Gina Picha




Gina Picha’s career in education began in Illinois where she earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration with a minor in economics and later a master’s degree in education.  Over the past fifteen years, Gina has worked as a classroom teacher, instructional coach, curriculum specialist and district math coordinator.  In 2020, Gina graduated with a doctorate in curriculum and instruction from Concordia University-Austin where she conducted research on teacher professional learning that includes time for teachers to reflect on their math identities.

Gina is passionate about providing elementary students with daily opportunities to engage as mathematicians by exploring, making conjectures, and sharing ideas in ways that reinforce their status as valued members of a math community. Throughout her career, Gina has written several articles and presented on various topics that she believes can impact students’ beliefs about mathematics, including STEM education, math anxiety, technology in the math classroom, and math conferences.

As a parent of two young children, Gina is inspired as a mother and teacher to continue learning and sharing new ideas for teaching our youngest mathematicians.  Gina believes that for too long children have thought of math as a subject that they need to earn their way into.  She continues working in pursuit of a time when all young children will know that the world is filled with math…and it is a world in which they already belong.

Gina Picha

 Twitter: @ginapicha

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1 product
Conferring in the Math Classroom
Conferring in the Math Classroom
Gina Picha
Paperback
$38.67 $29.00 Save $9.67
Gina Picha:::100266

Conferring in the Math Classroom

9781625315137

$38.67 $29.00 Save $9.67
All students enter our math classrooms with ideas worthy of discussion. Some of the most effective breakthroughs come from short, intentional conversations between students and teacher, yet planning for these moments can seem daunting. In her innovative book, Conferring in the Math Classroom: A Practical Guidebook to Using 5-Minute Conferences to Grow Confident Mathematicians, Gina Picha focuses on simple and transformative ways teachers can use math conferences, short conversations between teachers and small groups of students at work, to guide instruction, assess understanding, and build strong math thinkers. 

Inside you will learn to: 
 
  • Facilitate math conferences to listen to students, identify and build on their strengths, and encourage them to share their math thinking
  • Build a positive math identity that will help nurture student-centered math classrooms
  • Ask exploratory questions to gain data-driven insight into their math reasoning and plan the next steps for instruction 
  • Provide differentiated math instruction based on the individual or small group needs
  • Drive fun and interactive math talk in the classroom
 
Picha includes teacher questioning guides, If-Then charts organized by grade level and math topic, and note-taking templates to help you get started with math conferring right away. This practical and highly accessible approach can help students deepen their math understanding, build confidence in their math abilities, and connect learnings between math subjects.  

 
Conferring in the Math Classroom