I also showed proficiency in establishing the norms for my number talks. I was particularly successful with leaning into my students’ mistakes and providing them the space to correct the errors in their mathematical thinking independently. For instance, as seen in this video of my first number talk, I allowed Elijah to talk through how he got the answer nine without telling him whether it was right or wrong. Instead, I had him independently count out the dots, asking him if he wanted to revise his answer only after he reached the answer of eight on his own. In this manner, I centered Elijah’s voice and mathematical meaning-making during the number talk. I also took more of a growth mindset in that I did not penalize Elijah for getting the wrong answer and allowed him to talk through his thinking so he could learn from his mistakes.
