Ep 73. Mailbag I: Choosing math resources and handling mixed classes with Jon Regino
This transcript was created with speech-to-text software. It was reviewed before posting but may contain errors. Credit to Canadian Podcasting Productions.
In this special two-part Chalk & Talk mailbag episode, Anna Stokke is joined by Jonathan Regino, Pre-K–12 Supervisor of Math at Interboro School District, to answer questions submitted by listeners.
Together, they answer questions from teachers and parents about math resources, explicit instruction, teaching mixed ability classes, supporting advanced learners, and more. Drawing on their experience in mathematics education, Anna and Jonathan share practical, evidence-informed insights for teachers and school leaders looking to improve student outcomes.
This is Part 1 of a two-part listener Q&A special.
This episode is available in video at www.youtube.com/@chalktalk-stokke
TIMESTAMPS
[00:00:22] Introduction
[00:03:35] Saxon Math and Singapore Math
[00:09:59] Recommended books for math teachers
[00:13:28] Difference between Direct Instruction and direct instruction
[00:16:10] Resources for preparing students for algebra
[00:18:10] Tips for introducing evidenced-based instruction to colleagues
[00:26:27] Teaching mixed ability classes
[00:28:39] Teaching advanced students
[00:31:14] Resources for advanced students
[00:33:42] Ability grouping and mixed ability classrooms
[00:36:05] Flexible ability grouping
[00:39:32] Final thoughts
[00:00:04] Anna Stokke: Welcome to Chalk & Talk, a podcast about education and math. I'm Anna Stokke, a math professor and your host. Welcome back to another episode of Chalk & Talk.
Today's episode is the first of a two-part Chalk & Talk mailbag special, where we'll be answering your questions directly. And joining me is someone many of you already know from my previous mailbag episode, Jonathan Regino. Jonathan is the pre-K-12 supervisor of math at Interboro School District, and he has spent years supporting teachers and schools in mathematics instruction, intervention, and curriculum design.
He also taught middle school math and science for 10 years, so he's the perfect person to help me answer your questions. Remember, if you have a question, you can fill out the form on my website, and it could be featured on a future mailbag episode. Also note that long-time listener and teacher Olivier Chabot created a virtual assistant to help you get answers from previous Chalk & Talk episodes.
You just type in your question, and it searches transcripts and summarizes what was discussed. I'll link to that in the show notes. Over these two mailbag episodes, Jon and I tackle questions about Saxon math, Singapore math, explicit instruction, Common Core state standards, using multiple strategies, teaching standard algorithms, fractions, full-class teaching, calculators in IEPs, supporting advanced students, foundational skills, and much more.
I also want to say thank you to everyone who sent in questions. The quality of the questions was amazing, and it is encouraging for me to see how many educators are actively searching for better evidence and better ways to support students with math. So, grab a coffee or turn up the volume in your car, and let's get into part one of our Chalk & Talk mailbag special.
On with the show. I am delighted to have Jonathan Regino with me again today to help answer some of your questions. He is the pre-K-12 Supervisor of Math at Interboro School District.
He has also held roles as Supervisor of Teaching and Learning for STEM at Marple Newton School District, Curriculum Specialist at Age of Learning, and Teaching and Learning Specialist at the Delaware County Intermediate Unit. Jonathan has also worked as an Educational Consultant with the Pennsylvania Training and Technical Assistance Network, which is the training arm of the Bureau of Special Education supporting schools across the state. Before moving into leadership roles, Jonathan taught middle school math and science for 10 years.
Jonathan has also shared expertise on math interventions and curriculum at state and national math conferences over the last 10 years, always with the goal of making math more meaningful and accessible for all students. And I am honored to have him here with me today. So welcome back to the podcast, Jonathan.
[00:03:30] Jonathan Regino: Thanks for having me back. I am very excited to answer these questions.
[00:03:35] Anna Stokke: Well, I'm excited to have you here to help me answer these questions. So, I really appreciate you making the time to help me out with this because we have a lot of questions. So, a lot of questions have come in, and we'll answer some of them.
We'll do our best. Let's start with this question from Dan. Dan is asking about some particular math programs, and he'd like to know our thoughts.
So, he asks, are you familiar with Saxon math? And what are your thoughts? And what are your thoughts on Singapore math?
And he also asks, what is a good book or a few about teaching math? So, what do you think, Jonathan?
[00:04:14] Jonathan Regino: We actually looked into Saxon math for my own school district. We're going to pilot their algebra course for their 26-27 school year. What I found though, was that there are two versions running here in North America.
There's the version from Newton Mifflin, and then there's a homeschool version. I don't know what the difference between the two of them are, but if you are looking for them online, there are two separate versions. As we go through our pilot, I'm happy to give feedback and answer questions about it.
From what we noticed and from what we looked at, there's lots and lots of practice. It does focus on one skill at a time, which we truly appreciate. It's a very traditional looking book.
[00:05:00] Anna Stokke: I like Saxon math, by the way. I will say my daughter used that in a program that she was in, grade seven, eight. It was actually considered an advanced program.
But I think the good thing about Saxon is I think it really sets kids up for success in algebra. Like it concentrates on the right topics. They also build in space practice, right?
Space practice?
[00:05:26] Jonathan Region: Yes. Yes.
[00:05:27] Anna Stokke: Yeah, which is good. Like that's actually pretty rare in math textbooks. So, I actually think it's a pretty good program.
That's my opinion on it. He also asked about Singapore math. Are you familiar with Singapore math?
[00:05:41] Jonathan Regino: Yes. The most popular version here in America is the one through Math & Focus, which is also HMH. I think the issue is when HMH built their version of Singapore math, they Americanized, quote unquote Americanized their version of it.
So, the original version of Singapore math, if you go out to Singapore, looks very much like jump math. It is black and white, not a lot of color, not a lot of words on the page. They're actually very thin books.
And when they came over to America, they added a lot more examples, a lot more color, a lot more strategies into it. The American version of Singapore math isn't the actual Singapore math. So, if you are looking for Singapore math, you actually want to go to the source and look at their curriculum and look at the way that their version of their textbooks look, and then see if you can find one here in America that matches or source it right from Singapore.
[00:06:43] Anna Stokke: Can you get those textbooks right from Singapore?
[00:06:47] Jonathan Regino: They have portions of them posted on their education website. I don't believe it's the full curriculum, but it's enough to get the understanding of the flow and what a lesson looks like. I think there are very few textbooks and curriculums out there that match the version of math that many of your guests have spoken about.
You know, jump math matches that and the explicit math program by Ali Lavelle matches that. But if you want that version in like secondary math, you're going to have to build something on your own or take samples and kind of figure out the flow and the style of it and build that way.
[00:07:27] Anna Stokke: Okay. So, the Singapore math series that I've looked at, so first of all, I have looked quite closely at the Singapore math curriculum in the past. In fact, my colleagues and I did a comparison of the Singapore math curriculum with some of the math curricula in Canada, and it's a really good curriculum.
But a lot of times when you hear people talk about Singapore, they take one particular piece of it, and that's the concrete pictorial abstract. Because that's sort of the thing that people, you know, it sounds really good. We like concrete pictorial abstract.
But I highly doubt that that's the thing that's responsible for Singapore's success in math. And certainly, we have no evidence of that because they certainly do focus on foundations and a lot of practice as well. So, the one that I've looked at in terms of like the math program is called the Singapore primary math series.
[00:08:19] Anna Stokke: That's not the same as math in focus, right?
[00:08:25] Jonathan Regino: It's not.
[00:08:26] Anna Stokke: I thought the Singapore primary math series is pretty good, but it does move quite quickly. Like it's not sort of the type of thing that a lot of North American schools are maybe used to, but it is actually quite good.
[00:08:40] Jonathan Regino: Would you agree? Yes. And that's the style.
So, if you go back and you read what actually was happening in Singapore when it became all the rage, that was their policy is they moved very quickly. They expected the teachers to be the expert on the math content. They know all the misconceptions, they knew the ins and outs and where the math was going over multiple years.
And they moved their students at a very brisk pace. So, they expected mastery. They knew how to break down the problems into the most simplest forms and then had the kids master each step and then move quickly to the next step.
[00:09:16] Anna Stokke: Yeah, definitely. So, I think what we're kind of saying about this is we think the Singapore math curriculum is really great, right? I think we both agree on that.
We're not so keen maybe on the Americanized version. I'll admit I haven't looked at the Americanized version, but you have, okay? And I believe you that an Americanized version would probably have like multiple strategies and things that they're not necessarily doing in Singapore, right?
Lots of pictures, you know, whereas what we know is that actually you kind of want to minimize pictures, right? Because they can create cognitive overload. But maybe the primary math series is okay, but it does move rather quickly.
Would you agree? Does that sort of sum it up?
[00:09:58] Jonathan Regino: Yes, that's exactly it.
[00:09:59] Anna Stokke: What about Dan's other question? So, what is a good book or a few about teaching math? What do you think, Jon?
[00:10:07] Jonathan Regino: I think Mr. Barton's, The Way I Wish I Had Been Taught Math book that he put out definitely kind of opens up the window to the whole line of thinking that many of your guests have shared in the past. It's a nice, easy book. You know, as a former math teacher, learning about all the things I've learned over the last 10 years is that you feel really guilty about the way you were originally teaching when you first got out of college and you had your first classroom.
And I think he does a really good job of kind of taking that thought process and moving into the science behind learning and how we should teach math. And you kind of go through that guilt trip with him and come out on the other side of now that I know better, I can do better.
[00:10:51] Anna Stokke: Yeah, I agree. And he also has these little books, Craig Barton's Tips for Teachers. Do you have those ones?
[00:10:58] Jonathan Regino: I do. They're awesome.
[00:11:01] Anna Stokke: Yeah, I agree. You know, so for instance, there's one on worked examples. There's even one on problem solving.
There's one on mini whiteboards. And they're all in the context of teaching math. So, I would highly recommend those.
And I'll recommend a couple others and maybe you have some too, but I'd like to recommend Barry Gerlich and J.R. Wilson's book, Traditional Math. I like that book. And also, Barbara Oakley's A Mind for Numbers.
A really great book about teaching math and it's really meant for teachers is the book Direct Instruction Mathematics by Marcy Stein and colleagues. And that's really good. And that's kind of based on the capital D, capital I direct instruction that was developed by Sigrid Engelman.
Do you have any others that you want to mention?
[00:11:52] Jonathan Regino: I think Dr. Codding and Dr. Poncy's book on interventions is a really good place. Even if you're not an intervention teacher or a special ed teacher, knowing the majority of our kids are struggling in math right now and having that background of my kids struggling, what do I do next? That book does a really good job of breaking that down into easily adaptable things for your regular classroom.
My version of the book has a sticky note on almost every page. It's got great things in it that you can use. It really helps you answer that question, hey, my kid's struggling, what do I do next?
And gives you a foundation of the questions to ask and the resources you should be using to help those kids achieve.
[00:12:38] Anna Stokke: Yeah, I agree. And just can you tell us the title of that book again?
[00:12:42] Jonathan Regino: The book by Robin Codding and Dr. Poncy is Effective Math Interventions, a Guide to Improving Whole Number Knowledge.
[00:12:51] Anna Stokke: Yeah, good book to get.
[00:12:53] Jonathan Regino: I give that out to every one of my special ed teachers gets a copy when they join our district.
[00:12:28] Anna Stokke: Oh, wow. Lucky teachers. And we'll also maybe create a resource page for this episode that has links to some of the things we're talking about because we're going to talk about a lot of things today.
So, I think we've covered that question. Now, we have a question from Dawn, and I can probably just give you a break and answer this one myself. It's fairly short.
Dawn says: Hello, Dr. Stokke. I have been a longtime listener of your podcast, and I'm indebted to you for the work you do. I have been teaching elementary school for 25 years and have spent many years as a self-proclaimed constructivist math teacher.
Your podcast has been instrumental in helping me root my work in evidence-based practice. Okay, that's really good. So, thanks for the feedback.
I have heard many times that there is a distinct difference between direct instruction, capital D, capital I, direct instruction, little d, little i, and explicit instruction. Yet I'm still unclear what those differences are. When I look for books, articles, and podcasts, so many of them contradict each other.
Can you recommend resources that can clarify the distinction? So first, I'm going to clarify the distinction. So direct instruction, capital D, capital I, is a specific program.
So, it's like jump math is a program, right? So direct instruction is a program. It was created by Siegfried Engelmann, and it was actually the program that was studied in Project Follow-Through, which is the largest educational study ever conducted.
And I have an episode with Marcy Stein on that. And you can also find out more about it at nifty.org, okay? But you can think of it this way, direct instruction, capital D, capital I, is like a program that uses explicit instruction techniques, but it's a specific program.
Now explicit instruction and direct instruction with a lowercase d and a lowercase i are essentially used interchangeably, and you might also hear systematic instruction. They're essentially the same thing. This isn't a program, but rather it's a way of teaching or a teaching philosophy, and it's evidence based.
And I talked about it in detail in my episode with Anita Archer. And there is a great paper, I think it's called Explicit Instruction, Historical and Contemporary Contexts by Hughes et al, that talks about the definition of explicit instruction, the five pillars of explicit instruction, components of explicit instruction, et cetera. And we will link to that for this episode.
So, I hope that clarifies the distinction. Let's move to the next question. This one is from Sarah.
Hello, Anna. I'm a teacher and parent, and I listen to your podcast consistently. I appreciate your perspective and value the insights of your guests.
My seventh-grade son is in pre-algebra, and I'm concerned he's not mastering the skills needed to take algebra next year. Do you have a workbook that you recommend for him to get more practice? Thanks for any recommendations.
So, I'll turn that over to you, Jon. Do you have any suggestions?
[00:16:10] Jonathan Regino: The first program I would suggest is Essentials for Algebra. You can find links to it on the NFTY website, but it's produced by McGraw-Hill now. Essentials for Algebra, you give your student an assessment.
It'll tell you what lesson to start with, if you have to start at the very beginning of the program or halfway through the program. And it's a scripted program, step-by-step breakdown of the types of problems, and it'll walk you through all the essential content to be ready for an algebra class. We actually run this as a summer course for kids who are struggling, and we know they're moving into algebra.
We want them to have a leg up and get ready. So, we break it down over the summer. It's a very good program.
Anybody can teach it because it is scripted. As long as you follow that script, you'll know what you're doing. If you need less hands-on as a parent, you know, you're busy over the summer and you want something that your kid could do on their own time, Math Academy is a great resource.
I use this with my own kids. If they are struggling on the concept, I can throw them on and they can work through a few problems and I can kind of sit there and coach them as they're working along with it, or they can do it independently. And the nice thing about Math Academy is that your kids aren't stuck on just one area.
They can go as far and as fast as they want, or as slow and as far as they want. And then the last piece, and I suggest this during the last mailbag, there's a website called Delta Math RTI. It is different than the online program called Delta Math.
Delta Math RTI is all paper based. It is all skills. So, if you have specific skills that you know your kid's struggling on and you don't want them to be on the computer and you want them paper-based, Delta Math RTI is a great resource.
It's a great starting spot to work on specific skills and it'll give you enough practice and enough ideas as a parent who might not have a math background to be able to support your child over the summer to get ready for the algebra class.
[00:18:10] Anna Stokke: Okay. Those are great recommendations. And so, I'm going to leave it at that.
And I mean, I also second Math Academy. I think that's a good program to use. And I've had them on the show and I like your other recommendations as well.
I think people will find that really helpful. So, thank you for that. Let's go to the next one.
I've been greatly appreciating your podcast, particularly the Canadian perspective.
It's encouraging and humbling to hear that divisions across the country are grappling with similar challenges around curriculum, resources, and instructional supports. Your most recent episode helped clarify several misconceptions about math instruction and how we can't be afraid to have some important conversations. So, Sarah asks this, as I step into my new role, I have an opportunity to help shift some thinking around best practices in math instruction.
Our division has done meaningful work aligned with the science of reading, yet there remains hesitation about applying a similarly evidence-informed lens to math. At times, conversations emphasize how math is different and some encouraged practices seem to prioritize engagement over learning. Can you recommend one or two essential research articles, books, or authors that would serve as strong starting points for division-level conversations?
Okay. So, what do you think, Jon?
[00:19:51] Jonathan Regino: So, as a district leader, I started with Rosenshine’s principles because it covers every subject and every grade level. And the nice thing about Rosenshine is that teachers are doing a lot of what he talks about and what he found to be effective teaching. They just have to tweak a few things here and there to actually get to the level of what he was seeing.
So, for example, he talks about students responding and giving feedback. And this idea of response opportunities is a really easy thing for somebody to go in and you can chart how many times a student is responding in class, whether that's physical, writing, verbally, any way that they're responding, sit down with a teacher and say, Hey, you know, in five minutes, your kids responded this many times. There was this many different versions of responses.
And here are ways that we can amp that up and get more responses, more meaningful responses. And then the teacher can quickly adapt and try something new and get coached over again, like really easy entry points. Those conversations about the Rosenshine’s principles really opened the door to the science of learning side that we have been talking about in math and what does effective math look like and was less of just another one-off PD that tends to happen in districts.
So, we spent the last two years working on Rosenshine’s and then that led to easy conversations about what math program should we use? What should math look like in a 90 minute or 60-minute classroom? And that was just a really easy entry point.
And then the ELA side, the reading side could do the same thing. And then when we talk about, you know, gym teachers and music teachers, they could all use the same language and use the same book. So, we could really focus as an entire district on here's what we want to do.
And here's how we're going to do it over time. As far as books, I already recommended it with effective math interventions, whether you're regulated or special ed, it's just a good starting point. It gives you that natural language of how am I going to help this student instead of just saying, I'm going to give them more practice or I'm going to do more of the same.
It actually tells you don't do more of the same. Let's find the effective intervention for the specific thing that is happening or the kids struggling with.
[00:22:14] Anna Stokke: Yeah, those are really great recommendations. And I second Rosenshine’s principles. I will address one thing that she mentioned is, you know, you do hear that.
I mean, there's been this movement in the science of reading, right? We're moving towards these explicit instruction techniques in reading. And naturally, there will be some people who don't want that to happen with math.
And so, what they'll tend to say is that math is different, right? So, math is different than reading. And I addressed that on an episode with Sarah Powell.
But it's true, of course, math is different than reading. Math isn't reading, like they're not the same thing. That's obvious, right?
However, what I would say is that the way that we learn things, when you're first learning something new, we all go through the same stages, no matter what that topic is. It could be learning to play the guitar. It could be learning to skate, learning to swim, learning to ride a bike, learning math, learning reading.
We go through those stages, like we start with the acquisition stage, the instructional hierarchy. And, you know, we have to first get good at things. And then we have to be able to do them correctly.
And then we move on to fluency. And then we move to those generalization adaptation stages. So, I think framing it in terms of the instructional hierarchy can help people to understand this, if they want to listen, that is.
But I would also say it's almost, and I hesitate to say this because it might bother some people, but I think actually explicit instruction may be even more important in math because it's so hierarchical. If students fall off that ladder anywhere, like if they miss a rung on the ladder, it's going to be really, really hard to get caught up later. And, you know, that book I mentioned earlier, Direct Instruction Mathematics by Stein et al., they have skills hierarchies for each topic. And like the fraction skills hierarchy is just massive, right? Because fractions are a really difficult topic, also really important. And we've got to do it systematically and make sure we get it right at each step so that students are set up for success later.
[00:24:27] Jonathan Regino: The last part of our question on the parent support guides for math, I would love if we could crowdsource and find these types of resources. I know in my area, the parent groups are all ad hoc. It's, there's no formal thing.
I've been finding that there's a lot more parents going to research ed, which is amazing. And I've connected with a lot through there. I just attended our state level dyslexia conference, and it was almost all parents.
And it's like, there's little one day conferences that I think are pulling in the parents at this point. And connecting that way has been great. But like an official organization, I haven't found one.
And I don't know where that exists. I do find that what parents are reaching out to me about, and not just in my district, but parents that are meeting at these conferences, is they are finding all these different resources and different ideas, and they don't know how to connect all the dots and put all the pieces together. And for me, like, I think Dr. Stockett, you and Dr. Solomon did that webinar on the learning hierarchies and taking that information and combining it with Dr. Amanda Vander Hayden's and Dr. Powell's ideas on interventions and be able to connect all those dots and put them together would really answer a lot of questions on how we help kids who struggle in math and any kid who takes a step off that hierarchical ladder, how to get them back on that ladder as quickly as possible. I feel like that's where my expertise comes in.
I can take all those pieces and put them together, but we need that on a larger scale and be able to help parents and educators connect all those dots. And that's where those parent groups, I think, become really helpful, allowing different people who find different information to share it and just say like, here's what I learned. How does that connect with what you learned and putting it into practice with our students?
[00:26:27] Anna Stokke: Yeah, definitely. And it's tough as a parent because you're getting told everything is research-based, et cetera. So, I did a little episode on that recently about how to deal with these sorts of research, it's research shows claims, right?
And it can be hard. It can be hard to spot what's going on. So, I agree.
There isn't a lot out there for parents at the moment. But I mean, it's good if subject area experts can maybe get together and kind of lead the way on that sort of thing. Let's move on to this question from Amy.
And Amy is writing from New Zealand. She says, I write to you from New Zealand having just listened to your podcast episode with Dr. Jon Sweller on cognitive load theory and learning math. I really enjoyed the episode.
Something that really struck me in the episode was the discussion around how we should not teach novice learners and expert learners in the same way. I'm wondering how this aligns with the shift towards whole class teaching. This is a big movement in New Zealand currently with the aim of achieving more equitable outcomes for students.
I teach year three, four, which is grade two, three. I have a student who I consider an expert in year four math. He knows everything already.
And I don't believe I've taught him anything new this year. Of course, like every other teacher, I also have students who are complete novices in year four content, having not yet mastered content from previous years. I understand the theory behind whole class teaching.
However, I am really struggling with how to do this in a way that teaches both novice and more expert learners effectively. I would be so grateful for your thoughts on this. Please feel free to point me in the direction of a podcast episode or reading that I've missed.
And I will say this is probably the most common question that I get some form of this from teachers. So as someone who works in a school, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this.
[00:28:39] Jonathan Regino: Yeah, that's one of the biggest complaints that we get right away is the range of abilities in a classroom and how do I meet the needs of all those students? So, one of the things that you need to think about first is if you focus on that learning hierarchies, that student is in a generalization or adaptation stage, and it doesn't necessarily mean that they have to move on to the next concept. This is like prime time to do those inquiry and there's problem-based and project-based ideas that people love to do, right?
Our philosophy is that the explicit teaching comes first, and then when the kids master the content, then we can go into the inquiry piece. We kind of flip the script of what most textbooks out there are doing. And for this student, it might break the rule of whole class instruction, but this is prime opportunity for them to go deeper on the content.
So, if there's a logic puzzle or a project that they can do that actually connects to the next level of math they're going to learn or the next stage of math they're going to learn, this is a great opportunity. It doesn't have to be an everyday thing. It could be a once-a-week thing, but this student's ready for it.
They could probably do a lot of that more independent work and just need feedback here and there. I like Jon Mighton's idea with this. So, in jump math, what he would share is that, you know, all you have to do is make the problem a little bit more difficult.
If I could do that by adding some extra numbers to the problem, I can do that by changing it to a negative or a fraction or a decimal problem, depending on the grade level. So taking whatever problem I'm working on and just adding to it slightly to make it seem or make it actually a little bit more difficult. So if I'm adding two digits plus two digits, I might throw a three digit by three digit to that kid.
Or if I, if they're ready for it, we could throw in some negative numbers and see what they do with it. There's a quick and easy things that you could do in class. For us, one of the things that we do is that one to 3% of kids that just, they know everything and they're ready to move on.
We give them the opportunity to use beast academy or math academy in the classroom. So sit in the lesson, hear the lesson. And then when we move into the independent work or the practice work that you can hop on to beast academy or math academy, and you can fly as fast as you want on those programs.
And that way you get the in-depth and the extra practice that you need at the level you need.
[00:31:14] Anna Stokke: Yeah. So I agree with you about the beast academy and math academy, particularly because I suspect it may be difficult for teachers to come up with those extra bonus problems themselves a lot of the time. And it takes a lot of time.
Like I kind of think there should be something like that available in every classroom for those kids who are moving quickly, because they also deserve instruction at their level, right? They deserve to work on problems at their level. I will say I'm slightly familiar with this situation because I run an afterschool program.
Those kids are in grades four, five, six, and people come to our program for a number of reasons. They come there sometimes because their kids are struggling in math. And so those kids need a lot of support.
But there are also kids that come there because they're not being challenged in school. And so they want enrichment. And one thing we do in our program, the rule sort of is that every kid has to do the whole class instruction piece.
And we use jump math for our whole class instruction. But then we have enrichment problems for them to do if they get that part done. Because there are kids that'll just speed through that, right?
And so we have enrichment problems that are based on like contest problems. So for instance, the kangaroo math contest. We also use Math League.
There's various Canadian contests that we work with. Math League is actually American. Kangaroo, I think, might be international.
But you can look it up. You can get those problems online and you can have them available for kids to work on. And I would like, why not sign up?
Those kids that are really advanced, sign them up for math contests, right? Maybe even have a little club for them to prepare. And the other program that I've used for getting bonus problems for kids is Singapore's Challenging Word Problem Series.
Have you ever heard of those? Yes. Yeah, they're good.
They're sometimes quite tough, right? So they have various problems like that. So I think just having things like that available for kids to do so that they have more things to challenge them in class.
But honestly, like I like your idea of Math Academy and Beast Academy, because those programs are actually providing the sort of instruction too, right?
[00:33:42] Jonathan Regino: Yeah. And then from a district leader perspective, teachers aren't going to be able to control this. But from a district level, we are leveling our classes.
We can put more support in our classes that need more help by doing that. Our kids who are stronger in math have the ability to go a little bit faster and get through more content and get to higher level content. So, we tried for many years, tried the mixed ability grouping and the results just aren't there.
We, over the last five or six years coming out of the pandemic with mixed ability, you can see the trend of the highest kids not keeping up with the growth that they should be seeing every year. And the kids who struggle were still struggling. So by taking our classes and just doing ability leveling, and there's evidence in the reading world coming.
So Steubenville, Ohio, where a lot of the science of reading evidence had originally come from, they did this. I forget what they called it. I think it was like walk to read, but everybody taught reading at the exact same time.
And the kids were placed by ability and skill level. So even if I was a fifth grade teacher, I might have a first grader in my class and I'm going to work with those kids at the skill level. And then they, after reading, they move on to math.
We're doing the same version here with our reading program. We're allowing the kids to not be grouped by necessarily grade, but by ability. And we're starting to move in that direction with math.
And we have these blocks of time built out where it doesn't matter your grade level. We, we pull you by what you need and you all work at that level. And I think until we, that's one piece where I think until we move into that reading world and start following that philosophy, we're going to have these big divides in our classrooms.
And that's a lot to ask for a teacher, 30 kids, 30 different abilities and being able to meet the needs of all of them. We know what happens. We tend to teach to the middle and then the two ends of that spectrum kind of get left to their own until a parent complains.
And then we Band-Aid the problem and hope for the best.
[00:36:05] Anna Stokke: Yeah. And you've touched on something really important there. And I am actually going to link to an episode I did with Jonathan Plucker.
It's actually on teaching advanced students, but it applies to what you're saying here is actually people think that we're being more equitable by putting students all in the same classroom, you know, mixed ability grouping, I guess, whole class teaching. But actually the evidence sort of tells us that if we group kids by ability, so flexible ability grouping, it actually is better for the kids, both at the bottom that are struggling and at the top, because they're getting their needs met. Right.
And so, you're doing some form of that in your district. And I do have a question about that. So, when you do the ability grouping, does each group get their own teacher?
[00:37:02] Jonathan Regino: They do. So, on the reading side, we've been doing this a little bit longer. For us, we call it the bucks bounce because we're the buccaneers.
And the strongest teacher has the most intensive group. And then the students who come up on, we use Acadian. So, the Acadian screener says, hey, these kids need support.
They get put into this intensive group and it's supposed to be pretty fluid. So once your needs are met, you can bump up to the next level. And then you keep bumping up till you're back on the grade level group.
But each group has a specific teacher that focuses on that ability group or that skill that they're working on. And then they move on. Math, it's not as formalized as, you know, it's this skill.
But we are getting to that point where we can put kids in a certain skill at a certain level with a certain teacher. You know, math is always a couple steps behind reading and districts. So, need to fight certain battles.
And we're not moving as fast as I want to, but we are moving in the right direction to be able to meet the needs of students that way.
[00:38:10] Anna Stokke: If you're a district leader and you're listening, you should do that. I mean, it's just this whole, you know, we're going to keep getting these questions from teachers. Every time I do a mailbag episode, I answer some version of this question.
How do I deal with these wide ranges in my classroom? It's a situation that's almost impossible to deal with in a good way, unless we're doing some form of ability grouping. And, you know, I've heard of districts too with the group that really struggles that they get the best teacher and that that teacher is, and that's kind of what you were saying too.
And that they also get double the time. I've heard that too, that sometimes that group gets double the time because you do, you want to catch people up as much as you can. We don't want to keep them at that low level, right?
And this seems to be the best way to do it.
[00:39:00] Jonathan Regino: Groshell just had a podcast with some, I forget the person's name, I apologize, but they just talked about that, the second dose of the content and what that should look like and how it should flow. The person was an educator talking about classroom experience. For us, we can't give double time the way our state mandates are.
There's just not enough time for double, but we can give an extra 30 minutes. So our kids, instead of getting the full, they are getting 30 minutes extra time on whatever they need.
[00:39:32] Anna Stokke: Okay. Sounds great. So maybe some people will make some changes in their school or their district based on what we just talked about.
And if not, I hope we gave some things that might be useful or helpful. Thank you for listening to today's Mailbag episode. So many great questions came in that Jonathan, and I decided to make this a two-part episode.
Next week, we'll be back with part two where we tackle questions about whether too much in the standards or curriculum makes it hard for students to reach mastery, the role of NCTM in math education, teacher content knowledge, what to prioritize once a child has mastered basic math facts, and whether calculators should be included in individualized education programs. So tune in next week. Thank you so much for all your great questions.
And a huge thank you to Jonathan for joining me today. Thank you so much for listening. If you enjoy this podcast, please consider showing your support by leaving a five-star rating on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.
Don't forget to subscribe on your favourite podcast app or on YouTube so you never miss an episode. You can stay connected with me on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, X, Blue Sky, or LinkedIn. All links are in the show notes.
And check out my website annastokke.com for more information. This podcast is funded by a grant from La Trobe University and from the Trottier Family Foundation through a grant to the University of Winnipeg to fund the Chalk & Talk podcast.