sped up when I was writing questions and making resources. You can even put it in Google Forms and make quizzes! I mean come on, this is the dream folks!

Loving my new Equatio life I ingested their website. I watched video after video, became certified in Read and Write (Texthelp make both products, I am not paid by them for this post, this is not an ad, I'm not paid by anyone to blog, wish I was!) importantly I signed up to updates from Texthelp and their monthly webinar list. Some time later I was introduced to the mobile features of Equatio. Students can handwrite their working out, photograph it into Equatio and it will make it editable typed maths for them... Take a moment... Take that in. Happy dance!!!!!!! Equatio has and does a lot more but I might do another blog on the other bits later. 

Students prefer pen and paper for maths in my experience. Maybe it's because I teach resit and they have experienced that paper linear exam, I don't know. I know that I prefer paper when I am work things out, I always have a pen in my pony tail ready to go in class! Students like to show their working out, sometimes! I like those conversations where they have spent ages anwering a question incorrectly and you go through their working out together to spot where it went wrong. I dislike those conversations where they have spent ages working something out incorrectly and their working out cannot be followed and they cannot articulate what they were trying to do. Those conversations are the hardest, where you desperately want to help but you can't. I have always wanted a way to make students stop and check their work or at least check they are on the right track. I have tried setting timers to get them to practise pausing mid answer but generally they just lose their flow. I have tried building in check your answer time but mainly they stare into space. Anyway back to Equatio... 

It's become my new way of working, especially since lock down. Students snap their work and sent it to me all typed up. Yes they could just snap their work but sometimes I struggle with the shadows of their photos, or the clarity of their working out. This way Equatio does the quality check for me. If it can't read what the students have put (and its very good at reading, trust me I have tried all sorts of maths working out to try to catch it out!) then an examiner wouldn't be able to read what they have put. Equatio helps me promote high standards. Equatio saves me time and it saves me marking on paper, although that's not happening in the world anyway at the minute.

Since lock down I have wanted to stay connected with my learners. I have found that the Read and Write tools that I have ignored in my maths lessons have really become invaluable. It has a feature where you can make a 1 minute voice note. I have been able to give verbal feedback to my learners. I don't mind that it's 1 minute because if I'm talking for more than 1 minute to each learner I'm not being clear enough in my feedback. My learners have said they feel little difference in terms of marking and being in the classroom, they can still hear my voice. 

I am so overjoyed that finally I have something that is invaluable and it is maths specific and maths focused. I feel like we can truly support learners remotely now, which is more important than ever. We have accessibility and maths speak all under one roof. Learners like it too. Sure they get frustrated when it doesn't correctly type up their written work and they have to edit it. But what's the harm in that, they are checking their work! A battle I long since thought that i would never win! 

Feedback and Marking

This is a hard post to write as I feel that this is one of the weakest areas of my teaching. I have to be honest, I struggle! I am well read on types of feedback and marking but I often find it a challenge to apply to maths when the answer is either right or wrong and it is SO natural to tick and flick. I hate ticking and flicking I also hate writing “great” or “well done” I despair when I see it in other books when I am observing. But what is the answer? I’m not sure I have one!

We did a lot of work around growth mindset, Carol Dweck being the expert. One of the things that came out of it was providing learners with a help zone. The idea of the help zone is that at any point in the lesson learners could go and seek further information to help them overcome what they are stuck on. This was universal to all subjects and it is something I really ran with. I always have a help zone, I have a travel pack for when I am in between rooms! It contains:

• Chromebook - learners can look online for answers

• Revision Guide - learners can research the topic

• Templates/grids - prompts that learners may need, e.g. lattice method grids pre-printed

• Equipment - if tracing paper will help with a rotation or loci question, why not use it?

• Dictionary - English one to help with definitions, overseas language to English if I have a few learners from the same country in class too

• Answers - to all the questions/worksheets/tasks of the class

Why do some teachers make the answers a secret, it was the same when I was at school. I vividly remember by teacher telling me that she would give me the answers after I had done the first exercises. Interestingly she recently interviewed me for a post, I didn’t recognise her, it’s funny how the mind builds up images of people over time! If the students have the answers they can mark their work and move on to an appropriate task when they are ready. Sometimes it is easier to unpick where you have gone wrong when you see the answer. I am a firm believer that as hard as understanding is to teach if you can articulate how, where any why an answer exists incorrect or correct you are on your way to developing understanding. 

If you are sat in my class and you can’t go forward because you haven’t got a clue how to tackle the first question. I would like to think I would spot you and be able to help. However with adults they can be very good and acting like a swan and mis-lead the teacher into being OK when they aren’t (this happens weekly with a student of mine who rattled through work happily but all of it incorrect!) If you are stuck and you don’t want to ask for help, how do you get help? Yes students should be comfortable asking for help, that is the purpose of staff being there! But sometimes it is a lot more than that, take my student with severe anxiety in public. For her to turn up is an achievement. Yet when she is stuck, how does she alert me, how do I know? I actually keep a close eye on her but what she likes best is that she has the answers and she can work out where she went wrong once she sees the answer and then move on. Take my confident student who likes to regularly tell me I have written something wrong on the board. She wants to know that she has got everything right and get to the harder work before I have even typed it out! She needs the answers so she can pick and choose a few of the easier ones to do, check she has got it and move on. Take my student who is a doctor in her home country. She needs the answers because she knows the maths but is unfamiliar with the language of the GCSE exam. She wants to read a few questions and answers before moving on to the harder work. 

If my learners have the answers, what am I doing I hear you ask? I have my trusty coloured pen in my hair. It can be red, green, purple or rainbow coloured depending on the department I am working in. I wander around the room giving feedback and asking students, why did you put that? Can you tell me how you got that answer? What would happen if we did this? I am helping those who are really struggling, offering alternative explanations. I am having conversations with my learners about their homework, or lack of it. I am asking them to move up a level in the tasks they are completing. I am spending time with them. I think that is a better use of my time than me standing at the front reading the answers out so that they can tick and flick.

So how do I record feedback? This is another challenge. They have got everything right, they have answered a more challenging set of work. We are collectively at the end of the topic now, where do I take them? How do I feedback? Like I said I am not an expert but I take this opportunity to ask them to find my error in some incorrect work that I have done or for them to write a cheat sheet of their workings out, I challenge them! See my post on Challenge for all

To record feedback is hard, most of it is verbal, or notes over corrections. I have tried the old, “verbal feedback given” stamp and they have to copy down what you said. I like this idea, it allows them time to reflect on what you said and by writing it down it may stick a little more than if they just heard it. However it takes time, it slows them down, pace is crucial in maths. I also have the challenge of adults who don’t really want to talk things through with me or admit that they are struggling freely, I mean who does! So I hit upon a fake imessage idea. It is a printed template, it has a blank fake messaging conversation

that looks like this,

We use this during the lesson to capture verbal feedback. I am the green, they are the white. Sometimes I will write in the green myself for speed. The white is what is important to them, their misconception. I then developed it to include a progress line on the top as well. This then meant that learners naturally wrote in the white part how they felt in my progress checks in my lesson. Say we were mid way through translations and we were just finishing translations with words before we looked at column vectors the lesson naturally has a progress check in, learners will record their thoughts in the white message bubbles at that point. “This is easy” “ I need to remember that I pick a corner first” and so on. 

When I think about my aim when providing feedback, it isn’t to say “great”. It is to develop the learner, that is why I am there. They can watch videos on you tube and learn translations without me. They can also find exam questions on translations and mark schemes and tick and flick them without me. The purpose of me being there is to help them overcome misconceptions. I am there to guide them on next steps. I am there to provide alternative explanations. I am there to praise them. I am there to support them. All of this needs an active dialogue between me and my learners. I need a one to one with them during class, after class, mid week when they tackle their homework and before they come into class to check on their actions from the last one to one. This isn’t possible! But if we have an active dialogue we can achieve many of these things. This messaging print out allows me to do this. Remember the old red card on the desk to alert you that a student was struggling. These do the same thing, they can write down they are unsure and you can see it as you go round the room. I take them in at the end of the lesson, provide detailed summary feedback from my point of view after the lesson. I set next steps or challenge work and we have 5 minutes reflection on what i have written at the start of next lesson. 

Now I know what I do isn’t perfect, nor is it ground breaking but it works for me and I may provide someone with a structure that may help them, so if you are struggling to avoid writing “great” it may be worth a try?