How I helped my students retain basic math skills during the school year
As a first year teacher, I struggled with how to help my students retain the information that I taught them in September all the way until May. As a second year teacher, I knew it was vital for the information to stick even longer than just one year. And as a third year teacher I discovered spiral warm ups and my way of teaching changed forever.
Spiral warm ups are some problems that students complete at the beginning of class that are a review from a previous chapter or unit. Students have to recall basic information on a daily basis to complete a fraction problem or solve an equation. This daily recollection helps students maintain their understanding of a concept, because they review the basic work necessary for the more challenging problems on a daily basis.
After a year of having students work on these spiral warm ups I’ve learned a few things.
First, there is always time to complete 4 basic problems. I would have students use the same set of numbers in each problem but I would change the operation each time. For example, my students who needed review with integer work would see these problems on the board:
1) 4+7
2) 4-7
3) 4×7
4) 4/7
Second, the problems need to be BASIC! Don’t get fancy. Adding decimals and equations together in one problem is NOT necessary. This is the opposite of what you want – you’ll spend more time reviewing decimals and then equations instead of moving on with your lesson on percents. This is not the desired outcome you’re looking for.
Third, be consistent. I know it’s super hard to be consistent, I’m a parent and a teacher, so I get how hard it is on both ends. However, consistency is really important for student learning. I had a dedicated space on my whiteboard where students would look for the agenda AND the warm up. Even on days when I had a substitute, my students knew to look for the warm up.
Fourth, it was really helpful to have a warm up that had something to do with the concept I was teaching for that day. For example, when I worked on the percent unit we would work on all operations with decimals and fractions as part of our warm ups.
Fifth, Spiral Warm Ups helped my students retain basic math skills better than some of colleagues students during that school year. I’m not saying this to be boastful. But I think it is interesting to note that my colleagues who claimed there was no time to complete a 4 question warm up at the beginning of class, had students who were struggling more significantly on equations than my students.