Math Justice League Blog

Dear Math Justice League, 

How would you describe your math story? Were you a kid who liked math? This was a question asked at the beginning of a year-long math problem solving initiative at my school. After a few seconds I knew exactly what my math story would show. Tears. Lots of tears. I have never identified as a “math person.” However, as an educator I recognized the necessity of fully committing myself to my students' mathematical growth. In doing so, I found that my most cherished math moments were giving my students the opportunity to share their thinking. This starkly contrasted with my own experiences as a student, but left me determined to rewrite my math story.

One of the first steps in rewriting my story was deepening my math content knowledge. As an instructional coach for kindergarten through sixth grade, I faced a significant challenge. With the leadership from my EL math coach, we began exploring the Base 10 Progression for grades kindergarten through 2nd. Through this exploration I realized that  I missed out on the opportunity to flexibly explore numbers as an elementary student. As a primary teacher for most of my career, I have since focused on building a strong and flexible foundation with numbers and operations in Base 10. Starting with manipulatives such as unifix cubes, ten frames or the number line, my goal was to give students different access points for understanding numbers and operations and the Base 10 system. 

Here is a wonderful resource that was shared during my coaching. This document is a one stop shop for progression of models and strategies for some critical math concepts. This tool helped my team and me deepen our knowledge of how different physical, visual, and symbolic models and the strategies students apply to them can be connected to support the development of conceptual understanding and fluency. For example, we observed that some students still rely on physical models like Base 10 blocks, while others are able to represent these models through drawings. This distinction offers valuable insights into how different students conceptualize and work with mathematical concepts. During discourse, we would focus on deepening the understanding each model and the connections between different models and strategies. In order to support students to make connections between different models that represent the same strategy, teachers need a clear grasp of how mathematical concepts build from one grade to the next. 

Equipped with this new resource to deepen my content knowledge, the next step in rewriting my math story was learning the power of anticipating student thinking. As my team and I deepened our knowledge of the progressions of models and strategies for a particular math concept, we were better equipped to use student work as the basis for class discussion and learning . One tool we found particularly helpful for planning was an anticipatory framework. We used this to anticipate student thinking and pinpoint the models and strategies we wanted to highlight during discourse. This was also a wonderful formative assessment tool to identify where students were in the learning progression and how we might support their advancement.  

In addition to expanding our content knowledge and shifting to anticipatory planning,  one other important focus was building a math community centered around discourse. Getting students to be comfortable with sharing their strategies with their crew was a primary focus for my school.  A few key strategies we implemented to support this were: 

• Math discussion norms were established and present in our classrooms. 

• Our students gathered together when discussing during discourse, usually on the floor in a circle around an anchor chart to allow all students to see and hear one another. 

• When a student shared a strategy, they were asked to speak to the entire crew- not just with the teacher. 

• Teachers pre-planned purposeful questions for the discourse, ones that supported students to make connections, conjectures, and generalize  mathematical concepts (learn more in the “Plan for the Discourse & Synthesis” section of the ELED Anticipatory Planning Guide). 

Over the past year, my math story has undergone a transformation. I have come to understand the importance of a strong grasp of mathematical content knowledge. This knowledge is crucial for anticipating student work and leading an effective math discourse. When students feel safe to take risks and try out strategies suggested by their peers, the math community within the classroom thrives. These factors all contribute to creating positive math experiences, or stories, for students and staff alike. Now, my math story is marked by fewer tears and more triumphs. My mindset has shifted: Everyone can be a 'math' person, even me.

In Crew, 

Megan Edinger

Instructional Coach and Math Culture Lead

Marsh Elementary School in Michigan City, IN