Students Need Their Math Teachers to Collaborate. Here’s Why.
By Sarah B. Bush, Professor of K-12 STEM Education and Reveal Math Author
Imagine a student’s mathematics journey as they move from unit to unit, grade to grade, and from one school to the next. This student’s path is paved with high-quality and consistent messaging. They see familiar concepts, tools, and strategies all along the way as they grow in their ability to be a doer of increasingly complex mathematics. They learn to see the world of mathematics as a rich tapestry of connected big mathematical ideas that have meaning and application authentic to their real-world experiences, and they never ask, “Why do I need to know this?”
Now imagine another student on a mathematics journey. This student instead navigates a confusing maze of inconsistencies and mismatched instruction. They frequently sigh and ask, “Why do I need to know this?” and ultimately develop the troublesome belief that mathematics is a set of mysterious tricks and disconnected procedures and formulas.
Which journey would you choose for your students?
The conversation around high-quality coherent instruction within and across grades is not new. In fact, you’re probably familiar with curriculum maps, pacing guides, learning progression documents, or other resources developed by your district and aligned to your state’s standards that were intentionally designed to ensure such coherence. Even the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics has weighed in on the dangers of educators creating or selecting resources at random. They state this often can result in “instruction that is not deep, coherent, or aligned with a carefully crafted development learning sequence. The progressive nature of mathematics learning demands coherent instructional experiences that build and connect to one another…” (NCTM, 2020, p. 39). I believe that in addition to high-quality and coherent curriculum and assessments well aligned to your standards, a shift to deeply embracing a team mindset is essential.
For the last decade, my two colleagues and I have contemplated how schools and districts can develop a systematic approach to mathematics instruction to address the systemic issues of inconsistencies and inequities that exist. Our proposed solution is The Math Pact (Karp, Dougherty, Bush, 2021; Bush, Karp, Dougherty, 2021; Dougherty, Bush, Karp, 2021). It provides an organizational frame to work towards achieving high-quality mathematics instruction for every student in your school and district. The Math Pact necessitates all those involved in mathematics instruction to adopt and embrace that team mindset as they embark on creating a mathematics whole-school agreement (MWSA). This is designed to enhance students’ strengths and address their learning needs. Even with a coherent core mathematics curriculum, there can be substantial differences in the implementation, so conversations and agreements around using correct and familiar mathematics 1) language, 2) notation, 3) representations, 4) not teaching rules that expire, and 5) developing generalizations are key. Through this, we can achieve consistent messaging and give students every opportunity to see mathematics for the truly beautiful, joyful, and deeply connected subject it is.
As educators, we often hold on tight to strategies, tools, and lessons we feel we are good at implementing and that we are comfortable delivering. We’ve also historically been tasked with the heavy burden of finding our own lessons and developing our own individual ways of teaching. Because of this, we can feel deep ownership of our teaching. So, you may be wondering how you could possibly convince your colleagues and leadership to buy into this team mindset. Based on our experiences learning from dedicated educators engaged in this work, I leave you with three suggestions for starting this journey:
- Seek out early adopters. While the shift to embracing a team mindset takes time, there tends to be a snowball effect. As early adopters experience success, enthusiasm will spread!
- Start where you’ll have an easy “win”. We recommend starting where you feel you can most easily come to a consensus. This might be abandoning some practices that most of the team didn’t love anyway, but just hadn’t had the time to seek a better solution. This could also be getting everyone on the same page regarding mathematical language. The bottom line is that starting where you’ll have fairly easy success helps to build momentum for tackling more complex conversations.
- Aim for progress, not perfection! This journey is a process, not a checklist. Don’t focus on perfection, instead focus on making meaningful progress. As an example, even after a year if there is 30% more consistency in instruction with higher quality implementation, that could make a substantial difference in students’ mathematics learning, mathematical identity, and what students believe about mathematics.
I’ll end with one of my favorite quotes from Principles to Actions, an official position of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (2014),
“The question is not whether all students can succeed in mathematics but whether the adults organizing mathematical learning opportunities can alter traditional beliefs and practices to promote success for all” (p. 61).
As a change agent and advocate for students, what will be your first step?
Dr. Sarah B. Bush is a professor of K-12 STEM Education and serves as the Lockheed Martin Eminent Scholar Chair at the University of Central Florida in Orlando. She is the Director of the Lockheed Martin/UCF Mathematics and Science Academy. She is also the program coordinator of the mathematics education PhD track. She teaches primarily graduate courses in mathematics education. She recently served as an elected member of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics Board of Directors (2019–2022). She served as lead writer and task force chair for Catalyzing Change in Middle School Mathematics: Initiating Critical Conversations, published in 2020.
She is a former middle school mathematics teacher and earned her Ph.D. at the University of Louisville. Sarah and her colleagues Karen Karp and Barbara Dougherty are the authors of The Math Pact series.
References
Dougherty, B. J., Bush, S. B., & Karp, K. S. (2021). The math pact, high school: Achieving instructional coherence within and across grades. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin and Reston, VA: National Council of Teachers of Mathematics.
Bush, S. B., Karp, K. S., & Dougherty, B. J. (2021). The math pact, middle school: Achieving instructional coherence within and across grades. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin and Reston, VA: National Council of Teachers of Mathematics.
Karp, K. S., Dougherty, B. J., & Bush, S. B. (2021). The math pact, elementary: Achieving instructional coherence within and across grades. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin and Reston, VA: National Council of Teachers of Mathematics.
National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. (2014). Principles to actions: Ensuring mathematical success for all. Reston, VA: National Council of Teachers of Mathematics
National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. (2020). Catalyzing change in early childhood and elementary mathematics: Initiating critical conversations. Reston, VA: National Council of Teachers of Mathematics
