Reflective Questions for Math Shifts

Categorized by North Carolina Professional Teaching Standards

Standard 1: teachers demonstrate leadership
Do you see any possible opportunities to offer professional development for other teachers in our school?
In what ways have you contributed to your vertical planning team in designing strategies for coherence in math topics across the grade level?

A major component of the school's strategic plan is to increase reading and writing in the content areas. How is this occurring in your math cla
How do you choose resources to address students weakness and strengths?
How does data inform your instruction in math?
How does your math instruction require students to demonstrate deep understanding vs. applying an algorithm taught?
What data did you use to plan this lesson/activity? What prior knowledge did your students have?
How do you contribute to students graduating from high school? What does this contribution look like in daily interaction with students?
What type of evaluation have you used and how have you used the da?
How can you collaborate with your peers to think across grades?
How does this lesson prepare your students for next year?
In what ways do you hold students responsible for their own learning?
What would be the benefits of leading a K-8 Vertical alignment PLC?
In what ways have you been able to promote vertical dialogue with yoru peers so that Math is not a series of disconnected topics?
How does this lesson relate to knowledge students bring from their prior grade level? to their next grade level?
How do you know what your students have retained from last year in Math? What data are you using?
How are you asking students to apply their answers to new situations or are you still just teaching them how to get the answers?

How can you create real world Math problems that have multiple pathways to solutions allowing for collaboration and communication of deci
How have you effectively worked with other teachers/disciplines and how have you sustained effective/impactful results?
Standard 2: teachers establish a respectfule environment for a diverse population of students
How are you adapting your math assignments for students with disabilities in a way that ensures the rigor is still intact?
How have you modeled respect in the classroom?
How have you incorporated global awareness into your mathematics lessons?
What challenges do your ELL/EC students face in your classroom and how are you addressing those?
How do you adapt your teaching to engage your ELLs?
How do you leverage student diversity to increase understanding of each other? themselves?
What are your expectations for students understanding of complex academic vocabulary?

What conversations are you having with parents to inform them about the changes to the standards? For example, students will no longer ha
Rigor does not equal more work.
How do you communicate the expectation that your students persevere in solving problems?
How do you use manipulatives to reinforce learning basic math facts to provide for a variety of learners?
How will you be sure students with math anxiety participate in your new CC interactive classrooms?

How do you create a safe environment in which your students feel comfortable extending their knowledge and demonstrating conceptual unde

How would you have students recognize that there are multiple ways to solve a problem and that it is OK/even encouraged to have different s
How were your students grouped in today's lesson?
Standard 3: teachers know their content
Discuss how your Core curriculum relates to the grade above and below you.

Thinking beyond simply being proficient with facts, what evidence do you have to show students have an I depth understanding of....?
How have you prepared your lesson/unit instruction as an extension of previous learning?
Do you have any examples of how your students apply the content learned outside of class in real world situations?

What have you learned after talking to your ELA and/or math colleagues in the grade above and below you, and how will it affect your plannin
How did you integrate other disciplines within your lesson?
What specific materials will you use to engage students in finding multiple solutions to problems?
How can you ensure that students are using the appropriate concepts so they can apply the math to real world situations?
How are you using the standards to remediate and enhance the content area standards for math?
Which strategies do you utilize to ensure students have a strong conceptual understanding of your content?
How are you addressing the gaps with this first year of implementation?
How could your students use this strategy in your personal life to track finances?

What specific math practices are you incorporating into the classroom activities I am going to observe? How will you facilitate students recogn
How do your lesson plans correlate with the instructional focus for your grade?
How would you use primary sources to emphasize real world applications to students?
Give examples of how your science students use math in your class?
How would you use primary sources to emphasize real world applications to students?

In what manner are you incorporating math into your specific content area so that students are utilizing math skills in real world situations appl
How can you change your instructional practices to ensure students gain a deep conceptual understanding of core math concepts?

Could you collaborate with a colleague from a different grade level to develop a math project that can be worked on across grade levels, allow
students on a problem using skills across grade levels?
What are some examples of the opportunities you provide for students to apply concepts in real world situations?

Develop an introductory task for this topic that poses a non-math math problem, to build context outside of the classroom and apart from algo
Could you collaborate with a colleague from a different grade level to develop a math project that can be worked on across grade levels, allow
students on a problem using skills across grade levels?
How do you encourage students to demonstrate their understanding of math concepts in other content areas?

I observed you instructing students to divide both sides of the equation by three or to add seven to both sides. Other than just saying that they
why that is the process? Can they explain or demonstrate with manipulatives or diagrams the process?
How do you plan to make connections to the math in other grade levels?
How do you allow students choice in the tools they use to apply math skills in real world, relevant situations?
How can you teach this standard via a real-world application?
How do you connect learning in mathematics within and across grade levels?
How did you make a connection with writing and math?
How can you help students understand the use of math in everyday life (and fraction)?
In what ways do you link math concepts to student prior knowledge?
How will you expand/enhance the information from the previous grade level to your grade level?
How do you show evidence of collaboration in thinking across grade levels in math?
Why is it important to increase student engagement your classroom?
How could you approach this reading to ensure students are grasping text evidences?
How could you better integrate other grade levels into your math lesson?
How do you integrate graphic data with word problems?
How do you help students understand that Math is a language of applying complex concepts to real world problems?
How do you link the Math topics so that each new concept is an extension of previous learning?

How can you link your Math concept to build prior knowledge and link it to prerequisite skills for the future?
What real world examples have you used in this Mathematics lesson?
How are you allowing the students to apply the concept just taught to real world applications?
Why did you use Science topic x to cover Math concept y? How are they connected?
How have you linked prior knowledge (6th grade) to the current grade/concept he/she is learning now?
How was your Math unit linked to the students previous learning? Previous skills taught last year?
In what ways have you considered, researched, and changed your instruction to increase coherence and rigor from previous grade levels?
Standard 4: teachers facilitate learning for their students
How do you measure the degree of fluency your students are achieving?
How will you be sure your students can apply mathematical practices in the real world?
How could you allow the students to collaborate in order to explain how they got the answer to a problem?
How can you lead your students through hands on demonstrations to gain deeper insight
into conceptual understanding?

What is the best example of student collaboration culminating with their presenting complex findings/conclusions to the class in a professiona
How can you lead your students through hands on demonstrations to gain deeper insight
into conceptual understanding?
How do you plan to achieve the balance between computational fluency and conceptual understanding?
What are some different ways you could ask students to explain their reasoning, other than by calling on them in front of the whole class?
What is your response when students offered different approaches to finding the solution?
How could you redesign the lesson to have students make practical applications?

Have you thought about creating a bank of open ended problems focused on the objective on which you are working that allow students to sh
What instructional activities are you using to evaluate student's conceptual understanding of mathematics? What resources are you using to
you use to make your lessons more rigorous.
How is your homework structured to practice core functions? What data do you use to plan homework assignments?

How do you ensure rigor through conceptual understanding, procedural skill and fluency, and application with intensity through differentiation o
What types of questions/instructional strategies do you use to support students to explain and justify their reasoning?

Looking back over your lesson, what next steps have you planned to incorporate data (unemployment rate, gas prices, etc., ) to make learning
What opportunities will you provide for students that allows them to demonstrate their conceptual understanding?
What evaluation techniques are you using to ensure that students are mastering standards with a high level of rigor?

How do your long-range plans reflect the key focus areas for your grade level? Were you able to integrate these focus areas in today's lesson
How did you utilize technology to provide additional assistance to students in the area of ______________________?

How can you design a lesson to allow students to express multiple ways in solving the math necessary to solve the hypothesis to the lab expe
How will you preassess students in your 8th grade math class before Unit 3 begins?

How do you motivate students to pursue different approaches to solving a problem once they already arrived at a correct answer using one ap
How will you have students to explain their math problems?
How will you move students beyond "how to get the answer?"
What system do you use to monitor student performace and respond to individual learning needs? Does your data support the effectiveness
How can I help teachers understand that students must be responsible for explaining their answer to either small or whole groups?
How have you differentiated your math application activities to fit the needs of all students in your classroom?
Are your students writng, reading, thinking and speaking math on a daily basis in math?
How will you allow students to demonstrate their understanding of perimeter?

How are you creating coherence between your lessons?

How can you use the current technologies at your disposal to maximize student learning and engagement in math?
How do you help students "strike a balance" between building conceptual understanding, fluency (skill-building), and application?
How do you assess prior knowledge for a mathematical concept? How do you use that data to inform instruction?
What real world situations could you have included to demonstrate the math concept of this lesson?
What prior learning is required to ensure students can conceptually grasp new learning?
In thinking about crossing over to other grade levels, how do you know they are getting it? Do you know the developmental levels?
How often do your lessons include multiple math practices in activities?
How are students justifying and supporting their answers?
How did you make connections between topics to facilitate and solidify student understanding?
Tell me how you could have used a real world scenario in this math lesson?
How do you encourage discussion around concepts and procedure in your math class?

I noticed you began this new lesson that you were telling students they needed to understand a previous concept to move forward. You were a
you know that your students were ready to move forward? What formative assessments did you use? What percentage of your students are r
What manipulatives could you have used today to have better student understanding of ratio and proportion?
In what ways are students providing you with how they solve the problem?
How do you know that your students can apply the concepts learned to real world situations?
What different ways do students represent their conceptual understanding of math?
How can you engage students into collaboration and problem solving?

What real world example/application could you have used to help students make better connections and answer, Why do I need to know this
What activities could you have used with your lesson to ensure greater understanding of the content by your students?
What data do you use to match student with appropriate level of reading material?

After pre-assessing students math content knowledge of given goal, what opportunities are given to students that master sub-goals to continu
How has the use of formative assessments impacted your teaching methodology?
How did this activity facilitate speed and accuracy in calculation?
What manipulatives will provide students a visual understanding of concept? How?
What methods or tools are you employing to increase procedural skill and fluency?

Discuss how you have students apply new skills they have gained in math into real-world situations to solve problems? How do Math skills re
How have you used teamwork and students collaboration beyond your classroom with this lesson or unit in Math?
What lessons from previous nine weeks do you see the most opportunity to add activities at the evaluate/create level of RBT?
How will you be certain you are building upon students prior understanding of Math topics in your lessons?
What is a real world example you could have used to explain that Mathematical concept?
Even though you teach higher level Math courses Calculus and AP Stat, how do you incorporate teaching strategies that encourage fluency?
How do you stay current on new/innovative strategies to teach students a conceptual understanding of Math more than just algorithms?

How did you promote the character trait of perseverance through your lesson? How did students metacognitively think about their perseveran
Which kinds of products do you require students to evidence their conceptual understanding?
What can you do to help students link major concepts across the disciplines?

How are you collaborating with Math teachers in grades above and below the grade you teach to discuss how specific concepts are being taug
How do you choose which standards to focus on based on the needs of the students in your class?
How could you differentiate instruction in this lesson to meet the needs of the highest level of learner?

How would you design a lesson where students will apply this concept in the real world?
Describe the various assessments used in the classroom and how you adjusted the neat lesson to reflect on data collected?
How do you integrate literacy standards with content?
What opportunities are available to demonstrate the why behind solving a Math problem?
Are students expressing (multiple ways) the methods used to arrive at their answer/conclusion to a scenario/problem?
What do you do when a students does not understand and cannot apply a basic concept that he/she should have mastered 2 years ago?
Are students able to teach the process of solving problems to other members of the class?
How will you design opportunities for students to talk about their problem solving/thinking?
Standard 5: Teachers reflect on their practice
What professional development needs have you identified that will aid you connecting math to real world applications?
When reviewing student data, how is this information used to effectively impact instruction and how do you know if it's working?
Look at one Math concept you taught this year. How did your instruction, assessment, and sequencing change from the previous year?
How do you know which students mastered the concepts? How will you follow-up with students who do not?
How could you guide students to solve the problem in a different way?
In what ways are you allowing students with special needs to express mastery?
How did you assess individual conceptual understanding of (a specific math skill) to determine the appropriate level of instructional design?
What alternative resource could you have used to build understanding?
What opportunities will provide students to express continued mastery of topic?

Based on daily formative assessments, how do you plan to adjust your instructions to meet the needs of students not demonstrating mastery o
What processes do you incorporate to differentiate multiple ways to get end result/answer?
How do you create an inter-disciplinary lesson that focuses on elementary Math concepts that connect the learning across grade levels?
How do you construct a Math lesson that requires students to have speed and accuracy in calculation?