Teaching math lessons without paper is about getting your students to think about math and math concepts without the incentive of graded work. What you’re looking for from students when asking them to do math without paper is collaboration, problem solving, and building independence.
This concept works best when students are in groups and can work together to talk through each problem. The ultimate goal of this differentiation strategy is for your students to be able to work independently, so that you can walk around and facilitate their learning rather than giving them all the information.
If you want to go all in with this different approach to teaching math, there are a few expectations that you should outline for your students before starting. First of all, your students should always be grouped randomly.
Random Grouping
There are multiple ways that you can randomly group your students like using a spinner or a deck of cards. Making sure your students know that the groups are random and fair is essential.
When your students are grouped randomly, they may be pushed out of their comfort zone. However, most of the time your students will be more productive because they’re all coming together to solve a common problem.
Participation
The second expectation of teaching math lessons without paper is that every single person needs to either write or participate. Each group should have a vertical non-permanent space to show their work. Basically, this is a jargon-y way of saying some kind of whiteboard on the wall. You can use your main whiteboards or you can get removable whiteboards that can stick to your wall.
When the expectation is set that every student should write then you get rid of the problem where one person is doing everything and everyone else is just watching. You’re holding all of your students accountable rather than just the students that don’t want to participate.
Introducing a Concept
When you first introduce this type of math lesson, I recommend starting with a logic puzzle or non-math-related problem so that your students get the idea of what the expectations are and how you want them to work together.
I love assigning complete the pattern problems or logic puzzles to get my students thinking without necessarily needing it to be about math. You could also just start with a simpler problem in the topic that you are currently and have them get more challenging as the class period moves on.
Bulk of the Lesson
Once your students get the idea of what you’re asking them to do, they can start working on more content aligned problems. For these lessons, I typically have three problems ready to go for my students.
Some groups get to all three problems when some groups only get through one or two in the class period. It’s important to remember that you’re not always looking for quantity here but more so the quality of their answer.
It’s important to note that your students should complete one task at a time before moving on to the next task. Depending on the vibe of your class, you can make yourself the only person who has the answers or you can have students who have already completed the previous problem to check the other groups’ work.
This gives you even more opportunities to walk around the classroom, make observations, and have conversations about the work your students are doing.
Examples of ways to scaffold a paperless lesson
You want problems where students have some background information but a lot of it is something new that they need to try to figure out on their own. My favorite way to encourage students to do math without paper is with writing prompts. These questions are open-ended in nature and challenge students to think outside the box.
I like introducing linear regression with experimental learning. Students typically know how to plot points and create a scatter plot from data but they might not necessarily know how to make predictions based on a line of best fit.
This also works really well with polynomials or any topic that you can use models to solve word problems. For example, start with a basic polynomial word problem where students need to add two polynomials and evaluate the function. You can then challenge your students with geometry problems using polynomials.
More activities for teaching math without paper
Task cards
You can use task cards as a gallery walk by hanging them around the room and having small groups work to solve the answers. Rotate the students and have the next group add to the previous group’s work with a different strategy, idea, etc.
Word problems
Give your students a real world application to work through together. You can shorten the problem by breaking it into separate parts or keep it long and have your students explain their reasoning.
Algebra tiles
Algebra tiles are a great way to model math concepts and engage your hands-on learners. Your students can use magnetic algebra tiles on the vertical whiteboard or they can use regular algebra tiles on tables and explain their thinking on the whiteboard.
Final thoughts about teaching math lessons without paper
Always follow up differentiated math activities like these with whole class discussions about problem solving strategies. This is a great time to discuss common patterns that your students saw and ask what strategies worked in their groups and what didn’t.