Amanda Ruch Teaches the 95%

An illustration of "culturally responsive teaching" + a new survey about teachers and AI + analysis of an update to Khanmigo.

We’re halfway through our July program—watching video of classroom teaching and learning how to draw participation and thinking out of the 95% of students that edtech frequently writes off. 

If you scroll down to the Featured Comments, I think you’ll agree with me that the analysis has been spectacular. Keep scrolling to the Odds & Ends section to read some quick encapsulations of edtech news of the day, including Quizlet’s State of AI in Education survey and some analysis of updates to Khan Academy’s AI chatbot Khanmigo.

What is Amanda Ruch up to here?

In this clip, Amanda Ruch teaches one of our lessons that tries to connect mathematics and culture. Ruch makes that connection in ways that I think are uncommon and deft and I’d love to read your analysis here.

Teacher (Ruch)

Any thoughts about what people might decide as they're designing or making quilts?

Emily, what's one thing people might think about?

Emily

Size.

Teacher

Okay, size and therefore then how much fabric you need. Valerie?

Valerie

The colors.

Teacher

Colors. Anything else? Kim?

Kim

The pattern.

Teacher

Patterns, yes.

Okay, so would the fabric just be a solid color, a pattern?

Anything else?

Student

The design.

Teacher

The design, yeah, how you're gonna then lay that out.

You're gonna design your own quilt in just a moment but does anyone have a quilt at home?

Students

[indistinct]

Teacher

I'm going to bring one in. My kids each got one from a family friend who does quilt designing and quilt making, and they're a little different than just a blanket, okay?

Blankets can be wonderful, but quilts often … there's sort of more that goes into their design.

Does anyone have a family member who makes quilts?

Yeah, Oscar, you do. Your grandmother, yeah?

My sister does quilt making. So one thing as we finish the math, either today or tomorrow—

I really appreciate people who are tuning in. So you only have access to this slide, so just hold tight—

I just wanna tell you one more thing. We're gonna explore a little bit of the history of quilting and I had this book out recently with my daughter, Rosemary, and it's one I used to read in third grade, okay?

It's by a wonderful author, Jacqueline Woodson and it's called "Show Way" and it's sort of a memoir.

She looks back in her own family history and one of the connecting threads is her family's quilt making and the significance it has in African-American history.

So we'll do a little history dive into quilt making after the math.

Student

There was a book about a girl, I mean a guy who had a quilt and then it kept like breaking. So his grandpa would make it into different things and it ended up as like a pin or a button.

Teacher

I feel like I read that book. Do you remember what it's called? Okay, well, we might do a little throwback and do a read aloud today or tomorrow where we all gather around and hear this wonderful book, "Show Way".

What's up Foster?

Foster

I know the name.

Teacher

What?

Foster

"Lion King".

[students laugh]

Teacher

I don't think there's a quilt in "Lion King".

Foster

Yeah, there is one.

[students talking indistinctly]

Teacher

Oh, that was the name of the book.

Student

Oh yeah, no, yeah, remember that one part where they shave the lion and they use it to make a quilt.

Teacher

Okay, before we go to bathroom break make your own quilt, okay? And then open up the next slide.

And you're gonna think about some of the things that Valerie and Dan in particular pointed out, okay?

Pattern versus solid.

How are you gonna set it up?

And then take a look at what information you get once you create a quilt.

[students chatting]

---

Open thread with a conversation starter:

• What did Ruch do that seemed especially effective?

• In 2000, Geneva Gay defined “culturally responsive teaching” as “using the cultural characteristics, experiences, and perspectives of ethnically diverse students as conduits for teaching them more effectively.” How does Ruch illustrate culturally responsive teaching?

Featured Comments

Here are several of your comments analyzing Gen Esmende’s fantastic teaching in last week’s installment.

Jacob:

This is one of my favourite approaches to use. It is especially effective with intimidating content because of the strong emotional response. In some variations, I also emphasize to my students that this really is how mathematicians work: we look at a problem and notice what we don't like about it ("hmm, this would be a lot easier if we didn't have this part") and this emotional response can often be trusted to guide us towards an appropriate approach. Students learn that mathematical intuition and common intuition are not fundamentally different -- and who doesn't feel great about being "a natural"?! It feels wonderful knowing you can trust yourself.

Mardalee Burwitz:

Giving students the opportunity to choose the "least difficult" of problems, offering student agency - giving them a choice and an entry into their learning. However, it also provides those who are confident to be looking for the most challenging to solve if they want. I recall advanced students who would jump to looking for the most difficult to answer, looking for that challenge, too.

Tanya Zerbo:

Kids need to feel seen and heard, so asking them to articulate their opinions about the difficulty of equations to open rather than showing them procedures invites all learners to the lesson by meeting an essential need.

Rachel Henighan:

Talk about a low floor! The question is an invitation that pretty much anyone can engage with. It is also a question that does not have one right answer. At the same time, it is an invitation to look at all the problems and evaluate how you think about them -- to consider them critically -- so it is not an "easy" ask either. In addition, by saying, "don't solve them," Gen is taking the need to get an answer off the table -- for this time, everyone is just considering the problems from their own points of view without the pressure to solve.

Odds & Ends

¶ Khanmigo Korner. I consider it community service to offer my edtech consulting services pro bono to non-profits like Khan Academy. Previously, I noted that Khan Academy wasn’t injecting a student’s answer—perhaps the key ingredient of any effective tutoring session—into their conversation with Khanmigo. Shortly after that newsletter, Khanmigo started injecting the student’s answer into your conversation with Khanmigo.

At that point I noted that Khan Academy was preloading your side of the conversation with a bunch of text you didn’t type, including text like “show me your best guess as to what I did wrong,” an unsettling user experience and an indication of a deficit mindset. Today I note that they have significantly shortened that preloaded text to “Help me check my answer” and, as I recommended, injecting the rest of the context invisibly.

If I hadn’t already fulfilled my monthly pro bono consulting obligations, I’d probably note that “Help me check my answer” is still odd to see preloaded because a) I didn’t say it, b) at this point in the user experience, Khan Academy has already told me my answer is incorrect. However those and other observations will have to wait until my community service quota resets in August.

¶ Quizlet has released the results of its second annual state of AI in education survey. AI optimists will probably find some reason for cheer in the results, but these trends are not moving in their direction:

When it comes to the future of education for teachers, 38% say AI will have a positive impact—down from 51% in 2023. [..] 36% of teachers indicate that AI will somewhat or greatly help address learning loss caused by the pandemic, compared to 48% in 2023.

I swear to you this Statement of Work goes on for 13 pages.

¶ In EdSurge, Jeff Young has the latest on the implosion of LAUSD’s centralized student system, Ed. He submitted a FOIA request and got the vendor contract from LAUSD. The Statement of Work (page 56 in the PDF) should immediately induce vertigo. “Michael Feldstein, a longtime edtech consultant, said that from the first time he heard about the Ed chatbot, he saw the project as too ambitious for a small startup to tackle.”

¶ I’m quoted in a special report in The Economist this week on artificial intelligence in education.

Dan Meyer, a former maths teacher in California who now works in edtech, agrees. “You could throw trillions of dollars at the project of convincing kids and teachers that they will learn better without each other, and that they might even prefer it,” he writes. “And they will tell you en masse, ‘I don’t think so.’” Every day children come to school seeking answers to two big questions, he argues: not just, “How do I do this?” but also, “Who am I?” Spending time in large and lively classrooms can offer answers to both questions at once, whatever the subject being studied. Time spent with a chatbot, by contrast, shines light on only one.

Justin Reich also has solid quotes throughout: “Talking to robots is boring. The reason students learn algebra is because they like their teacher, and because they care about the peers around them.”

Related: career educator Henri Picciotto writes a very brief, very insightful post asking, “Can Bots Teach Math?”

¶ Jill Barshay summarizes recent research into the challenges facing online tutors, including student attendance, participation, and learning. You have to wonder: If online human tutors face those struggles, how much more challenging is the terrain for online virtual tutors like AI chatbots.

¶ A Reddit thread on r/Teachers asking, “How are you using AI in the classroom?” I’m not claiming this is representative of anything, but I love eavesdropping on conversations between people who have no real ideological or financial stake in the AI edtech debate. They’re just anonymous teachers trying to make learning happen and get home. Make of their comments what you will.

¶ Bill Gates posted a video of his walkthrough at a Khanmigo pilot site. Shout out to his advisors for implanting this comment somewhere in his thought process: “Historically, a lot of the stuff is really great for motivated stuff and not so great for struggling students.”

¶ If you’re heading to the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics annual conference in Chicago this fall, mark your calendar for the Desmos Classroom day featuring good learning, good food, good technology, and good friends, including yours truly.