Math Teacher Lounge

S6-E07: Building math fluency through games

• Bethany Lockhart Johnson and Dan Meyer • Season 6 • Episode 7

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Join Math Teacher Lounge as we continue our season-long discussion on math fluency with a special live recording at NCTM 2023. In this episode, our guest, Jennifer Bay-Williams Ph.D., and Dan dive into math fluency games to discuss how we bring joy into the classroom while building math fluency.

For more from Jennifer, check out the following resources:

Speaker 1:

The games are fun, but that's a byproduct, right? That's not the reason we're doing the games.

Speaker 2:

Hey folks, welcome back to Matthew Lounge. I am one of your co-hosts, Dan Meyer.

Speaker 3:

And I'm Bethany Lockhart Johnson . Hi, Dan. Welcome back to another episode.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and you, I've been missing you. We , uh, had a live show at NCTM , the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics annual conference , uh, where I was and you were not. And I was , uh, definitely feeling your absence. So tell me you're well at least

Speaker 3:

<laugh>. Well, no, what I wanna tell you is that when we started planning for this season, and we were talking about different folks that like would be on our dream list to interview, right ? Today's guest , the person that Dan got to talk to was on that list, right ? Like, she's like the second person that I mentioned. So it was kind of funny because then, you know, we're all geared up for NCTM and then for a variety of reasons, I had to say, actually, I cannot attend. I was very disappointed. And so what I thought was gonna happen is that all gears like ground to a halt, and it was going to be like, okay, well then I guess this can't happen. We're gonna have to reschedule, schedule her for when Bethany <laugh> ,

Speaker 2:

I thought that they were gonna cancel ncms annual conference and reschedule. I thought so too . The entire thing for when I thought so too , one , Bethany Lockhart Johnson could attend, but , uh, the show, the show went on and I , oh ,

Speaker 3:

It went on

Speaker 2:

<laugh> . I had the privilege of chatting with one of Bethany's absolute math education idols. And , uh, I tried to, I tried to treat her with the deference and enthusiasm that, that you would. But , uh, yeah, it was a thank you for connecting me , uh, connecting us to , uh, one of your just best friends. That was , uh, fantastic. Yeah,

Speaker 3:

You guys made fast friends. You guys sounded real chummy there. Um , yeah.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. Did you get invited to , uh, her birthday party , uh, next year <laugh> , because I did. I don't know if you got that, but , uh,

Speaker 3:

You're my heart, Dan, my heart.

Speaker 2:

Um, anyway, so we're gonna get to it here. It was a sprawling episode, a live show with lots of moving parts and interests and audience participation. And

Speaker 3:

We are bringing that to you, dear listener. And so Dan, I do appreciate that you're gonna help kind of set the scene for me because I know like audio will be a little different 'cause it's live, but that's what makes it exciting. Yep . So who, who we got on the show today? Dan, why don't you introduce her since you were there?

Speaker 2:

Yes. We will give Dr . Jenny Bay Williams, her due in the actual live show you'll hear. But she , uh, just so you folks know, Dr. Jenny Bay Williams is an expert on many things related to early math ed. She's got her name on one of the, the absolute seminal biggest math methods textbooks for elementary educators. Um, and she also is an expert in fluency, including fluency building games, which is the main reason I was excited to chat with her. And she, so she offered a book with , uh, Gina Kling entitled Math Fact Fluency 60 Games and Assessment Tools to Support Learning and Retention. So, should we jump in?

Speaker 3:

Okay, that sounds good, but I'm gonna stop you when I have something to, I'm gonna hold myself back, but I may jump in a few times. How does that sound? Fair,

Speaker 2:

Fair, fair. And there's gonna be some moments ahead where I gotta jump in real fast to explain what was going on in the room. That's how outta control things got back in the day .

Speaker 3:

Alright , let's give it a listen,

Speaker 4:

Ladies and gentlemen, please put your hands together for your host. It's me, it's just me.

Speaker 5:

<laugh> . Hey , love that , love , see you folks .

Speaker 4:

Um , my name is Dan Meyer . I'm not sure how we know each other perhaps through three Act Math, Desmos. I'm a , you know, father, son, brother, man about town. It's just great to see you folks. Have you had a good NCTM ? Woo . Love that . Love that. Great to hear it tallied up. I'm curious, how many sessions have you attended? This is a , uh, like this is a real question here, like, tallied up. I'm just curious, has anyone been to like four or above counting this one? Count this one. Five or above six or above seven or above eight or above nine or above. Have we even had nine sessions? 10 or above ? That's incredible. Uh, big ups to you folks. Big round of applause for you learners. I got , I gotta be real. Like I'm, I'm a bit of , uh, an introvert. You who would've guessed that ? Like a math teacher nerd type as an introvert. So I gotta like, occasionally have my fortress of solitude. You know, I , but you doing 10 sessions, like that's nine sessions. Thank you. Correcting me nine sessions. That , that is , um, that's real learning. I appreciate you. Um, so I'm not sure how we know each other, perhaps. Are you familiar with Math Teacher Lounge, my podcast? Any subscribers? A few of you. Uh , some of you just saw free junk on the , uh, on the brochure. I'm like, Ooh , more free stuff. I'm into that. Um , if you folks are a subscriber, I'm so happy that some of you are not. I encourage you to subscribe. Uh , team here puts a lot of time and effort into it. Uh , but if you do subscribe, I gotta ask one question very seriously. At what speed do you listen to it? <laugh> , is it a , is it a, like, is it a one x ? You're a two Xer? No . One , 1.2. Okay. Anybody slower than 1.2? I wanna know who the real heads are out here. I listen to it at one one X . You're invited to my birthday party. The rest of you enjoy not being at my birthday party. Um, I don't listen to a single podcast any, any slower than 1.5 x . So one x really means a lot. I try , I try to talk super fast, so folks slow it down for me. You know? Um, so if you, if you do know me from the pod , um, you know that I have a co-host, Bethany Lockhart Johnson, who is , um, every bit my better half. She's , uh, so wise, she knows the little kids where I , I know the older kids much better. She could not be here. And so this is a little bit corny, I realize , but can I , can I just like, get you folks to give kind of a, like a brownie face, like a sad face, maybe a tear like that. Just like a send a picture back to Bethany, just pantomime like, you're sad. I know you're pumped and happy. Work hard and try to bring it , bring the mood down a little bit . Stop smiling. <laugh> , stop laughing. Alright , here we go. Alright . This is , uh, this is not bad. You still seem pretty pumped, but I'll see, still be like, oh, that was a crowd of people , uh, without me. Nice.

Speaker 3:

Okay. My first interjection, Dan, I have to say that was very kind of you, I felt for a moment. The , the emotion in the room at my absence. Okay. Okay, let's keep going. Let's keep going.

Speaker 4:

Um, let's get this going here. We have , uh, you know, a few things for you. Wants to be a nice time. So we have a few things, you know, my charm, whatever this is, bag of stuff, warm up the crowd, but the real meat of it is this. On the podcast this season , it's been all about fluency and no one in here tell me, you've got fluency figured out like we did this season now five, six episodes. Martin, what is it? Six episodes. Who even knows who can count that high? But I've, I've not been doing this as like a, let me share my expertise about fluency. I feel very conflicted and destabilized about fluency. So inviting guests on Bethany's been helping out, obviously, and we've been learning so much about what fluency is, how to assess it, how to develop it. I gotta say, here's my unease. Here's my unease. Check me on this here. Okay? If you were to ask someone who would say to you, I really don't like math. I mean, who would say that really? But if you're like at a party and you say, Hey, I do math, you might get someone who feels a bit uneasy about math. And if you ask them why, I find that there are a couple very common reasons. One of them is about fluency and how it was attempted to be developed in them as a kid. Oftentimes in experiences that felt very high stress, very high stakes, maybe they were timed. Maybe there are flashcards involved. I'm not saying those always lead to anxiety, but that's a common reason why people freak out about math. But another common reason why people freak out about math is I just didn't get it past a certain age. And do you know what helps you get it Fluency? Like fluency is the sort of thing that makes so much possible. So I just admit my, my stock and trade well , I get excited about talking about is not fluency. Like, I love thinking about like learning new things and why we're doing this and what's the application and how can technology help us fluency. I'm like, well, we'll just leave that to the, to the experts. And so it's been a growing season for me of trying to find my enthusiasm for fluency is , is really timely. 'cause I got kids in kinder and first right now. So I'm watching what happens with them, with their teachers. I'm so grateful for the thought that goes into that fluency exercises. And today we have one of the guests I'm just so excited about, very excited about hanging out with us today. Someone who is an expert in fluency. Someone whose name is on the book that teaches so many people how to learn, how to teach elementary and middle school mathematics and expert in pedagogy. And someone who's an expert in fluency, but not just that is an expert in game-based fluency, which I dunno if that has an appeal to you. I think fluency, I'm not thinking games necessarily, but this is someone who knows how to turn fluency. I think people sometimes dislike into a thing. People like a game. So I would, we're gonna be up here. I'll have some questions for her. You might have some questions. We're gonna play a game, me and her. And we're gonna compete in that game against you folks. Uh, you have the materials to play this game yourself. I hope we all learn tons. I know we will. I'm so excited to welcome up Dr. Jenny Bay Williams. Please put your hands together for Jenny . Welcome. Welcome. Please join us, have a seat. We're gonna segue gracefully to the other mics here. Nothing weird about this. Okay. So , um, welcome to our show to Math Teacher Lounge.

Speaker 1:

Thank you. How

Speaker 4:

Has , how has your NCTM been?

Speaker 1:

It's been great. I was , um, lucky to be able to go to a lot of sessions and I've been targeting sessions of , um, teachers that might be first time presenters. So I've really gained , um, some great insights from some people that I didn't otherwise know. It's

Speaker 4:

Tricky, right? How you pick your sessions. It's like, there's names you kind of know, but who knows what's out there off the names, you know, do you go for ones that are like, you know, maybe a bet for a , a solid double or like, maybe you just like go swing hard and go for a find a home, run in some , uh, some room down on the third floor or something. You found some good stuff. I found

Speaker 1:

Some good stuff and you know, we , we all presented at one point by ourselves for the first time and, and all of that. And so , uh, I , I was in some great sessions that had, you know, maybe 12 others that got to benefit from the session and it was really, really good. So yeah , I , I felt lucky to be there.

Speaker 4:

Yeah. Awesome. And you're in a position to amplify their voices , uh, even more now as , uh, your work on that editorial board of our journal. Mathematics Teacher T lt . Yes . TLT . Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Always looking for good writers.

Speaker 4:

Love that. Uh, always be plugging, always be plugging. Anyone know how to write out there? Great talk to Jenny . Awesome. So I'm , can you give us like a , a brief, you know, like a tour of like how you got to be, you know, where you are, the work that excites you. Um , assume you're a classroom teacher at some point. Just start us from there and give us like a , you know , a couple of highlights.

Speaker 1:

All right , I'm gonna go, I'm , I'm gonna , I don't know if this is where you want me to start, but I wanna start with , uh, birth,

Speaker 4:

Go for birth. I don't care. Let's just like, let's do this. You know ,

Speaker 1:

Uh , I remember sitting in high school , uh, thinking I would never be a teacher because they just worked too darn hard. Like I just couldn't be that person at eight o'clock in the morning. So then in college , um, I was bored. I actually didn't know what a syllabus was, so I couldn't figure out why everybody was so busy because I had all this free time. I didn't realize there was homework on the syllabus. Um, so anyways, I saw this volunteer open opportunity at an elementary school. And when I got to that school, true story, a child needed help with their basic facts. And , um, I came back to the school a week later and the like specialist, the vice principal or somebody met me at the door and she said, this is a pseudonym. What did you do with Adam? Well, of course I'm having a panic attack 'cause I didn't get any instructions. I just worked with him. And , um, she said he got a perfect score on his basic facts test. And I felt better than I'd felt about anything else I was exploring. Wow . And you know , when you're a freshman in college and you don't know what you wanna do, the pressure's on. So I took my first education class and then , um, ever since I've been teaching, I love teaching in , um, courses , uh, in , I like taking the sections when I was a middle school teacher, so I would take the , um, I hate this phrase, but lower level classes and just noticing the , um, impact over time of whether students are fluent or not. And , um, and also their confidence, you know , going hand in hand , right? So that's really how I got started. And then I got to come and do a workshop at NCTM actually ages ago. And I just got such a thrill after I got over the terror of it that I really , um, found a passion for working with teachers.

Speaker 4:

You people are scary when you look at us. You're very scary . The way you listen is really

Speaker 1:

Unnerving. I'm sweating up here,

Speaker 4:

<laugh> . So yeah. Very intimidating. Yeah. And just a , that's a fantastic story and very relatable. I , I would love to know, on the subject of fluency, I would love to know something that in your personal life, as personal as you want to go here, that you are developing fluency in ,

Speaker 1:

Um, something I'm developing fluency in. Um, there's so many things that I should be working on. Um, one thing, okay. So my favorite thing that I'm developing fluency in is , um, horseback riding.

Speaker 4:

Okay. Yeah . Just, let's just imagine you , I I am not a , uh, uh, what do you call it ? A question. I'm not a horseback rider myself. So I am in this moment, like, I'm not sure I could pick a horse out of a lineup, honestly. Like, you know, horse cow lion. I'm like, Hmm , okay. Uh , but like I am , so I'm wondering now, you know, like how would one develop fluency with intent? You know, I imagine it involves some riding, but try to imagine if you would, you know, like what goes into becoming fluent in horseback riding? So yeah, tell us. Right.

Speaker 1:

So , um, I actually, when I was a teenager , um, I rode western, I lived in Missouri. I rode Western. I actually won some stuff at the county fair on my horseback riding. So I had some skill. Okay. You know , so I had one way of riding. So that's a connection to fluency as I think about it. Um , and then COVID hits and my husband suggested maybe I need to get out of the house <laugh> . So he suggested I go ride , uh, at a place down the road in Kentucky where we have, you know, what I would call English riding. I didn't know there's a whole host of kinds of ways to ride in an with a saddle that didn't have a horn on it. So, and you have to like, imagine you have to po you have to post when you're riding . I'd never done that. Uhhuh <affirmative> . Um, and then the teacher is using language I had never heard before, and I'm like, I don't know what that means. And I'm holding two reigns in two hands instead of, you know, one reign in one hand. So I'm just learning this whole different way to go about it. And I guess one day I'll know what the difference is between, I don't know , hunt seat English , uh, this or that, or whatever, all the different kinds of riding and how you're supposed to sit in the saddle and all the things. But it's a pretty fun challenge.

Speaker 4:

Okay. There's a teacher, like , that's a teacher that's interesting to me. You know, I kind of just assumed you, like, if you stayed on, you're good <laugh> . And if you don't, you learn from that. But , uh, as actually someone who's helping you develop your fluency. Yeah. Fantastic. Um, I would love to ask every one of you what you're developing fluency in. Um, it's an interesting question, I think, especially outside of mathematics. So here's the thing about UF find fascinating is that you, you know, you've done some very, I would call it serious work. You know, like very capital s you know, the kind that gets , uh, you know, has citations and goes into the fancy books and you have some, a lot of that serious work and then you've pivoted a bit or like have developed this whole angle around games , uh, game-based fluency to the degree that I think if we , um, that's right here. Yeah. Here's some , uh, some books that our guest Dr. Jenny Bay Williams has authored on fluency, including this one that we're here to talk about today . Uh , you know, 60 games and tools to support learning and retention. So what's, what's the appeal of games to you? What is , what have games offered you? Could we have an , like an equestrian, a horseback riding game for your fluency? <laugh> answer, whichever part of that scattered question you want to <laugh>.

Speaker 1:

Uh, so I, I am a serious person and um, I sometimes say I am from the show me state. So like you have to like, show me something's really gonna work before I'm willing to try it. I was that teacher that really wanted to feel solid, something was gonna work before I would try it. So I've always carried that with me. And I appreciate teachers that don't just on a whim try something without evidence. So I've been an evidence-driven person. I got my doctorate, I read so much research, I really don't wanna do anything that there isn't some solid background on. So I am a serious person. Um, but then in all of my work, I continue to focus on how , um, many students don't feel. And let's just say people, many people don't feel good at math. Yep . They don't like math. And when you boil down to it, they're not good at basic facts. And you know, I've taught hundreds of pre-service teachers, mostly elementary. I've done the whole gamut, but this is a negative memory for most people. And so that's not fun in games. And so then I'm in grade like one and two classrooms watching with, you know, dismay at how children are learning their facts, which you just see the joy coming right out of whatever they brought to school with 'em . So that's when I started thinking, how can you bring more joy to the learning of math , um, in a serious way. Like the games are fun. Um, but that's a byproduct, right? Like, that's not the reason we're doing the games, right? You know, like I tried to do at the end of a workshop, like, wait, let's go back. Why are we doing these games? And the teachers are like, they're fun. And I'm like, but remember, that's the byproduct. Like, really why are we doing the game? So that's like the serious side of it.

Speaker 4:

Yeah. Uh , excellent combination of serious and fun. And I'm excited today to learn a game with you, especially one that's , uh, about subtracting two digit numbers, which has always been on my bucket list of things to learn how to do <laugh>. So if I may, I'm gonna learn this game. We have a just a , a deck of cards and uh, apparently this right here, which as it happens, you folks will be getting , um, this can help kids learn how to subtract two digit numbers and probably other things as well in a serious and fun way. I do feel like I need to take out the jokers. I assume a joker gone.

Speaker 1:

All the guys go the jacks, no offense. Oh , but the jacks go. The kings go the jokers go. All the guys go. You do have one of these. Uh , do you want them to take their their cards out or you want them ? Well,

Speaker 4:

We'll just wait a second on taking it out on yours.

Speaker 1:

Yeah , just watch Dan with this nice little deck so you can,

Speaker 4:

Yeah . Give us a second here. Team . So the queen stay

Speaker 1:

The queen stay . The ladies are the zeroes. The queens are the zeroes, Queens

Speaker 4:

Are the zeroes. Okay. Right .

Speaker 1:

And then for this particular, so this is how I usually have my decks, like in my classroom and in my book bag. And when I travel, that's the deck, right? But for this game, you don't want your tens, you just want single digits. So we also gotta go

Speaker 4:

Finds those tens again. ohss . Yeah. I suppose if you pulled one of the, one of your math class decks out for an evening of playing Texas, no limit. It gets a little bit, it gets a little bit weird for people .

Speaker 1:

You just wait to see how long it is till somebody notices, someone notices that No , no . Face cards are shown

Speaker 4:

Showing no one's getting no one's. Cards are all that great.

Speaker 1:

That happens at my house. Actually,

Speaker 4:

I <laugh> I actually am not surprised at all. Okay? Uh , I have never shuffled a deck of cards. This small <laugh> , I had ample opportunity to do this before you both got here. Bethany, you can't imagine just how much fun this part was for the audience. <laugh> .

Speaker 3:

I am actually, I'm pretty sure the only thing more fun than watching you try to shuffle a deck of cards, miniature cards is listening to you try to shuffle a deck of nature miniature card . So we will reenact this next time I see you. Just to

Speaker 4:

Be clear, I'll learn that one from a child, <laugh>. Good enough, good enough. Okay. So yeah. So we've got this. And I don't think that a civilian, which is what I call someone who's not like us, would see these and say, oh, there's a math game about to happen here, right? Like this is this , this looks like just kind of normal playing cards. My goodness. These are not wax coded . Okay? <laugh> , this is not my usual deck. <laugh> , do these have seven sides? <laugh> ? How am I still rotating some of these <laugh> stop down, down.

Speaker 1:

Can I make a suggestion that we just like turn them face down and not worry about it?

Speaker 4:

I am gonna beat these cards. There. There, okay. See, I love the relationship. I looked at them, they knew I was struggling and I looked at them and they saw in my face both pride and the desire to be acknowledged for having done this. And they gave the acknowledgement. This is , this is why we vibed so well. Okay, so what's next? You'll watch us do a round and then give it a try yourself and we'll see who wins. The two of us or anyone out there,

Speaker 1:

We're playing a version of a game called For keeps. For keeps. So we get to keep two of our answers, okay ? We're gonna play four times, okay ? That's big picture. We're gonna do this thing four times, okay ? We only can keep two answers. So , um, Dan, you can start, you're gonna draw four cards.

Speaker 4:

I'm gonna draw four cards just like we're at the top or okay ,

Speaker 1:

Two , we're we're , we're gonna be teammates here. I'm not gonna play against Dan in front of a live audience. Okay?

Speaker 4:

<laugh>.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so we're gonna turn and face up. I'm

Speaker 4:

Gonna waste me here. Okay, so we got me

Speaker 2:

Again, Bethany, here's where I drew a three, a nine, an eight, and then another eight.

Speaker 4:

We have a very well shuffled deck here, as you can tell , uh, <laugh> .

Speaker 1:

And so nows this . Yes .

Speaker 4:

Okay .

Speaker 1:

There is an advantage to not having a shuffle deck as you're gonna see here. Yeah , I like this. I like this. So we're trying to get the smallest difference. The smallest difference, okay ? So we're gonna arrange these. However you want to have two digits minus two digits with the smallest difference. Okay? For example, this would not be my answer, but

Speaker 2:

Thing , I think it might be helpful here to talk a little bit more about what this game look like. Is that okay? Please?

Speaker 3:

Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2:

So four cards come off the deck. You know, we've got jacks and kings are gone. So we're talking number cards and queens for zeroes. All right , so can you picture

Speaker 3:

The well shuffled deck is face down ? Yeah,

Speaker 2:

Super well shuffled deck and

Speaker 3:

You're flipping <laugh> , you're flipping over four cards

Speaker 2:

Or just draw four off the top anyway , so , okay , got now , now there's four face up and they're just like in no particular order. And our job is to make two , two digit numbers out of those cards. So you can imagine the different kinds of numbers that might have popped up and how you might decide to start arranging them. And there's like no wrong answer here, which is kind of fun. Like, put them into any two, two digit numbers and you're fine. Find their difference. So you can imagine now perhaps their difference and that's what we're doing. That's

Speaker 3:

Super helpful, Dan. I can totally picture it and , uh, yeah , let's keep going.

Speaker 4:

Not like the worst difference would be something with the nineties and the thirties, I would imagine, right? That'd

Speaker 1:

Be a real rough . So if we were going for the biggest difference, biggest difference, this might, that might be a possibility. So we're going for the smallest difference. Um, Dan, how do you wanna arrange your cards?

Speaker 4:

Like , I just wanna like catch the vibe though. <laugh> , there's like a moment of activation for a game versus a worksheet where it's like people are kind of murmuring and shattering and like mentally strategizing to such a degree that it comes out of their mouth a little bit and they kind of murmur themselves. And I wanna , I wanna dig on that a little bit. Like what makes this a game versus why is like a worksheet less of a game, let's say. So right here and ,

Speaker 1:

And as he's talking, I'm like itching to come over here and start like moving the cards around to try help things , but okay , you ,

Speaker 4:

I mean I , I noticed that there's a potential for some 80 eighties going on here. So I do want to just like, kind of think about what it would be like to do 89, 83 is one thought I have. Those ones are pretty close.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so that gives us an answer of ,

Speaker 4:

Uh, that right there is answer of six. Six. I think we've got like maybe better though. Is there a better one if we , um, if we switch . I felt good about that, by the way. Real good. But like I'm curious though, low nineties, high eighties here,

Speaker 2:

I reorganized the cards

Speaker 4:

To give us

Speaker 2:

A 93 and 88.

Speaker 1:

Now he's got the vertical. Um , see that there Orientation . So the horizontal changing , oh, I know my standard algorithm, <laugh> .

Speaker 4:

Oh,

Speaker 1:

I know it because this one involves regrouping right here. <laugh>.

Speaker 4:

Yeah. Yeah . So that'd be a five. I , right <laugh> did not get the acknowledgement I'd hoped for there and instantly second guess

Speaker 1:

Myself. 'cause Dan's still, Dan's still working on his fluency. <laugh> , I'm working on my fluency.

Speaker 4:

Yeah. Um , no , it's great to do fluency when you're developing it in front of a huge crowd. It like helps you like desire to avoid embarrassment, helps you, you know, do better. So ,

Speaker 1:

Okay, so Dan is settled . So our first score is for keeps . Here's our little scoreboard score. You're gonna be doing the same thing. You get this , this is also in your bag five. So five. Now we have to decide if we're gonna keep this one or we're not gonna keep it. So we only get to keep two and we can't change our minds. Oh,

Speaker 4:

So we don't do all four and then just like wrap

Speaker 1:

Two . That would be, yeah , we , so

Speaker 4:

Again , you catch this here. Like there's something about this that is game-like, you know what I'm saying? There's something that I don't quite know what it is, but it feels game like the audience wants to participate on the question. What makes it game-like, but you have misjudged the situation friend. This is not, this is not an audience participation moment, though . There will be time for you.

Speaker 1:

This feels like there will be time

Speaker 4:

For you. It's , do you have a big mic? Do you have a big mic? You don't have a big mic, do you? Okay, well

Speaker 1:

<laugh>

Speaker 4:

Well I'm sorry about that. I would involve you here, but not right now.

Speaker 3:

Okay. Dan Meyer, I, I have to interject to just say, you know, your community building in that room. I , I feel it Dan. I feel it . No sur there. Okay.

Speaker 2:

Alright . I think that not having you there really revealed to the audience, the people there, to me, especially one of the main things you bring to our partnership, which is being nice. You know, you just gotta name it, just gotta name it that like, I , I got a vibe. I got like have a , an antagonistic vibe with the crowd that I think you would've brought a lot of of levity to that, I think. So. Missed you , uh,

Speaker 1:

Missed you too. But it reminds me of the start of a game show , um, where , uh, the audience is saying low . Go again. Go, go .

Speaker 4:

Oh , right , yeah . Uhhuh , you've been sick at 10:00 AM and watched that on TV when you were a kid or something. I know you have. Can I just say I am definitely keeping five? Like I just like you cannot talk me out of getting rid of five. I just like, five has gotta be like a real good number here again, I'm like looking at the crowd to like see, do they agree with me? I think they do. All right . Is that cool with you?

Speaker 1:

Uh , yeah, no, I'd like to see the crowd. Any thumbs down? Thumbs up. You would keep it thumbs up?

Speaker 4:

Okay. Okay,

Speaker 1:

Go for it. Alright , you got some love out there? Let's

Speaker 4:

Just do one more and then pass it to them to do a couple on their own. Okay, some folks are already doing it. Can we just peel off a couple, a couple more here .

Speaker 1:

So yeah, so you don't have to shuffle again. Nobody wants to watch that <laugh>

Speaker 4:

One wants to watch that. That was , that was literally miserable for everybody, most of all me. Okay, so I just deal off four more,

Speaker 1:

Four more cards . A nine.

Speaker 4:

Great. So tired of seeing nines. I'm gonna gonna cut the deck at least. Okay. Alright . A new number. Okay. Nine five. Five. Okay. And a five <laugh>

Speaker 1:

Here. I'm taking these two away. I'm gonna make you draw again. <laugh> .

Speaker 4:

This is how , this is how I do it and I'm in Vegas at the tables. I'm like, I don't want that one. Uh , different one. Okay. Alright . Okay. Okay . Alright . So quick

Speaker 2:

Cutting here. This is when Jenny mercifully replaced two of those fives with a four and a seven, giving us a 9, 5, 4 and a seven. Think about how you might have paired those up to create two, two digit numbers.

Speaker 4:

I'd love to hear how you think through this yourself or if you can channel a kid or, I , I did a lot of talking last time, so I'm curious where you would , where you'd go here at this one and then we'll pass to you folks to try around ,

Speaker 1:

Right? So , um, I'm having a , okay, so I'm , whoa ,

Speaker 4:

The audience has a question expressed via via card. They wrote it down in the card because I brutally shut my friend down here from participating <laugh> . So they're like, oh, that was your question. Yes . They're like, we're communicating non-verbally. And the question was a good one and I, I feel I regret , uh, you know, not calling on you. The question was, can it be negative? And what does that do for us rules wise ?

Speaker 1:

I , so why

Speaker 4:

Am I asking you isn't the best part of a game that like <laugh> , like we can decide, right? Is that cool to decide

Speaker 1:

Your thought? No , I get , I always get asked, what about this? What's the rule on this? And I'm like, you know, you are the teacher, right? You get to make the rules. That's one of the joys of teaching. You get to make the rules. So if I'm teaching middle school, I can't wait for our students to ask that question. I might not put it out there to tell them about that. But then when they're working for that overall smallest amount and they recognize that if they have something like positive 15 now if they could counter with a negative 15, then when they put those two results together, right? But I do like to start simple. I don't like to make it too hard at the start. So we're gonna stay with , Dan's gonna stay within the positive world.

Speaker 4:

I'm staying in positive world, which suits my personality. <laugh> , but also, yeah, I

Speaker 1:

Don't know . Or zero. You can

Speaker 4:

Do a zero. I just love that . Like , and be asking like a kid, what would make it most fun or ask a teacher what would be most mentally productive? Um , anyway, that's just fun, the creativity there. So , uh, talk to us, how , how are you playing this from here ?

Speaker 1:

Alright , so what's your move? Yeah, so what I'm looking for is numbers that are close together to put them in my tens place. That's where my brain goes. So my first thinking is that I want these in my tens place.

Speaker 2:

So Jenny put the five and the four in the tens places. Okay,

Speaker 4:

Get that five and four. And

Speaker 2:

Remember that left two cards, a seven and the nine. And then Jenny decided to make a 57. A 49. How's that sound?

Speaker 4:

You did that fast. I get , can you like tell us what your thought is there about why you did it ? So how that was quick for you. What are you thinking about

Speaker 1:

Right here? Well, because if you have it this way

Speaker 2:

A 59 and a 47,

Speaker 1:

Then you have more than 10 if you're counting up.

Speaker 4:

Okay. Okay.

Speaker 1:

And so if you do it this way now nine, now it's under 10.

Speaker 4:

Yeah . Okay .

Speaker 1:

To count up. Follow

Speaker 4:

That, follow that. Okay. Thumbs up on that one? I don't know . Sound good? So that that'd be uh , an eight. An

Speaker 1:

Eight.

Speaker 4:

You could ask me my middle name and I would second guess myself with like the whole crowd watching. I was like, that's a an eight, right? We got

Speaker 1:

An eight.

Speaker 4:

Um , what ? Oh sorry . Are we , are we so , uh, sorry. Uh , thumbs up to keep eight or thumbs down to get rid of eight. The crowd says thumbs down, eight's gone. Okay. Um , yeah, the two of us are gonna wrap up our second hand , two hands while you folks try out with someone else. And we'll just be curious who's got the low , what is it? Lowest total sum of your two. Yeah, right.

Speaker 1:

Ultimately Dan will have a total, see if you can get under a dance total.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, right on. Alright . And everyone in here has to sh bowl . I had to do it . You've gotta do it <laugh> . You see how easy it is? Okay. Why is he shuffling so weird. How come he is bad at shuffling? You try it.

Speaker 2:

So Bethany here is where we let the audience play for themselves, which will speed through, but I've gotta , I got a name that everyone who was trying it felt a lot of empathy for me when they tried to shuffle these impossibly small cards. I , I felt very vindicated with how hard that was.

Speaker 3:

Well, what you didn't say in the audio, you know, I know because I I've seen the cards, but you didn't say that they're mini cards miniature, so that makes it even better. Like, got it. But, but wait for real slow . Dan, I want to flag what you said . I love how you called out the energy in the room, like you said, whoa, hold on. There's this like activation that happens when, you know, you're about to like launch into gameplay, right? Can you talk a little about the vibe in that room? Like the shift that you felt?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think it was like the way Jenny set up the game created conditions where people wanted to get into it. Like people were done with us talking about it, done watching us play and wanted to do, do it themselves. And I , I think a big part of that is like, I've had games introduced to me where I we're basically reading the whole rule book where like all the pieces are trotted out and the , the , the launch of it is like more muted than it was in the room. 'cause I think Jenny did not get into all the ins and outs. This , the strategy. Like all the technique that she knew would emerge from the game, but instead was like, Hey, here's the pieces, here's what you're gonna do with them, here's the goal. And people got that and wanted to get going and the game itself had really lends itself to that kind of energy, I think.

Speaker 3:

So hopefully as folks are listening to this, they're , they're thinking about how games could play a more central role in their everyday fluency practice. So let's get back to the room

Speaker 4:

A second here . Let's uh , head on back and , uh, having seen what's out there in the crowd, I am embarrassed <laugh>. I'm like, I'm honestly like I'm blushing to report a nine <laugh> . Is anyone worse than nine? <laugh> Cool. <laugh> . Yeah, we got some folks who are getting outed. I see ya . I see ya . Got a little special double digit club for you . <laugh> , which I am not in <laugh> . Ugh . I could never be in the double digit club, just in the high single digits. Uh , so who's got something lower than nine? Show us. Most everybody lower than eight, lower than seven, lower than six, lower than five, lower than four, lower than three, lower than two. Lower than one, one or lower. So who's two back there? We got twos. Twos amazing . A few twos. That's amazing. Give a round of applause for our twos. That's strong. That's awesome. Yeah. Alright . Uh , look, I'm into this. The good news, I mean the bad news is that I crashed and burned in the game. The good news is that I now know how to subtract two digit numbers. <laugh> , I feel, I feel in a word, fluent. So I have a few questions here. Okay. Like, what is, here's my question and it's an annoying one to start with here to debrief this. But like, what is a game? You know, like it kind of begs the question for me. Like if I, if you give me the flashcards of the , the four flashcards of the same four problems that I solved and said do this one, do this one, do this one, do this one. It would not have felt as game-like the same four problems in that, in that context. So my goal here is that the listeners, you folks here live, we could go back and think about what we're trying to help students develop fluency in, in a gamey kind of way. But I'm like curious what made that a game for you?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's a great question. 'cause as we're like working on the book and things, sometimes we're like putting instructions down. It's like, is this a game? What makes it a game? So I think it's a great question and there's probably no right answer to this, but one thing is this, the surprise that happens when you draw a card or roll a dice. Like you could play this game with dice instead of the cards, you know? So , um, since you don't know what's gonna be your options, your cards, then there's some gaming to it because you get what? You get <laugh> and you don't get upset. You <laugh> arrange your cards and then you're doing some, you know , some math. So you're creating problems from that. And then, I mean it's true that in games there is , um, oftentimes that motivation to beat it could be beat your partner or beat a score. Like to get, like I love the , um, what Dan uh , just said about two digits. Like, can you get your score under two digits? That's a beautiful like target, which should be easy. <laugh> ,

Speaker 4:

Roasted roasted. Wow, that was brutal. I thought only I did that to , to the audience. But that's cool <laugh> .

Speaker 1:

Um , it's , I like this . It's , it's rubbing off. 'cause I'm not usually that way really <laugh> . No, actually I did grow up loving card games. Okay . I did love card games. So I think there is that chance. And then, so I think that's the game thing is there's this element of chance. Okay, so like if you did win or you didn't win, it's more the luck of the draw literally than like what you know or don't know . I mean, you can make bad choices with your cards of course 'cause you're working on your fluency, but in general it's the luck of the draw.

Speaker 4:

So the only thing worse than doing like arithmetic in front of a crowd for me is like doing handwriting in front of a crowd. So, but like, just to name this, so there's a balance of chance and skill here where the cards give you the Chancey stuff, but there still is skill involved. I'm just like summarizing for myself and maybe the crowd here as well. Yeah.

Speaker 1:

So you have a goal like target to get a lower score, a high score. You're trying to , you have a goal you're working towards and the

Speaker 4:

Target can change. Like, it could be like the greatest, the greatest difference, the smallest difference. Get your difference to single digits. For some people might be a really big thing for them. You know, <laugh> , it might be a really special day where when you do that, you go home and you brag about it a little bit and you treat yourself to some TV and ice cream, right? Single digits. Okay, so the target and like what , what do we , what are we missing here? What else?

Speaker 1:

Um, I like to think a game, they don't all have to be with another person, but I think they're , uh, games tend to be interactive.

Speaker 4:

Okay. So cooperative mode, competitive mode. Um, you know, if you're me growing up solo mode, <laugh> , you know ,

Speaker 1:

It's cool.

Speaker 4:

Yeah. My favorite person. So , okay. Okay. So we, we could have been competitive. We were cooperative in our version here. Can

Speaker 1:

I just say also like, when I first , uh, started playing this game, it was , um, one person against one person, but it was so much more fun. And IL learned these from watching teachers in classrooms when there was partners because they did have an idea. And then they're like, wait a minute, wait a minute. Here's a smaller difference. We could get to the discourse between the partners playing like the two across the table turned out to be a richer discourse around the mathematics. So yeah,

Speaker 4:

I love the vibe that we get in this room. And for me, when we hear discourse, rich discourse <laugh> , people are like, Hmm , that discourse, it's rich <laugh> . I was gonna , I I think sometimes about people I know in my life, <laugh> if they saw the way we talk or , oh , but I , that's why I love being here. Uh , one of many reasons. Okay. Uh , um, okay, here's my question. Here's a question. Okay. So I love that we have some like basics, some ideas about what is a game. And I see how like flashcards fail a couple of these, right? Like you could do flashcards by chance. You , it's hard to do flashcards with a target that's variable or interesting to me 'cause it's like the answer, right? There's not a lot of chance , uh, hard to be cooperative. So I'm seeing some differences there. But I love the idea of different materials, cards, dice. We gave all of you a single number cube in your bag. <laugh>, you're welcome, <laugh> . Here's what I'm curious about though, is what kinds of materials could we turn into a mathy game? So we're gonna do a little bit of improv for Dr. Jenny Bay Williams. We haven't scripted this at all, at all. I don't know what you're gonna say here, but what I want are , um, either some household, a household object, some that you would imagine everyone in the room might have either an object in the home or an object in a classroom. And we're gonna ask , uh, Dr. Jenny Williams here to uh, turn that into a math game for us. Taking like the, taking the first four here. Talk to us a pen or multiple pens. We'll give, we'll give multiple pens. Okay? This is your moment, sir. 'cause like I shut you down earlier and now you're in. Bring it what you got. Make it count. Shoes, shoes, shoes . Including laces. No loafers necessarily can use the laces. Okay. Uh , please. Toothbrush. Toothbrush. Okay. Plural. Works can be multiple. Okay, let's go two more back. I feel like you might benefit from a lot of options here. Actually, <laugh> two more back here. Hit it.

Speaker 1:

Forks.

Speaker 4:

Forks, which we will allow you to broaden to all silverware. And one more over there.

Speaker 1:

Coffee

Speaker 4:

Cups. Coffee cups. And then one last one right here. Coins. Coins. Any coin imaginable? I do feel like you might've just really offered a , a real , a life preserver to me anyway. I'm not sure. Like coin Coin you might've had it for , for all of these here. Um, and someone give us a math topic solving quadratic equations. Psych . Just kidding, just kidding. <laugh> choking . Choke . Choke . Okay. Uh , uh, I mean you can , you can do what you want here. Fractions is a fun one. Another math topic. You , you might think about times, tables, multiplication. We're gonna just like , like take one minute where you can think about these and think about multiplication. You can think about fractions. What do you , what is this ? Do you think? I cannot hear you. What is this? Is this important or is this your table? Come tell me something. Combining terms . Combining like terms. Ooh . Okay. Take one minute. One minute only. Uh , and then we'll come on back to you. You think about what you might do here. Okay?

Speaker 1:

Okay. Wow.

Speaker 4:

Okay .

Speaker 2:

Let's give Jenny some time to think about that.

Speaker 4:

We

Speaker 1:

Have shoes. We really have as many of these as we as we want, right? And we could use like the toothbrush as our fraction bar, right? That could be the equation.

Speaker 2:

And here is what Jenny came up with after not even a minute that we gave her to think.

Speaker 1:

I have , I have an idea.

Speaker 4:

Everyone quiet. Oh wait, everyone be quiet right now. It's Jenny's got an idea.

Speaker 1:

Wait, it's only , it's only half baked <laugh> . She's ,

Speaker 4:

She thought she was gonna run this by me and we were gonna bake it together, but nope, we're doing it live <laugh> . We're doing it live. Alright . It's just , it's just rough draft thinking. You're among friends here. Can you feel the friendship? We're all friends here. So just that , all

Speaker 1:

Right . So it , it is also like everybody jump in and like, you know , polish the game. 'cause it's just my first thought. Okay. So one of my favorite strateg , I'm , I'm going with the fraction idea. So one of my favorite strategies for fractions, the inspiration for this game is the idea of being able to make a whole . So I'm gonna work backwards from what I'm , what I'm heading for with this game. So, big picture is if you're adding like two and three-fourths plus two and three-fourths, there's no need to stack 'em and like get a fraction greater than one and do all that. No , you can just move one of the fourths over to make a hole . Right? Okay. So my, my shoes are going to be the , um, holders of the parts. All right ? So the coin is gonna get flipped or you're gonna drop some coins or flip the coin to pick your denominator. I'm telling you it's half baked . No,

Speaker 4:

I'm, I'm , I'm feeling as though , okay . Yeah. All

Speaker 1:

Right . So that you're gonna get your denominator. So let's say you're , let's see, how's that gonna work?

Speaker 4:

The coins all have a number on them, right? So we could kind of like shake 'em a little bit and that's like your denominator. Sure. How does the flipping, I gives you like one or two. She's in love with this idea, by the way. I know her well enough. She

Speaker 1:

Love this idea . I'm gonna , no , I'm stubborn. I'm gonna figure out a really great game and I'm gonna publish it. And math's teaching and learning <laugh>

Speaker 4:

And we were there for that. Okay. Okay.

Speaker 1:

Okay. So, well , what I'm thinking is, if we were gonna drop the coins really high into the coffee cup and whatever bounces out, that's our denominator. So if you get like 6 cents, then your denominator is six, right?

Speaker 4:

Got your chance. Got your

Speaker 1:

Chance. I mean , right. Could it work? I'm not really sure. I'm already thinking that my own children have walked away by now. <laugh>, <laugh> ,

Speaker 4:

Bored. I just love the thought process though. I love the thought process. And if I could just like say one more thing I want to add to this our list of like gaminess things and we can pick this back up and keep brainstorming. I , I get this sense that you're not happy with where this has ended up. It needs to work <laugh> . I , but I really love that you involve us in your process here. And I just wanna name a difference between us. When I was thinking about this is I was like, I had an idea that had like chance and I had not thought through a target, but I especially had not thought through a mathematical goal. And Jenny was like, yeah, but like, what are we doing here? Like, what is, like what ideas are we trying to develop? And you all heard it happen there. This idea of like making holes was like one of the first few things that Jenny started with and worked backwards from there. Rather than me thinking like, wouldn't it be cool if we threw, you know, knives at a wall or something, you

Speaker 1:

Know? Yeah . I mean if somebody would've suggested, you know, like beans from their cabinet or something, I gotta have something I can count. So this was a rough list. Yeah,

Speaker 4:

<laugh>. Love it. Last question from me , um, is just this, I want to know like the idea that you have like little playing cards , you have dice, we have, you know , beans, there's so much that can be turned into a fluency game, right? What I'd love to know is if you had say $5 per child for a fluency packet, like stuff you could buy for five bucks or less, dollar store, dollar General, that kind of thing. And you made one of those, you know, for your class app . So you have five bucks a kid and that's gonna carry you as far as you can make it last. What are the essential elements of your pack here? Well, for

Speaker 1:

Sure cards. I think after washing Dan , Dan , I would splurge on the bigger ones . <laugh> , thank

Speaker 4:

You. It's a little bit late, but thank you.

Speaker 1:

Uh , and then , uh, definitely uh , dice, if I really can fit it in my budget, I want the 10 sided die because zero is on the 10 sided die and I got all the single digits . So I prefer the 10 sided, but I do love the six, six-sided as a start. 'cause then you, like if we were doing , um, for keeps with a six-sided dye , the one that you have, if you just find a few friends, then you're just, you have smaller possibilities, right? They're all within 60. I wanna say

Speaker 4:

We're up to like three bucks now. Okay . Maybe a little Amy A. Little high , but two more , two more dollars. What do you got for

Speaker 1:

Us? So then, so then , uh, counters. But if that's too expensive, buy some large lima beans. I've done this on my back porch before, which my , uh, family didn't appreciate. 'cause then we spray painted, you know, one half , uh, in a school color and then we turned 'em over and painted the other half in the school color. Wow. And then the , and then the um, concrete forevermore on the back deck wasn't really, wasn't really white anymore, but , uh, anyways. Um , but I would definitely have counter. So those are the three essentials. I mean, to be honest, every time I travel, those are the three things that have to go on my suitcase. Hey ,

Speaker 4:

You know , <laugh> , TSA sees you coming like, oh, good to see you Dr. J . Yeah. Okay comes love that. Okay. Yeah , I'm , I think you still like Lima beans. What do they call lima beans? Like a a dollar per, I don't know what lima bean costs. Uh , no. You , you have still some room here. Is there any like one last thing you'd sock in there?

Speaker 1:

Well , I ,

Speaker 4:

I'm in bulk. That was a

Speaker 1:

Cheap , right? Yeah. Um, well, I mean, I feel like I would want either big pieces of card stock or little note cards. Mm . Just for , um, coming up with like visuals to support like their fluency work. Maybe not for the games, but there always could be a way to use note cards, right?

Speaker 4:

Sure. I personally would choose a pocket calculator to help them develop fluency. <laugh>, perhaps I standalone here. That is my bravery. Um, look folks , uh, Jenny , it's been fantastic to hear how you are helping people work through an area of math that for many people was one of the hardest for them. Had some traumatizing memories from that. And you're doing it in a way that is game-like and fun. And I, I , I put fun as a co-equal goal for myself. Uh , fun and math. Like, what's the point of doing math? It's not , not a little bit fun sometimes. And so I just love your work and learning from you. Can we all give , uh, Jenny Bailey Williams , uh, a big round of applause . Thank you for

Speaker 1:

Efforts ,

Speaker 4:

<laugh> . Thank you. Thank

Speaker 1:

You , thank you, thank you.

Speaker 4:

Thank you for being part of this, part of our time here. Yeah, <laugh> , that's like a , that's a diplomatic summit. Handshake <laugh> in was , we're in Washington <laugh> and thank you folks for being here , uh, that we are nothing as a podcast without our audience. And please like, rate and subscribe. Uh , let's see here. Hop on and join me and Bethany on the podcast as we round out our season on fluency. Make sure you listen to that one x or even 0.75 x . So it was really those really brilliant nuggets don't pass you by too fast. And thank you folks for being here meets this huge part of this live show. This was us all together, not just the two of us. It was a blast hanging out with you. Thank you so much and have a great day, team. Thanks. So

Speaker 2:

That was the conversation with Dr. Jennifer Bay Williams at NCTM, Bethany , uh, what'd you think, aside from being just super jealous that I was there hanging out with, with your Maine , with your bestie , um, what'd you think about all that?

Speaker 3:

By the way, she does not know me at all. Not like, not even a little bit <laugh> . It's my own appreciation from afar of your work, Dr. Jennifer Big Williams, but for real. So Dan, first of all, I thought that was super fun and like I love that folks got to participate and dive in, and I felt like they experienced that enjoyment and the excitement about the game, and I feel like they now can like, try to recreate that for their own students. And you also help to kind of reframe what fluency practice could look like. So just say again for me and our listeners, what were a couple of the elements that you think are gonna be crucial if you're trying to create that level of excitement and enthusiasm for our students in the classroom?

Speaker 2:

Oh, my. Such a huge question. Um, I think like by the book, I don't know by Jenny Bailey , Williams' book I think, but like Okay,

Speaker 3:

Fair enough, fair enough. No ,

Speaker 2:

But if I had like, you know, free associate, my own learning from what I heard here, we're talking about things like a very concrete goal that someone, you know, like three grade levels back could understand. You know, like the goal has gotta be just like crystal and materials that are also like tactile and tangible that involve an element of chance to them. So those were some of the elements. I think that that worked really well. The goal, small, small is like a word that lots of kids can understand, right? Um, and this element of chance what you, what you deal off of the deck and then like having some, some , a little bit of strategy and to , to risk something. Like someone got like a difference that was small, but is that one you wanna hold onto or should you throw it back and try for a different one? Those were the elements I think that really kept the group. Like they could have kept on playing this game for a lot longer. I think based on a lot of those elements.

Speaker 3:

I have two thoughts that I want to add. I'm, I'm wondering, like, I'm picturing my students playing this game and a couple things I'm thinking about are like, how could we give students for whom this is really challenging, not being able to fluently come up with the difference. How can we give them more access? Could you provide a hundred charts for everyone? And then whether or not they use it or not, it's up to them, but then it's just kind of this norm that we have a hundred chart in front of us, or unifix cubes or something. Like I know that in terms of like, if we could take that speed out of the game or like, especially I love the idea of partnering with someone so you can play around with the ideas together and come up with the differences. Like, I love that idea of that collaborative nature that could take some of that pressure off of it. So I kind of wanted to flag that because I think it could be, it could become like really high pace , like we talked about it quickly. Yeah. But does it need to move that fast?

Speaker 2:

I really appreciate you flagging these possible modifications. I really enjoyed being collaborative with a teammate and competitive with other teams and with my partner, we could like strategize and think and , um, with other teams I could be, you know, sassy , uh, as, as everyone now knows about me. Um, but the , the hundred chart, that's really interesting, like a tool for thinking what tools for thinking might be helpful to have around the room to keep students focused intellectually where we'd like their focus and not burdened, where we don't want them burdened. I think that's a really interesting comment.

Speaker 3:

Well, and I think, right, like part of fluency, building fluency is repetition. And so with this game, it sounds like by nature you're, you're coming up with a lot of differences because you're trying out different configurations. But I've always thought of a lot of the fluency games as like, the goal is to get as much practice in as possible in our short timeframe, right? So you don't want students to just do one version of subtraction and like, we're done. No, they're comparing numbers, they're trying out different configurations, and I think that's where some of the richness and the fluency is built. And I obviously this is one game on a long list of games you'd be playing with your students to build that fluency. But I think a real key as the teacher is pulling your students back together at the end of play and discussing and debriefing, right? So talking like to some of the students, how you were calling out, who got a total of nine, who got a double digit total , you know, and talking about the strategy a little bit, or maybe even like the next day you throw up four cards and you have all your students play around with different configurations. You know what I'm saying? That, that debrief

Speaker 2:

No, I'm, I'm really tracking that. Yeah. And like, it was wonderful that we all did different problems. We all, we all dealt off different cards to ourselves and that was wonderful from like a sense of agency and autonomy. But as far as like collective learning, I love what you just described of like, okay, now let's all think about the same four cards. And I would imagine it'd be wise to make those intentionally dealt out to highlight some of the learning objectives, like thinking about place value and you want large numbers in the, in the tens or the ones place. But that, that makes a ton of sense. I think it's , it's easily lost. I think I got excited about the game and the fun. Yeah. But also to focus on the learning objective and how to best support that. Yeah. I really appreciate your comments there. And we

Speaker 3:

Want our students like caught up in the game, right? But then some of that really rich discourse as you, as you flag comes from the student sharing out, I pulled these four cards and at first, you know, just like Jenny did or Dr. Williams did, at first, I had them arrange like this, but then I knew that I could get a smaller difference. And I feel like that could be a natural extension of the game that students are still just as invested in. Yeah .

Speaker 2:

Or to drag it back to like a sports as a another frame. Like you play the game, but then like the real pro sports teams , like don't just like say, all right , see ya at practice next week or See you the next game. Yes . It's like, let's watch some, let's watch some footage, you know, let's like take one moment from the game and watch it from seven angles and, and dissect it as a group. And that feels like kind of the moment you're describing.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely. Whether you won or not, we're all learners.

Speaker 2:

Right. Well, thank you so much for listening to this very special episode of Math Teacher Lounge. Please like, rate and subscribe on the podcast platform of your choice. It means a ton , uh, for, you know, the algorithms getting our stuff boosted out there and also, you know, my ego, my, my , you know, my , my mom checks my ratings, you

Speaker 3:

Know . Oh , right . Okay. Moving on . Right next time in the lounge we're going to be talking with Dr. Jody Garino about what it's like to make fluency a priority across an entire school.

Speaker 6:

I think there was a lot of leaning into each other. So I think if people are interested in working on fluency, finding a friend, even if that friend isn't at your school or at your grade level, like who can sort of be that accountability partner or thought partner that can, you can sort of lean on each other as you're doing this.

Speaker 3:

That's next time on Math Teacher Lounge. Thanks so much for listening.

People on this episode

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Bethany Lockhart Johnson

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Dan Meyer

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