Pathways and New Life presentation

If you would like a ‘quick’ summary and comparison of the Pathways (Statway™ and Quantway™) and New Life model, take a look at this presentation.

  Pathways and New Life session MDEC 2012 final

There is also a ‘handout’ — references for the models, and the current visual for the New Life model.   Here is that handout: References_EmergingModels_March2012

 
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Student Success — New Life at Grayson (TX)

Some of the best work in the profession is being done at smaller colleges.  Grayson County College (Denison, TX) exemplifies this in their good work in developmental mathematics.

This year, Grayson is running pilot sections of both New Life courses — MLCS and Transitions — as part of their plan to completely replace the traditional developmental math courses next year.  Like most of us, the Grayson math department is primarily adjunct faculty; three of the full-time faculty — Stanley Henderson, Shawn Eagleton, and Sherre Mercer — have  been willing to share some of their ideas and tools with us.

Here are some comments from Sherre Mercer:

We are using a “recipe for success” in our new courses.  The document was developed by Stanley Henderson, one of the professors in the department, and is based partially based on his first day of class activities over the years. Students are asked to grade themselves on their recipe for success and encouraged throughout the semester to make improvements in their study/life habits with regard to the four areas on the recipe.

The recipe for success is this document RECIPE FOR SUCCESS SPRING 2012 Grayson County College

Also, Sherre goes on to say:

The students are required to write verbal explanations frequently.  As part of the focus on conceptual understanding, my class was required to complete writing assignments before and after each exam.  These documents were developed by Terra Diehl, one of the presenters at NADE last year.   The students are asked to complete the pretest page before the exam.  They complete the post-test page after the graded exam is returned. 

 The math department at Grayson is doing a very good job, and showing generosity in sharing both the ideas they use and some of the tools that have helped students succeed.  Thanks, Grayson County College!!

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What do you need?

The purpose of this blog is (primarily) to help more people make the transition from the traditional developmental mathematics program to a model which serves our students better (either New Life, or Carnegie Pathways).  Most of the posts have dealt with specific or general issues … based on what I am thinking about and conversations I have.

I would like YOUR thoughts on this question:  What do you need?  What would help you make this transition?

Write your comment, with some description of what would help you. 

Perhaps you need some further description of the two models (described briefly on pages in this blog, and elsewhere).  Perhaps you need either some general ideas of how to start the process of changing … or a conversation with somebody who has done it.  Perhaps you need ideas on instructional materials that could be used.  Perhaps it’s professional development that concerns you.  Perhaps you have other areas in mind.

Take a few minutes, and post a comment.  I’ll reply to everybody, and we will work together to get you what you need.  And, your comments might help provide some direction for areas I can address in future posts

“TIA” (thanks in advance)
Jack

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Remediation as a Remedy

Over the past 40 years (roughly the period of my work in developmental mathematics), our approaches have shared one focus — we tend to ‘fix’ (provide what is needed) in our students by focusing on small (or even smallest) parts of the problem.  Algebra, in this approach, means that we study some properties of numbers … simplify expressions … solve equations … translate word problems … graph equations … and so on.  Does this approach result in any significant improvements for our students?

Earlier today, I was searching for some information and ideas on retention — especially of minority students.  In the process, I encountered a blog by Mike Rose at  http://mikerosebooks.blogspot.com/   … in a  post, Mike says:

Such problems of status and institutional structure interact with flawed beliefs about cognition and motivation that run throughout basic-skills instruction. One of those flawed beliefs is that the way to remedy a problem is to focus on the smallest units of the problem—in the case of writing, it would be rules of grammar, often treated out of context in a workbook or in an entire course focused only on the sentence. In such settings, students don’t get to work with language in a way consonant with the intellectual and rhetorical demands of the writing they will have to do in college. Another false belief is that underprepared students’ motivation and self-esteem will be hurt by a more-challenging curriculum. That is a one-dimensional, not to mention patronizing, understanding of motivation. There’s no scientific basis for such beliefs, but they persist.  (see http://mikerosebooks.blogspot.com/2010/08/smithsonian-of-basic-skills.html)

 As you might guess by the content, Mike Rose is talking specifically about developmental writing classes.  However, I am intrigued by this analysis — he is suggesting that this ‘small unit’ approach to remediation actually conflicts with meeting the goals of remediation (as in being ready).  In mathematics, we tend to focus even more on small units of learning (iin recent years); when done to the extreme, we see modular learning.  However, I encourage you to not make the mistake of thinking that non-modular courses avoid this ‘small unit’ problem — the small unit problem is dealing with fairly trivial details to the extent of missing the basic value; we can solve equations … but we are unable to communicate and reason algebraically.

This ‘small unit’ problem is part of what has given “algebra” a bad reputation.  If we fail to correct our approach, we will find other domains taking over the field — like statistis.  Statistics is fine, and has a purpose.  However, I believe that algebra has much to offer as a domain to help students become ‘ready’ for success in college and in life.  The concepts of algebra, and our modes of expression, would serve students well — if we focus on those fundamental goals, and not the smallest units.

I hope that you will share my journey of making remediation into a remedy for our students, so our work provides what students need to be ready.
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