Alderete Middle School teacher Cesar Weiss’ classroom philosophy which emphasizes learning from mistakes just as much as knowing the right answers was recently featured in a national blog showcasing best instructional practices for students.
Weiss was published in the Bridges to Learning Research. Practice. Results blog by the Institute for Learning, a weekly publication that connects educators with knowledge and research that shows every student can learn when provided cognitively challenging instructional opportunities.
In Weiss’ featured article, he shares his best practices on how he compliments an asset-based approach to teaching and learning in his math classroom at AMS. He discusses how he transformed a traditional lesson routine to be more of students engaging in math authoring, reasoning, and talk (SMART) lesson routine and how the shift changed the dynamics of his classroom.
“I hope that with my experiences being shared, that it could help or motivate someone to try this new way of teaching. Since I began trying this new way of teaching I have never seen so much engagement in the classroom and so much participation,” Weiss said.
The SMART approach is center student thinking with lesson routines that position students as the authors of mathematics specifically designed for students to learn from the work that has been authored by their peers.
“As teachers we are always sharing best practices with each other. We all are always willing to help each other and bring each other up,” Weiss said. “As far as sharing experiences, I believe it is important to share because as educators we can share areas of successes and areas of growth. It is a great way to share ideas and to try things that we have never tried before or try things that we never thought would work and it's all for the betterment of our students' education.”
Read more about Weiss’ story
here.