Natasha Malone_ Week 1 Blog - Using Statistical and Technological Skills to develop Creativity


My name is Natasha Malone. I am from and live in the British Virgin Islands. I have been teaching mathematics at Elmore Stoutt High School for 18 years.  Elmore Stoutt High School is a secondary public school from grades 7 to 12 located in the British Virgin Islands.  The British Virgin Islands currently uses a spiral approach curriculum in mathematics.  I was the Head of the Mathematics Department at Elmore Stoutt High School from grades 10 to 12 from 2018 – 2022 and head of the same department from grades 7 to 12 from 2022 to 2023. 

My current professional goal is to continue to assist the British Virgin Islands Ministry of Education to restructure the Mathematics Curriculum that will be similar to the Common Core State Standard. This restructure of the curriculum will allow students to easily transfer from British Virgin Islands to United States schools.

My future professional goal is to successfully complete my Master in Curriculum and Instructions – Math with Southeastern Oklahoma State University. I also will like to become an effective Instructional coach in Mathematics in the British Virgin Islands.

As a mathematics teacher I am interested in analyzing a computational thinker between ages 12 to 14 years.  The Computational Thinker indicator 5.b. requests that students find or organize data and use technology to analyze and represent it to solve problems and make decisions.  Students in grade 10 Statistics class could address Math Standards S.Q.1.2 formulate meaningful statistical questions to clarify the problem at hand.  Students in groups can conduct a research project at their school that addresses a problem or concern that needs evaluating. Students will first formulate a question such as “Do students who play a musical instrument perform better in mathematics than students who do not play a musical instrument?”, research background information, and collect data through surveys using an appropriate sample sized and an unbiased methods of collecting the data from the school’s population. Students will then use technology such as Microsoft suits (excel and words) or Google suites (Google docs, forms, and spreadsheets) to organize and present the data collected using statistical graphs and calculations. 

Students can use the statistical graphs and calculations to analyze the data based on content learned in statistics class.  Students can then discuss the findings and share the findings with stakeholders. Finally, recommendations can be made by students, and other stakeholders such as principals, parents, and teachers that can potentially assist all students regardless of musical background to improve their mathematics performance.  Students can publish their projects using technological tools such as Scribd, where students from around the world can give feedback on the project.

Persons around the world are faced with similar problems such as students do not perform well on key stage testing exams.  Schools must teach students to develop creativity.  In Make, learn, succeed: Building a culture of creativity in your school (2016), Gura emphasizes that students become functional individuals by being creators in this changing world.  The lesson activity that was highlighted can allow students to identify problems around them, formulate questions that address real life problems and use statistical content learned in Statistics class and technology to analyze the data and make educated decisions to solve problems.  These are the skills that must be taught to students which will prepare them to be productive citizens.  Gura presents ways that students can become creative. The one that supports my lesson activity is being creative in identifying and articulating relevant problems (Gura, 2016, p 27).  Students must be taught comfortably how to identify challenges and tackle them using the necessary technological, mathematical and research skills to assist society in making intellectual decisions to cope with the demands and challenges of the world.

References

Gura, M. (2016). Make, learn, succeed: Building a culture of creativity in your school. Portland, OR:                   ISTE, 27.          

International Society for Technology in Education. (2017). ISTE Standards for Students.  A practical                   guide for learning with technology. ISTE.

Oklahoma Curriculum Framework (2023).  Mathematics OAS 2022.

Virgin Islands Standards-Based Curriculum Guide Mathematics (2012).

 

Comments

  1. Reesa GuyAugust 26, 2023 at 6:22 AM

    Hello Natasha!
    It's wonderful to meet you and I find it so interesting that you live in the British Virgin Islands! I live here in rural Oklahoma with my husband and 2-year-old daughter. I teach 5th-8th grade English Language Arts and Reading so I loved hearing how you would incorporate research into your math activity. Research is a major component in my students learning during this age and creating research questions and learning to find resources to answer them is a huge goal for them for this year. It just shows how some learning targets are interchangeable in subjects! Giving them the guidance to research safely and effectively is also a major goal I have for myself because I want them to be able to research confidently.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Natasha MaloneAugust 26, 2023 at 7:38 AM

      Reesa thank you for your strong response to my blog. I agree with you that effective research in any discipline is very important as it allows students to make educate decisions and become productive citizens. I do look forward to working with you with integrating English and Mathematics with technology.

      Delete
  2. Bryce FieldsAugust 26, 2023 at 1:51 PM

    This sounds like an awesome project for students to be involved in. I have always been a fan of math and solving problems, so much so that I decided to major in it for undergrad. I would have loved to have a project like this when I was in high school taking statistics. It's applicable and will lead to students in the class improving their knowledge of the materials. This style of project, being more hands-on and personal, will likely keep students more engaged with the material. Well done, this is a great idea for an assignment.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Natasha MaloneAugust 27, 2023 at 6:22 AM

    Thank you Bryce, I myself love Statistics. I agree that creating learning activities that are hands-on and practical will allow students to be active and creative learners.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Lourdes RiveraAugust 27, 2023 at 9:27 PM

    Hi Natasha,

    I found your blog interesting because I actually dreaded math so much! Although I was able to make it through back in undergrad, I definitely would have wished to have an instructor like you at the time who made it engaging and fun rather than just overwhelming. By pairing your learning activity with real world research and data students can feel the extension beyond the classroom that Liz Kolb discusses in the Triple E framework. It leaves them with knowledge that goes further than just learning the mathematical concept meanwhile making that information much more likely to be retained because of its usefulness.

    ReplyDelete
  5. AnonymousSeptember 13, 2023 at 4:14 PM

    OMG, I don't even know where to start. But I can say that your reference to Guru's claim that students are able to be functioning individuals when they are able to express their creativity. We solve problems, adapt to the world around us, create solutions to the worlds problems all by being free to express. To be free to use our talents to work toward the issues at hand and for the common good.

    ReplyDelete

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