Be Less Helpful

What about this idea – teachers should be less helpful! A ridiculous notion or a recipe for more meaningful learning and deeper thinking? Check out the blog of Dan Meyer at blog.mrmeyer.com. He is making mathematics learning engaging by doing less and asking students to do more. In a subject area where whenever you do something you face the risk of being told you’re wrong! This concept is nothing short of revolutionary.

You might ask the question, how does this work? The answer, say less, give less – be less helpful! I have been doing this in problem solving for nearly five years and learnt that when you ask kids to keep thinking instead of relying on you (their teacher) to intervene every time they strike difficulty, you set them on a course toward enjoying mathematics!

How so? Well I’ll give you the example that I have just seen after teaching 3 lessons to 4 different Year 5 classes. Part of these lessons involved 15mins working on a problem sheet with 4 problems. Students work through the differentiated tasks at their own pace. Depending on their ability they usually get stumped on one of the questions. This is then followed by some huffing and puffing and cries for help. This is the crucial time of the lesson. The time to be less helpful! Ask them to keep working on trying to find the answer to the problem. What follows is a struggle as the student exhausts the extent of the mathematical ability. Often the outcome is the discovery of the answer, and with this comes a deep satisfaction. Yelps of “YES” were often heard after a student had persevered and found the answer. This outcome is priceless! A student deeply satisfied with their experience, because they have had some success that they own!

Recipe for Developing Mathematical Satisfaction in Problem Solving
1. Expound on the value of perseverance!
2. Students can’t say, they can’t solve a problem.
3. Students can ask a question about the question (for clarification purposes).
4. Students can ask if the question is correct.
5. Teacher observes and doesn’t help!

Example of questions on a differentiate problem sheet for Year 5s