2021 MTLC Master Class Webinar Series

Presenter: Matt Sexton (ACU)

Audience: Foundation to Year 3 teachers

Webinar Synopsis
The teaching and learning of place value needs to go beyond just reading, writing, and ordering numbers. This webinar will outline tasks and practical advice that teachers can use to draw explicit attention to developing students’ quantity sense with place value, focusing on the importance of interpreting quantities. 

Presenter: Linda Parish (ACU)

Audience: Foundation to Year 6 teachers

Webinar Synopsis
Concrete materials in the mathematics classroom helps students perceive and understand mathematical concepts. However, the use of these materials in the mathematics classroom can sometimes hinder student learning. How can both of these statements be true? Concrete materials have an important place in all mathematics classrooms, but it is not the materials themselves that teach – it is the teacher who orchestrates the learning experiences that teaches. This webinar explores ways to choose and use concrete materials, highlighting “how” materials are used is what makes all the difference.

Presenter: Peter Sullivan

Audience: Foundation to Year 8 teachers

Webinar Synopsis
Perhaps the greatest challenge facing mathematics teachers is dealing with the diversity of students’ prior experience. This webinar will outline 10 strategies for including all students, including those who experience difficulties and those who are ready for more challenges, in productive mathematics learning.

Presenter: Charles Lovitt

Audience: Foundation to Year 8 teachers

Webinar Synopsis
Charles Lovitt has collected a suite of lessons from across Australia highlighting how teachers have successfully built effective lessons stimulated by relevant community contexts. In this webinar, three of these lessons (Win at the Fair, Choc Chip Cookies and Radioactivity) will be workshopped and discussed to show the pedagogical decisions for converting an idea into a successful problem solving lesson for students.

Presenter: Jill Brown 

Audience: Years 4 to 8 teachers

Webinar Synopsis
For many teachers in the “middle years” (Years 4-8), the teaching of fractions and algebra can be daunting especially considering that teachers need to possess deep understanding of the important content and pedagogical content knowledge for those mathematics topics. In this webinar, the teacher knowledge that supports the teaching and learning fractions and algebraic thinking will be shared by focusing on particular tasks and teacher questioning that forces students to engage in mathematical reasoning. Other strategies and advice for these topics will also be highlighted.

Presenter: Doug Clarke

Audience: Years F-8 teachers, mathematics leaders, principals, and other school leaders

Webinar Synopsis
For many teachers in the “middle years” (Years 4-8), the teaching of fractions and algebra can be daunting especially considering that teachers need to possess deep understanding of the important content and pedagogical content knowledge for those mathematics topics. In this webinar, the teacher knowledge that supports the teaching and learning fractions and algebraic thinking will be shared by focusing on particular tasks and teacher questioning that forces students to engage in mathematical reasoning. Other strategies and advice for these topics will also be highlighted.

Presenter: Chrissy Monteleone (ACU)

Audience: Years K-6 teachers, mathematics leaders, principals, and other school leaders

Webinar Synopsis
The use of data to inform teaching decisions is an important element of effective teaching that impacts on student learning in mathematics. This webinar will support teachers and leaders of mathematics in primary schools to review current data collection and analysis processes through a review of best practices. The outcome of the session is to refine current practices and develop strategies to implement a whole school approach to data-informed practice.

Presenter: James Russo and Toby Russo

Audience: Years F-6 teachers

Webinar Synopsis
Beyond developing mathematical proficiency, teaching mathematics in multi-age settings needs to facilitate peer-to-peer learning and critical and creative thinking, whilst supporting students’ social and emotional development. In this webinar, the opportunities, challenges, and considerations when teaching mathematics in a multi-age setting will be explored.  A key focus is on examining the types of tasks and activities that appear to be most effective for engaging learners of all age groups in meaningful mathematics.

Presenter: Marina Papic (ACU)

Audience: Early Childhood, Foundation - Year 2 

Webinar Synopsis
Mathematics learning in the early years requires explicit attention to mathematical thinking and reasoning. This workshop provides teachers with ideas on how to enhance young children’s mathematical explorations, early algebraic thinking, and mathematical reasoning. Rich, mathematical learning opportunities, tasks and interactions will be explored providing participants with practical ideas to try out in their classroom. 

Presenter: Ann Downton

Audience: Foundation - Year 6 

Webinar Synopsis
Research findings point to the use of formative assessment as being instrumental in teachers' work when it comes to impacting student learning outcomes. A shift from using only pre-test and post-test assessment to collecting and using assessment in the day to day teaching of mathematics can be daunting. However, when we do get into the mindset of collecting and using data, we can work out ways of making assessment work for us and our students. In this webinar, strategies and practical advice for building assessment into mathematics lessons will be shared, along with ways of using insights from assessment data to influence teaching decisions. 

Presenter: Aylie Davidson

Audience: Foundation - Year 6 

Webinar Synopsis
If we believe that mathematics is a complex web of interrelated ideas, then our planning documentation should reflect this. A good starting point is a school’s year and term overview that provides powerful opportunities to identify and discuss mathematical and cross-curricular connections. This process helps ensure that important mathematical ideas are addressed in depth during the year. This workshop will offer strategies that teachers can use back at school when developing mathematics overviews that not only emphasise important connections but also alleviate the pressures of a ‘crowded curriculum’.

Presenter: James Russo & Matt Sexton

Audience: Foundation - Year 6 

Webinar Synopsis
The start of the school year is important for relationship building with your students. Through this webinar, we will highlight our perspective about the importance of building relationships with and through mathematics in primary classrooms. We will share strategies and advice for using games with the intention of building mathematical learning communities, differentiating those games, and using them to collect formative assessment data with the intention of starting the year with a buzz for mathematics.