Projects in a sixth‐grade classroom: entering a bumpy but promising road

Kindergarten through sixth grade classroom teachers in four school districts completed questionnaires designed to determine whether they would be more likely to refer a boy than a girl with an identical communication disorder. The teachers were found to be equally likely to refer a girl as a boy who presented a disorder of articulation, language, or voice, but they were more likely to refer a boy for speech-language remediation who presented the disorder of stuttering. The tendency for the teachers to allow the sex of a child to influence their likelihood of referral for stuttering remediation, to overlook a sizeable percentage of children with chronic voice disorders, and to be somewhat inaccurate generally in their referrals suggests that teacher referrals are best used as an adjunct to screening rather than as a primary procedure to locate children with communication disorders.

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Motivational and Emotional Orientation, Engagement, and Achievement in Mathematics. A Case Study With One Sixth-Grade Classroom Working With an Electronic Textbook on Fractions

Frontiers in Education ◽

10.3389/feduc.2021.588472 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 6 ◽

Author(s):

Frank Reinhold ◽

Stefan Hoch ◽

Anja Schiepe-Tiska ◽

Anselm R. Strohmaier ◽

Kristina Reiss

Keyword(s):

Learning Outcomes ◽

Prior Knowledge ◽

Cognitive Learning ◽

Sixth Grade ◽

Emotional Engagement ◽

Behavioral Engagement ◽

Electronic Textbook ◽

The Relationship ◽

Grade Classroom

Interactive and adaptive scaffolds implemented in electronic mathematics textbooks bear high potential for supporting students individually in learning mathematics. In this paper, we argue that emotional and behavioral engagement may account for the effectiveness of such digital curriculum resources. Following the general model for determinants and course of motivated action, we investigated the relationship between students’ domain-specific motivational and emotional orientations (person)—while working with an electronic textbook on fractions (situation), their emotional and behavioral engagement while learning (action), and their achievement after tuition (outcome). We conducted a case-study with N = 27 students from one sixth-grade classroom, asking about the relationship between students’ motivational and emotional orientations and their emotional and behavioral engagement, and whether emotional and behavioral engagement are unique predictors of students’ cognitive learning outcomes while working with an e-textbook. For that, we designed a four-week-intervention on fractions using an e-textbook on iPads. Utilizing self-reports and process data referring to students’ interactions with the e-textbook we aimed to describe if and how students make use of the offered learning opportunities. Despite being taught in the same classroom, results indicated large variance in students’ motivational and emotional orientations before the intervention, as well as in their emotional and behavioral engagement during the intervention. We found substantial correlations between motivational and emotional orientations (i.e., anxiety, self-concept, and enjoyment) and emotional engagement (i.e., intrinsic motivation, competence and autonomy support, situational interest, and perceived demand)—with positive orientations being associated with positive emotional engagement, as expected. Although the correlations between orientations and behavioral engagement (i.e., task, exercise, and hint count, problem solving time, and feedback time) also showed the expected directions, effect sizes were smaller than for emotional engagement. Generalized linear mixed models revealed that emotional engagement predicted cognitive learning outcomes uniquely, while for behavioral engagement the interaction with prior knowledge was a significant predictor. Taken together, they accounted for a variance change of 44% in addition to prior knowledge. We conclude that when designing digital learning environments, promoting engagement—in particular in students who share less-promizing prerequisites—should be considered a key feature.

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The relationship between historical response and narrative in a sixth-grade classroom

Researching History Education ◽

10.4324/9781315088815-2 ◽

2018 ◽

pp. 10-29

Author(s):

Linda S. Levstik

Keyword(s):

Sixth Grade ◽

The Relationship ◽

Grade Classroom

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Use of Apple iPads in K-6 Math and Science Classrooms

Cases on Educational Technology Implementation for Facilitating Learning ◽

10.4018/978-1-4666-3676-7.ch011 ◽

2013 ◽

pp. 177-192

Author(s):

Tara Bennett ◽

Florence Martin

Keyword(s):

Instructional Strategies ◽

Science Classroom ◽

Sixth Grade ◽

Comfort Level ◽

Magnet School ◽

Middle Grade ◽

Addition And Subtraction ◽

Grade Classroom ◽

Interest In Technology

In this chapter, the authors review how iPads were used in a middle grade math classroom of a technology magnet school. The school has received two mobile iPad carts in addition to the three they have. Ms. Martin, a science teacher at this middle school, has received one of the mobile iPad carts due to her interest in technology integration. Ms. Martin is considered to be an early adopter of technology at her school, and she has been using iPads for more than a year in her sixth grade classroom. Ms. Bennett, who recently received 25 iPads, paid a visit to Ms. Martin’s classroom to learn how to integrate iPads in her science classroom. This case study describes Ms. Bennett’s visit to Ms. Martin’s classroom on the day when the students were studying how to solve inequalities by using addition and subtraction. Ms. Bennett’s goal for the visit was to identify the different ways Ms. Martin was using iPads with her students, and monitor the comfort level of her students with the iPads. She documents what she learns from the visit, and discusses it with Ms. Martin; she also meets with Mr. Pallapu, the technology facilitator at school. Ms. Martin shares some tips and techniques that she can use in her classroom, and also some benefits and challenges of using the iPad. Mr. Pallapu provides her with a list of recommended apps and instructional strategies for using iPads in the classroom.

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Microcomputers in a Sixth-Grade Classroom

The Arithmetic Teacher ◽

10.5951/at.31.2.0022 ◽

1983 ◽

Vol 31 (2) ◽

pp. 22-24

Author(s):

Janet P. Morris

Keyword(s):

Mathematics Curriculum ◽

Sixth Grade ◽

Mathematical Concepts ◽

The Core ◽

Grade Classroom

How should computer be used in the classroom? An Agenda for Action state that “computers should be integrated into the core mathematics curriculum,” that they “should be used in imaginative ways for exploring, discovering, and developing mathematical concepts,” and that the computer activities should “fit the goals or objectives of the program” (NCTM 1980, p. 9).

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Digital Drawing to Digital Graphics

Advances in Early Childhood and K-12 Education - Infusing Technology into the Classroom ◽

10.4018/978-1-59904-765-2.ch007 ◽

2011 ◽

pp. 127-146

Author(s):

Catherine Schifter

Keyword(s):

Middle Class ◽

Sixth Grade ◽

Second Grade ◽

Grade Classroom

Do you remember your second grade classroom? I remember it being a rather large room, but then I was quite small back then. There were music instruments in one corner of the room that we used to “make music” every week. There were books along one wall, and small tables in the middle of the room where students sat. Students were grouped at the tables such that there were six to eight at any one table. Projects were done together and work was shared giving encouragement or trouble. There were windows along the wall across from the entrance that looked out onto a tree lined street. The school was a Kindergarten through sixth grade in a middle class neighborhood.

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Using a Pattern Table to Solve Contextualized Proportion Problems

Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School ◽

10.5951/mtms.8.8.0432 ◽

2003 ◽

Vol 8 (8) ◽

pp. 432-439

Author(s):

Janet M. Sharp ◽

Barbara Adams

Keyword(s):

Problem Solving ◽

Sixth Grade ◽

Grade Classroom

Students in a sixth-grade classroom we visited were celebrating a classmate's birthday and enjoying fun-sized bags of Peanut M&M's candies. We overheard them discussing their curiosity at the small number of blue M&M's each of them had received in their small bags. Because the students were occupied in an informal, party atmosphere, we were pleasantly surprised to hear one student, Rickea, comment on a related mathematical issue. She speculated that the teacher's class-sized bag would have relatively few blue M&M's, as well. What a wonderful teaching opportunity for ratios and proportions Rickea's casual comment posed! In this article, we describe (1) how we built a week-long, problem-based unit around Rickea's original proportion question and (2) the effectiveness of using problem solving to help Rickea and her classmates construct knowledge about ratio and proportional thinking.

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Building on Students' Intuitive Strategies to Make Sense of Cross Multiplication

Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School ◽

10.5951/mtms.9.3.0150 ◽

2003 ◽

Vol 9 (3) ◽

pp. 150-155

Author(s):

Melissa D. Boston ◽

Margaret S. Smith ◽

Amy F. Hillen

Keyword(s):

Problem Solving ◽

Middle Grades ◽

Sixth Grade ◽

Grade Classroom

Middle-grades students' understanding of proportional relationships should be fostered through problem solving and reasoning (NCTM 2000). Toward this end, instruction in proportionality should expose students to a variety of strategies and allow students to gain experience modeling proportional situations (Langrall and Swafford 2000). Students should be given ample opportunities to develop intuitive strategies based on factor- of-change (“how many times as many”) relationships (Cramer and Post 1993). Research has shown that middle-grades students are more successful at method is appropriate to use” (NCTM 2000, p. 221). We begin our discussion by focusing on the events that unfold in Marie Hanson's sixth-grade classroom during a lesson on understanding ratios and proportions (Smith et al. forthcoming), and use this lesson as a context for considering how factor-of-change relationships might be used to assist students in understanding why cross multiplication works.

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