Sue Kim and Myuriel Von Aspen, Building Productive Partnerships

Mike Wallus, Vice President for Educator Support

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 10

In this episode, we examine the practice of building productive student partnerships. We’ll talk about ways  educators can cultivate joyful and productive partnerships and the role the educator plays once students are engaged with their partner. 

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BIOGRAPHIES

Sue Kim is an advocate for children’s thinking and providing them a voice in learning mathematics. She received her teaching credential and master of education from Biola University in Southern California. She has been an educator for 15 years and has taught and coached across TK–5th grade classrooms including Los Angeles Unified School District and El Segundo Unified School District as well as several other Orange County, California, school districts. 

Myuriel von Aspen believes in fostering collaborative partnerships with teachers with the goal of advancing equitable, high-quality learning opportunities for all children. Myuriel earned a master of arts in teaching and a master of business administration from the University of California, Irvine and a bachelor of science in computer science from Florida International University. She currently serves as a math coordinator of the Teaching, Learning, and Instructional Leadership Collaborative. ​

RESOURCES

Catalyzing Change in Early Childhood and Elementary Mathematics by National Council of Teachers of Mathematics

Purposeful Play by Kristine Mraz, Alison Porcelli, and Cheryl Tyler 

Hands Down, Speak Out: Listening and Talking Across Literacy and Math K–5 by Kassia Omohundro Wedekind and Christy Hermann Thompson

TRANSCRIPT

Mike Wallus: What are the keys to establishing productive student partnerships in an elementary classroom? And how can educators leverage the learning that happens in partnerships for the benefit of the entire class? We'll explore these and other questions with Sue Kim and Myuriel von Aspen from the Orange County Office of Education on this episode of Rounding Up

Well, hi, Sue and Myuriel. Welcome to the podcast.

Myuriel von Aspen: Hi, Mike. 

Sue Kim: Thanks for having us.

Mike: Thrilled to have you both. 

So, I first heard you two talk about the power of student partnerships in a context that involved counting collections. And during that presentation, you all said a few things that I have been thinking about ever since. The first thing that you said was that neuroscience shows that you can't really separate emotions from the way that we learn. And I wonder what do you mean when you say that and why do you think it's important when we're thinking about student partnerships?

Myuriel: Yes, absolutely. So, this idea comes directly from neuroscience research, the idea that we cannot build memories without emotions. I'm going to read to you a short quote from the NCTM [National Council of Teachers of Mathematics] publication Catalyzing Change in Early Childhood and Elementary Mathematics that says, “Emerging evidence from neuroscience strongly shows that one cannot separate the learning of mathematics content from children's views and feelings toward mathematics.” 

So, to me, what that says is that how children feel has a huge influence on their ability to learn math and also on how they feel about themselves as learners of math. So, depending on how they feel, they might be willing to engage in the content or not. And so, as they're engaging in counting collections and they're enjoying counting and they feel joyful and they're doing this with friends, they will learn better because they enjoy it, and they care about what they're doing and what they're learning.

Mike: You know, this is a nice segue to the other thing that has been on my mind since I heard you all talk about this because I remember you said that students don't think about a task like counting collections as work, that they see it as play. And I wonder what you think the ramifications of that are for how we approach student partnership?

Sue: Yeah, you know, I've been in so many classrooms across TK through fifth [grade], and when I watch kids count collections, we see joy, we see engagement in these ways. But I've also been thinking about this idea of how play is even defined, in a way, since you asked that question that they think of it as play. 

Kristine Mraz, teacher, author, and a consultant, has [coauthored] a book called Purposeful Play. And I remember this was the first time I hear about this reference about Vivian Paley, an American early childhood educator and researcher, stress through her career, the importance of play for children when she discovered in her work that play’s actually a very complex activity and that it is indeed hard work. It's the work of kids. It's the work of what children do. That's their life, in a sense. And so, something I've been thinking about is how kids perceive play is different than how adults perceive play. And so, they take it with seriousness. There is a complex, very intentionality behind things that they do and say. And so, when we are in our session, and we reference Megan Franke, she says that when young people are engaging with each other's ideas, what they're able to do is mathematically important. But it's also important because they're learning to learn together. They're learning to hear each other. They're developing social and emotional skills as they try and navigate and negotiate each other's ideas. And I think for kids that this could be considered play, and I think that's so fascinating because it's so meaningful to them. And even in a task like counting, they're doing all these complex things. But as adults we see them, and we’re like, “Oh, they're playing.” But they are really thinking deeply about some of these ideas while they're developing these very critical skills that we need to give opportunities for them to develop.

Myuriel: I like that idea of leaning into the play that you consider maybe not as serious, but they are. Whether they're playing seriously or not, that you might take that opportunity to make it into a mathematical question or a mathematical reflection.

Sue: I totally agree with you. And taking it back to that question that you asked, Mike, about, “How do we approach student partnerships then?” And I think that we need to approach it with this lens of curiosity while we let kids engage in these ways and opportunities of learning to hear each other and develop these social-emotional skills, like we said. And so, when you see kids that we think are “playing” or they're building a tower: How might we enter that space with a lens of curiosity? Because to them, I think it's serious work. We can't just think, “Oh, they're not really in the task” or “They're not doing what they were supposed to do.” But how do we lean into that space with a lens of curiosity as Megan reminded us to do, to see what mathematical things we can tap into? And I think that kids always rise to the occasion.

Mike: I love that. So, let's talk about how educators can cultivate joyful and productive student partnerships. I'm going to guess that as is often the case, this starts by examining existing beliefs that I might have and some of my expectations.

Sue: Yeah, I think it really begins with your outlook and your identity as a teacher. What's your outlook on what's actually possible for kids in your class? Do you believe that kids as young as 4-year-olds can take on this responsibility of engaging with each other in these intelligent ways? Unless we begin there and we really think and reflect and examine what our beliefs are about that, I think it's hard to go and move beyond that, if that makes sense. 

And like what we just talked about, it's being open to the curiosity of what could be the capacity of how kids learn. I've seen enough 4-year-olds in TK classrooms doing these big things. They always blow my mind, blow my expectations, when opportunities are given to them and consistently given to them. And it's a process, right? They're not going to start on day one doing some of these more complex things. But they can learn from one another, and they also learn from you as a teacher because they are really paying attention. They are attending to some of these complex ideas that we put in front of them.

Mike: Well, you hit on the question that I was thinking about. Because I remember you saying that part of nurturing partnerships starts with a teacher and perhaps a pair of children at a table. Can you all paint a picture of what that might look like for educators who are listening?

Sue: Yeah, so actually in one of the most recent classrooms, I went in, and this teacher allowed me to partner with her in this work. She wanted to be able to observe and do it in a structured way so that she could pick up on some details of noticing the things that kids were doing. And so, she would have a collection out, or they got to choose. She was really good about offering choice to kids, another way to really engage them. And so, they would choose. They would come together. And then she started just taking some anecdotal notes on what she heard kids saying, what she saw them doing, what they had to actually navigate through some of the things, the stuck moments that came up. 

From that, we were able to develop, “OK, what are some goals? We noticed Students A and B doing this and speaking in these ways. What might be the next step that we might want to put into a mini lesson or model out or have them actually share with the class what they were working on mathematically?” Whether it was organization, or how they decided they wanted to represent their count, how they counted and things like that. 

And so, it was just this really natural process that took place that we were able to really lean into and leverage that kids really responded to because it wasn't someone else's work or a page from a textbook. It was their work, their collection that was meaningful to them and they had a true voice and a stake in that work.

Mike: I feel like there have been points in time where my understanding of building groups was almost like an engineering problem, where you needed to model what you wanted kids to do and have them rehearse it so specifically. But I think what sits at the bottom of that approach is more about compliance. And what I loved about what you described, Sue, is a process where you're building on the mathematical assets that kids are showing you during their time together—but also on the social assets that they're showing you. So, in that time when you might be observing a pair or a partnership playing together, working together with something like counting collections, you have a chance to observe the mathematics that's happening. You also have a chance to observe the social assets that you see happening. And you can use that as a way to build for that group, but also to build for the larger group of children. And that just feels really profoundly different than, I think, how I used to think about what it was to build partnerships that were “effective.”

Myuriel: You know, Mike, I think it's not only compliance. It's also that control. And what it makes me think about is, when we want to model ourselves what we want students to do, instead of—exactly what you said, looking at what they're doing and bringing that knowledge, those skills, that wisdom that's in the room from the students to show to others so that they feel like their knowledge counts. The teacher is not only the only authority or the only source of knowledge in the room—we bring so much, and we can learn from each other. So, I think it's so much more productive and so effective in developing the identity of students when you are showing something that they're doing to their peers versus you as an adult telling them what to do.

Mike: Yeah. Are there any particular resources that you all have found helpful for crafting mini lessons as students are learning about how to become a partnership or to be productive in a partnership?

Myuriel: Yes. One book that I love, it's not specific to counting collections, but it does provide opportunities for teachers to create micro-lessons when students are listening and talking to each other. It's Hands Down, Speak Out: Listening and Talking Across Literacy and Math K–5 by Kassia [Omohundro] Wedekind and Christy [Hermann] Thompson. And the reason why I love this book is because it provides, again, these micro-lessons depending on what the teacher is noticing, whether it is that the teacher is noticing that students need support listening to each other or maybe making their ideas clear. Or maybe students need to learn how to ask questions more effectively or even reflect on setting and reflecting on the goals that they have as partners. It does provide ideas for teachers to create those micro-lessons based on what the teacher is noticing.

Sue: Yeah, I guess I want to add to that, Mike, as well, the resources that Myuriel said. But also, I think this is something I really learned along the process of walking alongside this teacher, was looking at partnerships through a mathematical lens and then a social lens. And so, the mini lesson could be birthed out of watching kids in one day. It might be a social lens thinking about, “They were kind of stuck because they wanted to choose different collections. What might we do about that?” And that kind of is tied to this problem-solving type of skill and goal that we would want kids to work on. That’s definitely something that's going to come up as kids are working in partnerships. These partnerships are not perfect and pristine all the time. I think that's the nature of the job. And just as humans, they're learning how to get along, they're learning how to communicate and navigate and negotiate these things.

And I think those are beautiful opportunities for kids and for teachers, then, to really lean into as goals, as mini lessons that can be out of this. And these mini lessons don't have to be long and drawn out. They can be a quick 5-, 10-minute thing. Or you can pause in the middle of counting and kind of spotlight the fact that “Mike and Brent had this problem, but we want to learn from them because they figured out how to solve it. And this is how. Let's listen to what happened.” So, these natural, not only places in a lesson that these opportunities for teaching can pop up, but that these mini lessons come straight from kids and how they are interacting and how they are taking up partnerships, whether it be mathematical or social.

Mike: I think you're helping me address something that if I'm transparent about was challenging for me when I was a classroom teacher. I got a little bit nervous about what was happening and sometimes I would shut things down if I perceived partnerships to be, I don't know, overwhelming or maybe even messy. But you're making me think now that part of this work is actually noticing what are the assets that kids have in their social interactions in the way that they're playing together, collaborating together, the mathematics? And I think that's a big shift in my mind from the way that I was thinking about this work before. And I wonder, first of all, is this something that you all notice that teachers sometimes are challenged by? And two, how you talk to someone who's struggling with that question of like, “Oh my gosh, what's happening in my classroom?”

Myuriel: Yes, I can totally understand how teachers might get overwhelmed. We hear this from, not only from teachers trying to do the work of counting collections, but even just using tools for students to problem-solve because it does get messy. I like the way Sue keeps emphasizing how it will be messy. When you have rich mathematical learning happening, and you're using tools and collections and you have 30 students having conversations, it definitely will get messy. But I would say that something that teachers can do to mitigate some of that messiness is to think about the logistics ahead of time and be intentional about what you are planning to do. So, some of the things that they may want to think about is: How are students going to access the counting collections? Where are you going to [put] the tools that they're going to be using? Where physically in the classrooms will students get together to have collections so that they have enough room to spread out and record and talk to each other? And just like Sue was mentioning: How do I partner students so that they do have a good experience, and they support each other? So, all of these things that might cost a bit of chaos if you don't think about them, you can actually think about each one of those ahead of time so that you do have a plan for each one of those. 

Another thing that teachers may want to consider thinking about is, what do they want to pay attention to when they are facilitating or walking around? There's a lot that they need to pay attention to. Just like Sue mentioned, it is important for them to pay attention to something because you want to bring what's in the room to connect it and have these mini lessons of what students actually need. And also, thinking about after the counting collections: What worked and what didn’t? And what changes do I want to make next time when I do this again? Just so that there is a process of improvement every time. Because as Sue had mentioned, it's not going to happen on day one. You are learning as a teacher, and the students are learning. So, everybody in that room is learning to make this a productive and joyful experience.

Sue: Yeah, and another thing that I would definitely remind teachers about is that there's actually research out there about how important it is for kids to engage with one another's mathematical ideas. I'm so thankful that people are researching out there doing this work for us. And this goes along with what Myuriel was saying, but the expectations that we put on ourselves as teachers sometimes are too far. We're our biggest critique-ers of the work that we do. And of course we want things to go well, but to make it more low-risk for yourself. I think that when we lower those stakes, we're more prone to let kids take ownership of working together in these ways, to use language and communication that makes sense while doing math and using these cognitive abilities that are still in the process of developing. And I think they need to remember that it takes time to develop, and it's going to get there. And kids are going to learn. Kids are going to do some really big things with their understanding. But giving [yourself] space, the time to learn along with your students, I think is very critical so that you feel like it's manageable. You feel like you can do it again the next day.

Mike: Tell me a little bit about how you have seen educators use things like authentic images or even video to help their students make sense of what it means to work in a partnership. What have you seen teachers do?

Sue: Yeah. Not to mention how that is one sure way to get kids engaged. I don't know if you've been in a room full of first graders or kindergartners, but if you put a video image up that's them counting and showing how they are thinking about things, they are one-hundred-percent there with you. They love being acknowledged and recognized as being the doers and the sensemakers of mathematics. And it goes into this idea of how we position kids competently, and this is another way that we can do that. But capturing student thinking in photos or a short clip has really been a powerful tool to get kids to engage in each other's ideas in a deeper way. I think it allows teachers and students to pause and slow down and really focus in on the skill of noticing. I think people forget that noticing is a skill you have to teach. And you have to give opportunities for kids to actually do these things so they can see mathematically what's happening within the freeze-frame of this image, of this collection, and how we might ask questions to help facilitate and guide their thinking to think deeply about these ideas.

And so, I've seen teachers use them with partners, and they may say, “Hey, here's one way that they were counting. How do you think they counted within the frame of this picture or this photo that we took?” And then kids will have these conversations. They'll engage mathematically what they think, and then they might show the video clip of the students actually counting. And they get to make predictions. They get to navigate the language around what they think. And it's just, again, been a really nice tool that has then branched out into whole-group discussions. So, you can use it with partnerships and engage certain kids in specific ways, but then being able to utilize that and leverage that in whole-group settings has really been powerful to see.

Myuriel: I also recently observed a teacher with pictures, showing students different tools that different partners were using and having those discussions about, “Why did this tool work and why didn't this one?” or “What will you have to do if your collection gets bigger?” So, it is a great opportunity to really show from what they're using and having those discussions about what works and what doesn’t, and “Why would I use this versus this?” from their own work.

Mike: Myuriel, what you made me wonder is if you could apply this same idea of using video or images to help support some of those social goals that we were talking about for students as well.

Myuriel: I think that you could. I can just imagine that if you see two students working together and supporting each other or asking some good questions and being curious, you could record them and then show that to the others to ask them what they're noticing. “How are these two students supporting each other in their learning?” Even “How are they being kind to each other when they make a mistake?” So, there is so much power in using video for not just the mathematical skills, but also for the social skills.

Sue: Myuriel, when you're talking, you're reminding me about two particular students that we have watched, and we have recorded video around, actually, when they came to a disagreement. 

There was this one instance when a couple of students came to a disagreement about what to call the next number of the sequence. And that was a really cool moment because we actually discovered, “Wow, these two peers had enough trust in each other to pause, to listen to both sides.” And then when it came time to actually call the number and the sequence, the other student actually trusted enough and listened to the reasoning of the other student to say, “OK, I'm going to go along with you, and I think that should be what the sequence is.” And it was just a really neat opportunity and—that this teacher actually showed in front of kids just to see what kids would say in response to that particular moment.

Myuriel: It was actually one very cute, but very interesting moment when you see that second student who's listening to the other one. And actually at first she kind of argued with him a little bit about, “No, it's not this number.” But the second time around, when she counted, she paused right at that same spot where she had trouble before, and she set the number that he had suggested the earlier time so that you see that she's listening, she's considering someone else's ideas, and she's learning the correct sequence. Yes, that was really amazing to see.

Sue: So, it's the sequence of numbers that they're working on, but think about all the social aspects of what is happening and developing, and I think that they're addressing it and that they're having to engage with [it]. It's [a] very complex situation that they're learning a lot of skills around in that very moment.

Mike: You know, I wonder how an educator might think about their role once students are actually engaged with a partner. How do you all think about goals, or the role of the teacher, once students are working with a partner?

Sue: I think that one of the things we're really thinking about and being more intentional about is: When do we actually interject, or when do we as teachers actually say something? When and how do we make those decisions? And for several years now, I've really taken on this notion that we are facilitators. Yes, we're teachers. But more than anything, we are facilitators of the students in our class, and we want to really give them the opportunity to work through some of these ideas. And we will have set up partnerships based on what we've seen and notes that we took as kids have been working. But it's an ever-innovated process, I think. And I think something that's always going to be on the forefront is that idea: How are we facilitating? How are we deciding when we want to say something or interject, and why? And what is it that we are trying to get kids to think about?

Because I think we need to help students realize that they are always in the driver's seat of what they're doing, especially if they're in a partnership. And there are targeted things that we can have them maybe think about when we drop a question based on what we're noticing. Or maybe when they're stuck, and they're in the middle of negotiating something. But I really think that it starts there with us kind of thinking about: What is our role? Is it OK that we step back and we just watch even if they have to problem-solve through something that feels like, “Oh, I don't know if they're going to get through that moment.” But we’ve got to let them. We’ve got to give them opportunities to do that without having to rescue them every single time.

Myuriel: And you're right, Sue, we've seen it so many times when if you just bite your tongue, 10 seconds later, it's happening, right? They're helping each other, and they get to the idea that you thought you had to bring up to them. But they were able to resolve it. So, if we only allow that time for them to process the idea or to revise their thinking or to allow the other partner to support their partner, it will happen.

Sue: Yeah, and I think that doesn't mean that we can't set kids up. I've seen teachers launch the lesson with something a partner did before yesterday, and they will have referred to a protocol or something they're working on. And then as facilitators, we can then go out, and we might already be thinking about, “Oh, I want to be watching these two partnerships today”—having in mind, “OK, this is my target idea for them, my target goal for them.” So, there are definite ways that we can frame and decide who we want to watch and observe, but while in the balance of letting kids do what they're going to do and what the expectation of being surprised. Because kids always surprise us with their brilliance.

Mike: Yeah, there's multiple things that came to mind as I was listening to you all talk about this. The first one is how it's possible to inadvertently condition kids to see the teacher coming and look and stop and potentially look for the teacher to say something. We actually do want to avoid that. We want to see their thinking. 

The other piece is the difference between, as you said, potentially dropping a question and interjecting, as you said, Myuriel, biting your tongue and letting them persist through—whether it's an idea they're grappling with or a struggle for what to do next—that there's so much information in those moments that we can learn or that might help us think about what's next. It's a challenge, I think, because math culture in the United States is such that we're kind of trained to see something that looks like a mistake. “Let's get in there.” And I hear you giving people permission to say, “Actually, it's OK to step back and watch their thinking and watch them try to make sense of things because there's a big payoff there.”

Sue: Absolutely. Yeah. 

Myuriel: Yes. And, Mike, I think we as teachers—you feel the need of having to address every single “mistake” per either individual student or per partnership. And sometimes you feel like, “I have 30 students, how can I possibly do that?” And I think that's where the power of doing a share out from what you've observed, bringing everyone together, learning from what was in the room, right? Because just like Sue was saying, it's not that you don't ever set up kids with knowledge of what you've observed, but you bring the power. It's what you're bringing, what's in the room, what you've noticed. But you share it out, or you have students share it out, with everyone so that everyone is moving forward.

Mike: I have a follow-up question for you all about goals for partnerships. I'm wondering how you think about the potential for partnerships as a way to help develop language, be it academic or social, for students. Are there particular practices that you imagine educators could take up if language development was one of their goals?

Myuriel: I'm so glad you're asking that question because I don't think we can learn math without language. I don't think we can learn anything without language. And I think that working in partnerships provides such an authentic, meaningful way of developing language because students are in conversations with each other. And we know that conversation is one way that ideas develop conversations or even sharing your thinking. Sometimes we notice that as students are sharing their thinking, and they're listening to themselves, they catch themselves making a mistake, and they are able to revise their thinking based on what they are saying. So again, I think it is the perfect opportunity for students to mathematically learn counting sequence or socially learn how to negotiate and make sense of what they're going to represent, when they're counting, or to explain their thinking. And we know, of course, that one of the mathematical practices is justifying, explaining your thinking. So, it's important to provide those opportunities for students to do that in this kind of structural way.

I also think that working in partnerships provides this opportunity for teachers to listen and notice if there's any language that students are starting to use that can be shared with others. So again, this idea that you hear it from someone in the room and that's going to help everybody else grow. Or that if students are doing something and you can name it, provide those terms to students. So, for example, just like I mentioned, somebody's explaining their thinking and through that they change their mind. They revised their thinking. Actually sharing that with the whole class and naming it: “Oh, they were revising their thinking” or sharing how they were explaining something with academic language so that others can also use that language as they're explaining their own thinking. So, I think that those are powerful ways to provide opportunities for everyone's academic language or social skills through language to be developed.

Sue: Yeah, I think that another big idea that comes out of that language piece is just how kids are learning to make sense of how to be partners, especially our younger students, our younger mathematicians. They're really needing to figure out like, “Oh, what does it mean to take turns to speak about this and how I use my words in this way versus another?” And I think that's another big opportunity for kids to build those skills because we can't just assume that kids come into our classrooms knowing how to talk in these ways, how to address each other, how to engage respectfully, that they can disagree respectfully, even in partnerships. And we want them to have the time and space to be able to develop those skills through language as well.

Mike: You know, I think the mental movie that I have for the point in time after children have engaged in any kind of partnership task, be it counting collections or something else, has really shifted. Because I think beforehand the way the movie ended was potentially sharing a student's representation if they had represented something on a piece of paper that showed what they had physically done with their things. And I still think that's valid and important, particularly if that's one of your goals. 

But you're making me think a lot more about the potential of images of students at work as they're going through the process or video and how closing, or potentially opening the next time, with that really just kind of expands this idea of what's happening. Being able to look at a set of hands that are on a set of materials or in the process of moving materials or listening to language that's emerging from students in the form of a short video. There's a lot of richness that you could capture, and it's also a little bit more of a diverse way of showing what's going on. And it feels like another way to really position what you're doing—not just the output in the form of the paper representation—but what you're actually doing is valuable, and it's a contribution. And I think that just feels like there's a lot of potential in what you all are describing.

Sue: I think you hit the nail on the head. We're trying, and it's hard work. But to be open to these ideas, to these possibilities. And like you said, it's positioning kids so drastically different than how we've been doing it for so many years. And how you're actually inviting kids to be contributors of this work that they are now. They have the knowledge. They are the ones that hold the knowledge in the room. And how we frame kids and what they're doing is I think very critical because kids learn from that, and kids have so many things to offer that we need to really be able to think about how we want to create those opportunities for kids.

Myuriel: And, Mike, something that you said also made me think of just like we want to provide those opportunities for students to be creative and to show what they know. What you were talking about, having this new perspective, makes me think about also teachers being creative with how they use counting collections, right? There isn't just the one way. It doesn't mean that at the end of every counting collection, I have to have a share out right at the end and decide at that moment. I could start the day that way. I could start the next session that way. I could use a video. I could use a picture. I could have students share it. So, you can get creative. And I think that's the beauty also, because I think as a teacher, it's not only the students that are learning; you are learning along with them.

Mike: That's a great place to stop. This has been an absolutely fabulous conversation. Thank you both so much for joining us.

Myuriel: Thank you. Thank you so much for this opportunity.

Sue: Thank you. Thanks for having us.

Mike: This podcast is brought to you by The Math Learning Center and the Maier Math Foundation, dedicated to inspiring and enabling all individuals to discover and develop their mathematical confidence and ability.