Top Tip No. 2: Catch and release.
Hi {{custom.firstName}},
The first time you use the Desmos teacher dashboard, it may feel like your first time driving a car, back when you could either change lanes or change speed, but not both at the same time. It’ll be a moment to celebrate when you can use teacher pacing in our teacher dashboard without much effort. At that point, we can focus on purposeful use of teacher pacing.
The better your students understand the main task of the lesson and the more it interests them, the more energy and thought they’ll offer you and their classmates.
If I say, “Okay, I’m now going to pace you to screens 4 through 6—go for it,” students know some screen numbers but very little information about the math, the context, or the goal of the task itself. Instead, consider summarizing the goal of the task as concisely as possible.
What does it look like in practice?
In Dominoes, consider pacing to screens 3–4 and pausing the class. Before unpausing the class, while you have your students’ attention, consider setting up the main task: “You're going to see a bunch of dominoes. Play around with them. Then I'll want to notice what you notice and wonder.” Then release them. That’s a concise, comprehensible, and catchy invitation into mathematical investigation.
Dan & the Desmos Classroom Team
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