As anyone who reads Artichoke will attest – unboxing PIG was exciting – and I am happy to report that he has quickly settled into life in the corridor and is keeping a steadfast and focused snout on my desk from his perch on top of Quoll (Tasmanian).
Unboxing PIG proved a useful dry run for unboxing the latest Essential Resources (ER) book –SOLO Taxonomy in Mathematics – Strategies for thinking like a mathematician.
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My author copies arrived by courier post this afternoon. The arrival marks the success of my fourth SOLO collaborative writing project – an initiative whereby I invite teachers who use SOLO to good effect with students to collaborate with me to co-author a book on the classroom based use of the taxonomy.
I co-authored the SOLO in Maths book with three very experienced secondary maths teachers working in Christchurch. Courtney Gravett (Assistant Head of Department Mathematics at Riccarton High School) and Ellen John and Mitchell Howard ((Assistant Head of Mathematics and Head of Mathematics at Lincoln High School). We wrote the book over 18 months via Google docs.
We could well describe the books as “in our spare time” projects. We work on the books in our spare time – we are all working as full time teachers or in my case working as a full-time consultant in schools. We accommodate all distractions and forgive all the times life behaves badly and refuses to apologise – and in the end if we are determined enough we are rewarded with a text that gives something back to teaching and learning. These collaborative projects are acts of educational citizenship.
This ER book is about using SOLO in mathematics – earlier books explore using SOLO to make meaning in English (3 titles with LizMcNeill), in Health and PE (2 titles with Nicola Richards) and in the Early Years (1 title with Bridget Casse).
Currently in press is an Action Research book on how to introduce and implement SOLO across a school with case study examples from a secondary school in the UK – coauthored with two UK teachers – Simon Wall and Robert Manger and a second book on using SOLO in Learning Support and Special Needs (1 title with Rachel Saxton and Roxy Hickman)
