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Kris Hull

kristopher.hull@imaginelearning.com

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Getting Started with Imagine Math Site 1-2024

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Creating, Cloning, and Assigning Pathways

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Creating, Cloning, and Assigning Pathways

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Cloning, Creating, and Assigning Pathways

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Four Sections: Understanding Pathways (1:30) Cloning and Creating Pathways (3:00) Assigning Pathways (0:45) Summer Pathway Example (1:00) Use the chapters icon at the bottom right of the video player to access the chapter markers. Visit the Imagine Learning Help Center for more support.

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Centers Recipe Cards (NMUSD Pilot Units)

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Centers Recipe Cards (NMUSD Pilot Units)

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Understanding the Imagine Math PreK-2 Benchmark Test

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Understanding the Imagine Math PreK-2 Benchmark Test

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Before students take the Imagine Math PreK-2 Benchmark test, Administrators and Teachers should understand what the Benchmark test measures, how the test is structured, and when the test should be administered. Once you understand how the Benchmark works and how students experience the Benchmark test, you're ready to administer the Benchmark. After testing, you can review student test results.

When the Benchmark tests are administered

Three Benchmarks are available each school year. Provided they aren't taking the NWEA MAP Growth Assessment instead, PreK-2 students automatically receive the Imagine Math PreK-2 Benchmark 1 after they:

complete the introductory lesson that explains how to navigate through the program
-- AND --

complete the first lesson for their rostered grade level.

This helps young students become familiar with the program and with doing math on a computer before they are asked to take an assessment.

Benchmark 1 is enabled by default and cannot be disabled.

Benchmarks 2 and 3 are not mandatory. They are not enabled by default and must be assigned by a School Administrator or Teacher.

Recommendations

If you only administer one Benchmark, you will be unable to view growth over time in your students' Quantile® measures. For this reason, Imagine Learning recommends that you administer all three Benchmarks even though only one is required.

To allow sufficient time for student growth, administer each Benchmark at least 90 days apart.

What the Benchmark tests measure

Benchmark 1 determines students' proficiency in key skill areas and then places them in the Imagine Math curriculum so that they receive the instruction that they need. Benchmarks 2 and 3 can be administered throughout the school year to show evidence of student growth over time. When at least two Benchmarks have been administered, youcan compare students' latest Benchmark results with previous results. Benchmark results are also used to refine where your students are placed in Imagine Math. The Benchmark test determines students' proficiency in these skill areas:

Counting, Cardinality, and Numbers in Base 10

Addition and Subtraction

Geometry, Measurement, and Data

The results of the Benchmark test are reported as a Quantile® measure. Based on their Quantile measure, students are grouped into Performance Levels provided by MetaMetrics.

How Benchmarks affect pathways

The results of each Benchmark can cause prerequisite lessons to be added as needed throughout the pathway, and students can be moved further along in their grade level pathway if they have already mastered the lesson content. However, the students' underlying pathway will still be that of their rostered grade level.

Note

PreK students do not get prerequisite lessons added since they are already at the lowest level of content available.

How the Benchmark Test is structured

When students begin the Benchmark test, they initially receive test questions that are appropriate for their rostered grade level. As students work through the Benchmark, it adapts to their skill level, which means the students in your class will see test questions that vary from other students' questions. Student performance determines the level of difficulty of the test questions students receive.

The Imagine Math PreK-2 Benchmark tests look and sound like lessons in Imagine Math PreK-2, but students receive neutral feedback (instead of the instructional feedback they receive during lessons) while they work on the test.

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Understanding the Imagine Math PreK-2 Benchmark Test

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Caution This article does not apply to students taking the NWEA™ MAP® Growth Assessment. Before students take the Imagine Math PreK-2 Benchmark test, Administrators and Teachers should understan...

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When a student in PreK, K, or 1 completes their grade-level content, they move on seamlessly to the content for the next grade level. When a Grade 2 student completes all of their grade-level content, they enter Open Review. This means that all locations on the map are opened, and students can retry completed lessons, play math games, listen to songs, or read the characters' biographies.

The indicator that a student has finished all PreK-2 content is that their Student Progress report no longer shows numbers next to lessons; instead, each additional lesson displays OR, which stands for Open Review.

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When a student in PreK, K, or 1 completes their grade-level content, they move on seamlessly to the content for the next grade level. When a Grade 2 student completes all of their grade-level conte...

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ILIM K-5 Statement on Practice and Homework (2).pdf

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Making IM Centers Work: Joyful Practice, Meaningful Fluency, and Authentic Assessment - IM CERTIFIED® BLOG

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By Maureen D. O’Connell “How is it going with your implementation of IM K–5 Math Centers?” That’s my favorite question to ask during professional learning for IM K–5 Math. The response is a pedagogical temperature check about where teachers and grade levels are in their IM journey. Schools that repo…

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By Meredith Dadigan Abel, IM Certified® Facilitator

It is magical to be in a classroom with a strong math community. In this classroom, the brilliance of all students prevails. Students and teachers share a unanimous belief that they're all knowers and doers of math. While the experience is magical, this environment isn't created with abracadabra and a snap of the fingers. This classroom structure is the result of thoughtful planning, intentional time and teamwork, and a goal-oriented mindset.

At the Beginning: Co-Crafting Norms

The IM curriculum writers intentionally embedded opportunities to build a math community into lessons in the first unit for each K-5 grade level. These opportunities invite teachers to be purposeful about creating a math community by co-crafting math community norms with students. Ultimately, a strong, authentic math community is the result of much more than co-crafting norms during the first six lessons at the beginning of the first unit. We get to work on building community throughout the school year.

What does the work of building a community focused on discourse and collaboration look like?

After brainstorming math community norms with my students, we reviewed our "math community poster" for patterns. Students wanted a classroom community where students

listen to one another

have a growth mindset, and believe that they can learn

support one another

disagree respectfully with one another

Accordingly, we settled on four tenets to be the foundation of our community: uptake, encouragement, growth mindset, and feedback. Naming these was just the beginning. What do these look like when we're practicing them?

Co-creating a Rubric

We started with the tenet of uptake: how we respond to our partners during conversations. Students helped to create a rubric that they would use during math. They came up with ideas about what authentic listening looked like and sounded like. Students truly owned this tool because they came up with every part of it, including what pictures they wanted on it.

Once the rubric was created, students used it to create goals related to their collaborative work together. We also carved out time for students to self-monitor their progress.

Intentionally Developing Structures for Working Together in Teams

Next it was time to explicitly teach these behaviors while promoting ownership. We did a variety of activities specifically focused on listening:

Fishbowl: Students observed teachers talking about a math problem, through the lens of listening. Students wrote down what the teachers did well and what they could improve upon, and shared out. We repeated the process with a student group.

Practicing and Reflecting on Listening: After working in groups, there was time for students to recognize and share how their partner listened to them. The teacher also recognized groups that showed authentic listening.

Video or Audio Recordings: The teacher recorded video or audio of a group and played it back for the whole class or an individual group to reflect on.

Math Community Goal Index Card: Students created a math community goal for the week and monitored their progress with stickers. At the end of the week, if students felt like they met the goal, they started working on something different or chose to continue the current goal.

Math Community Group of the Week: The teacher nominated a group who showed behaviors associated with the math community tenet they were working on. The group got to keep a trophy with them when they worked.

Goal-oriented Mindset

After we created rubrics for all tenets, groups chose which rubric they wanted to use each day.

As we continued to build our math community, students were able to add or modify the content of each rubric to make it work for their group. For example, students came up with their own sentence stems to agree with what their partner said or to add on to what their partner said. Students saw the rubrics as living documents to adapt to their development and needs as the year progressed.

By the end of the year, the difference was clear. Students had worked hard to build their own classroom math community. They were persevering through hard math problems with discourse and encouragement. Students were able to give each other honest yet helpful feedback to support each other. By the end of the year, most students didn't need to use the rubrics to self-assess, because they had internalized the four tenets we had worked on all year. Our math community had become strong, authentic, and empowered. This level of student independence and success freed me up to fully engage in facilitating conversations and asking questions to learn more about student thinking.

Zaretta Hammond wrote, "The classroom has to be designed around talk and task structures that allow students to define the people they see themselves becoming. Simply calling students 'scholars' or telling them they are smart is not enough to shape their internal identity. When students have a chance to narrate their lives, put language to their experience, and process their thinking through discourse they begin to notice and name their own competence."

As teachers in an IM classroom, we are busy listening to student thinking and asking questions to learn more about their thinking. I invite us to pause once a week for a few seconds and think of this quote. Let's look around, and listen to all of our knowers and doers of math. Revel in the brilliance that surrounds us. Admire how our students have created a community that enables everyone to have a true identity as a mathematician.

Conclusion

It is never too late in the school year to work on your classroom's math community. Start evaluating your community with an asset-based approach. What strengths does your community already have? What tenet do you think your community would benefit from exploring? What methods can you use to explicitly teach this in a way that promotes student ownership? Instructional leaders, when can you intentionally spend time thinking about a math community with your teachers? How can you use co-teaching as a coach to support teachers in creating a math community?

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Co-Creating an Authentic Math Community - IM CERTIFIED® BLOG

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By Meredith Dadigan Abel, IM Certified® Facilitator It is magical to be in a classroom with a strong math community. In this classroom, the brilliance of all students prevails. Students and teachers share a unanimous belief that they're all knowers and doers of math. While the experience is magical, this environment isn't created with abracadabra [...]

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https://help.imaginelearning.com/hc/en-us/sections/360010921414-First-30-60-90-Days-for-Teachers

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Visit the Imagine Learning Help Center for more support.

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This video provides a deep-dive into the components of the Imagine IM print resources and highlights the digital platform.

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Math teachers can talk all day about math! We get super excited when we encounter someone else who enjoys these conversations as well.

But too many of our students don't get to experience that joyful discourse, which limits their understanding of and positive experiences with math.

How would our students' math learning and perception about math improve if they also had regular opportunities to talk about math? How might these opportunities help us create a world where learners know, use, and enjoy mathematics?

Let's explore the Math Language Routines, which are embedded in IM K-12 Math.

What are math language routines?

Stanford Graduate School of Education's Understanding Language and the Stanford Center for Assessment, Learning, and Equity (SCALE) designed eight Math Language Routines (MLRs) to help teachers "amplify, assess, and develop students' language" in math class. These routines are structured, but adaptable to the content and classroom context. The routines "emphasize the use of language that is meaningful and purposeful, not inauthentic or simply answer-based . . . [and] can and should be used to support all students learning mathematics." (from Understanding Language/SCALE's Principles for the Design of Mathematics Curricula: Promoting Language and Content Development ) There are four specific design principles used to entice students to discuss the concepts and ensure that the discussions provide opportunities for students to learn something new. The Math Language Routines also provide opportunities for students to engage in the Common Core's Standards for Mathematical Practice .

As students engage in math language routines, MLRs help students to advance their thinking in the following ways:

OPTIMIZING OUTPUT as students describe their own math thinking to others orally and visually or writing as physical, graphical, pictorial, or symbolic representations.

SUPPORT SENSE-MAKING as students scaffold their thinking and amplify language so students can make their own meaning between concepts and representations.

CULTIVATE CONVERSATION by providing opportunities to simultaneously make meaning, communicate that meaning, and refine the way content understandings are communicated.

MAXIMIZE META-AWARENESS as students organize their own experiences, ideas, and learning for themselves through reflection of the experience of discussing their math ideas, reasoning, and language.

This doesn't just mean that teachers tell students to talk about math and they do. We know that if we simply open the space and tell students to talk, much of the discussion will veer off-topic. Math Language Routines help teachers create a structure in which students can bring those four design principles to life.

Let's see what opportunities each MLR provides for students to practice exploring their math thinking and the MLRs' connections to the Standards for Mathematical Practice .

MLR 1: Stronger and Clearer Each Time - Students write a response to a math problem, then verbally share their response with a partner to get feedback from the listener to improve the response, and revise their original written response based on the feedback they received.

Students learn to both listen to their own thoughts and the thoughts of another with the purpose of strengthening their "first draft" thinking. This MLR strengthens student communication of their thinking. They make their explanations clearer through repeated "reviews" and revisions, which allow them to practice giving, receiving, and applying constructive feedback, and develop listening skills. This MLR helps students communicate their mathematical reasoning with greater clarity and focus.
(This connects to Standards for Mathematical Practice 1: Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them, 3: Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others, and 6: Attend to precision. As students verbalize and review in writing the strategies they used and justification of those strategies, students have the opportunity to get feedback which can be used to critique the precision of their solution strategy and answer.)
MLR 2: Collect and Display - Students access their own and others mathematical ideas as the teacher scribes the language, strategies, and concepts students use during partner, small group, or whole-class discussions using written words, diagrams, and pictures.

By creating stable representations of student thoughts, the teacher extends the involvement of students in the math classroom. Student contributions are displayed for everyone to see. During that discussion as well as future conversations, students refer to these written ideas to improve the clarity and focus of their own communication. They can use the vocabulary, reference previous relationships between concepts, and identify new connections. This MLR helps make student thinking visible and promotes student ownership over mathematical ideas.
(Standards for Mathematical Practice 3: Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others, and 6: Attend to precision. As students view the thinking of their classmates from the representation, they can address any differences they see between their representation and their classmates' representation in type and kind, further pushing students to find the most efficient or precise representation to solve the problem.)
MLR 3: Critique, Correct, and Clarify - Students rewrite a math response from an example that is incorrect, incomplete, or otherwise ambiguous.

In addition to providing students with a space to further engage in math, students employ a "growth mindset" and consider revisions to their work in order to strengthen their communication. This MLR helps students "try on" others' math thinking in order to improve it.
(Standards for Mathematical Practice 3: Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others. Similar to doing error analysis, students have the opportunity to engage with a strategy for solving that might be different from theirs in order to find ways to improve the situation representation, address and clarify misconceptions about the math, and "borrow" parts of the strategy that were relevant to add to their toolbox.)
MLR 4: Information Gap - In a group, each student has different parts of the math context and they work together to piece together that information orally and/or visually to bridge the gap between the parameters of a math situation and a question to solve a math problem.

As students work to make sense of individual pieces of information about a math context, they also identify what information they need in order to answer the math question. This creates an environment where students work together as they consider which strategies are the most efficient and what information they need to know to solve the problem. This MLR helps students explore math contexts with a purpose.
(Standards for Mathematical Practice 2: Reason abstractly and quantitatively, and 4: Model with mathematics. As students imagine the kinds of information they need to know and explain why they need to know that information, they are building an understanding of the problem and possible solutions related to the parameters of the problem and the kinds of data they need to solve for an answer.)
MLR 5: Co-Craft Questions and Problems - Students take a provided math "answer" to create a problem that could result in that answer or use a given context to create a problem that can be answered using that context.

With this MLR, students use their creativity to explore a math context as they iterate their understanding in order to identify questions that can be asked and answered by the context. As students share their understandings with others, they also uncover the importance of slowing down to explore and think before they try to answer a question, which results in students understanding the math more deeply. This MLR helps students define math contexts.
(Standards for Mathematical Practice 4: Model with mathematics. By creating their own questions and problems, students learn to visualize the parameters of the problem as they consider what kind of answers are possible with the information the problem provides.)
MLR 6: Three Reads - Students are guided to read the problem three separate times with three separate purposes with quick discussions between each read.

When students slow down to consider how they can use the information in a problem, they notice things about their understanding of the problem context and their own math understanding that they wouldn't have noticed before. Giving students a purpose to read helps to focus students to identify (1) the context of the mathematical situation, (2) relationships that exist within that context, and (3) strategies that can be used to answer the question using the problem context. This MLR helps students think metacognitively about their math problem solving.
(Standards for Mathematical Practice 1: Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them. As students set a purpose for reading each of the three times, students practice and see the importance of understanding the problem context and using the information they know from the problem in order to identify a strategy for solving that relates directly to the problem context and available information.)
MLR 7: Compare and Connect - Students identify, compare, and contrast their own understandings with other students' mathematical approaches, representations, concepts, examples, and language.

As students encounter other's math thinking, this MLR opens the floor for students to consider how they see and talk about math. This MLR specifically helps students interact with each other's thinking.
(Standards for Mathematical Practice 4: Model with mathematics, 6: Attend to precision, and 7: Look for and make use of structure. As students compare (find differences) and connect (find similarities) between their strategy for solving and another classmate's strategy for solving, students mine their understanding of the math concept in relation to the structure and steps of another student's understanding of the math. This allows both students to attend to precision because to be understood by another, they have to be precise with their explanation.)
MLR 8: Discussion Supports - Students access strategies in multi-modal ways, like visuals, aural, animation/movement, and symbols as modes, to help students better make sense of complex language, ideas, and classroom communication.

Enhancing access to the mathematical context through these multi-modal supports helps students develop understanding while also continuing to work on their mathematical communication. This MLR helps students deepen their mathematical understandings, and find ways to communicate their understandings in different ways.
(Standards for Mathematical Practice 1: Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them, 3: Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others, 5: Use appropriate tools strategically, and 6: Attend to precision. Using discussion supports helps students to see the reasoning of others as well as identify which tools to solve are most appropriate. In using these supports, students can be successful with in-depth or multistep problems with support from teachers and classmates.)
Next Steps

Consider what your students need to encounter math more deeply and in collaboration with others. More heads are better than one!

Looking for more support for distance learning ? Check out IM's collection of resources.

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Math Language Routines: Discourse with a Purpose - IM CERTIFIED® BLOG

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Welcome! You are invited to join a meeting: CA - Newport-Mesa Unified School District - IL IM: Customized Office Hours with Tailored Support, Grades K-5. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the meeting.

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Welcome! You are invited to join a meeting: CA - Newport-Mesa Unified School District - IL IM: Customized Office Hours with Tailored Support, Grades K-5. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the meeting.

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Topic: Imagine Math supplemental

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Welcome! You are invited to join a meeting: CA - Newport-Mesa Unified School District - IL IM: Customized Office Hours with Tailored Support, Grades K-5. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the meeting.

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Welcome! You are invited to join a meeting: CA - Newport-Mesa Unified School District - IL IM: Customized Office Hours with Tailored Support, Grades K-5. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the meeting.

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Welcome! You are invited to join a meeting: CA - Newport-Mesa Unified School District - IL IM: Customized Office Hours with Tailored Support, Grades K-5. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the meeting.

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Welcome! You are invited to join a meeting: CA - Newport-Mesa Unified School District - IL IM: Customized Office Hours with Tailored Support, Grades K-5. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the meeting.

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This guide will assist you in reviewing Imagine Learning's comprehensive print and digital solution.

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Asynchronous Learning for Imagine Learning Classroom

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Asynchronous Learning for Imagine Learning Classroom

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Allison Russell

allison.russell@imaginelearning.com
949.630.5856

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FAQ IM Pilot K-5 - Imagine Learning Classroom

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Classroom environments that foster a sense of community that allows students to express their mathematical ideas-together with norms that expect students to communicate their mathematical thinking to their peers and teacher, both orally and in writing, using the language of mathematics-positively affect participation and engagement among all students .

Principles to Action, NCTM

The beginning of the school year offers teachers and students a fresh start full of exciting possibilities. From the first day of class, as we begin to learn about each of the students in front of us, we have the opportunity to set the stage for how learning math will look, sound, and feel throughout the year. We also begin to foster the attitudes and beliefs that are important in shaping a mathematical classroom community in which each and every student is positioned as a capable learner and doer of mathematics, truly believes their voice is valued and heard, and understands that we learn math by doing deep and meaningful mathematics together. Building this classroom community requires a purposeful process that takes time and careful attention.

To build this community, it is first important to be mindful of who is involved in the process. While it may be fast and easy to simply tell students how they will engage in math this year by offering a given set of rules or norms, it completely removes student ownership in their own learning. It is also a missed opportunity to engage students in reflecting on the things they need to feel safe and successful in mathematics. To be invested in a classroom community, students should be active participants in identifying what it means for them to do math and the collective norms that allow each and every one of them the opportunity to do so.

Student-generated norms offer guidance and continuous reminders to students as to how they can work collaboratively and productively as individuals as well as in groups. Even with the best of intentions, however, all too often we establish norms at the beginning of the year only to struggle to maintain them. Creating norms within the context of building a mathematical community moves the norms from just a poster on the wall to a living, breathing culture in the classroom.

There are two important considerations when planning the student experiences through which to establish norms:

1. The experiences should be reflective of how learning math will look, sound, and feel all year.

2. The experiences should be connected to convey the message that learning math is a coherent journey.

If we want students to have access to, and engage in, deep and meaningful mathematics, their opportunities to do mathematics should be connected. A series of connected experiences that encourage mathematical discussions, collaborative work, and engagement in the Mathematical Practices not only create a mathematical classroom culture, but also give students a coherent picture of what it means to learn math. Through these experiences, the established norms are continuously reinforced.

T he first two weeks of class are often dedicated to giving students exciting math problems and establishing norms. While this is great for engaging students in mathematics, these activities are typically disconnected, isolated tasks that then create the need for the teacher to establish new routines and lesson structures when starting their first curriculum unit. These additional tasks take time and can add extra days into an already full year of learning, forcing teachers to make decisions about which content to cut later in the year because of pacing issues.

From the beginning of Unit 1 in the IM 6-8 Math curriculum, the problem-based lesson structure engages students in collaborative, connected mathematical experiences. Through warm-ups such as "Which One Doesn't Belong," "Notice and Wonder," and "Number Talks," and classroom activities that include card sorts and interactive Geogebra applets, the norms are intrinsic to the daily function of the mathematics classroom throughout the year.

Linked below is a process to start building a mathematical classroom community during the first week of school in Unit 1 of the IM 6-8 Math curriculum. In preparation for this work, we recommend teachers read the "What Is a Problem-based Curriculum?" section of the curriculum course guide to gain insight into the ways students actively participate in the learning throughout a lesson.

Download the Building a Mathematical Classroom Community plan.

Here are some ideas to help maintain your mathematical community norms throughout the year:

As the teacher, be a daily example of what it looks like to do math and be mindful of the community norms.

After the first week, be sure to revisit the "Mathematical Community" ideas and ask for revisions at least once a week. It is easy to focus solely on the math students are doing, but by revisiting this list it shows students that you value the mathematical community as much as you value the math.

To ensure this is a working and growing collection of ideas, make Post-its available to students and ask them to make suggestions or show evidence of either doing math or norms they experienced.

Before launching activities that require a lot of group interaction, remind students of their mathematical community ideas so the ideas are at the forefront of their work.

As students work during a lesson, occasionally monitor for evidence of their mathematical community in addition to the math. During the synthesis, highlight the actions and norms you saw being attended to during the lesson.

If time allows, periodically ask students to be more metacognitive about the norms by asking them which norms they think are the most difficult to follow, and why.

Organizational tip for the classroom: In the FB group, Lindsey K. posted, "I'm moving from elementary to middle school. I've always done collaborative norms and posted them. How do you do that for multiple classes? I was thinking of doing each class and then synthesizing all 5 on one anchor chart. Any other ideas?"

I thought this was a great question and one that many teachers face with limited wall space. I taught three 5th grade math classes and kept a separate piece of chart paper for each class because they were uniquely different. I also had an abnormally long room with a huge, empty wall that made it easy to do! If you are short on wall space, I think consolidating the class norms to one poster is a way to save space. And then, to value each classes' differences, you could make a 5×8 index card or copy of the norms on card stock to tape to the front of their workbooks or math journals.

If you use this process, we would love to see your students' ideas and hear about your experience. You can share your pictures, blog post links, and reflections in the comments section below, or on Twitter using our #LearnWithIM hashtag and tagging @IllustrateMath!

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Building a Mathematical Classroom Community - IM CERTIFIED® BLOG

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Classroom environments that foster a sense of community that allows students to express their mathematical ideas-together with norms that expect students to communicate their mathematical thinking to their peers and teacher, both orally and in writing, using the language of mathematics-positively affect participation and engagement among all students.

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by LaToya Byrd and Jenna Laib
School looks different this year. It's easy to focus on the changes that will need to be made-the new practices, the new routines, the new technologies-but we must first focus on our central beliefs about teaching and learning, and use those beliefs to determine what's important. It is essential to build a strong classroom community.

What does it look like?

This community should strive to be one where learners know, use, and enjoy mathematics. How do you envision this math class? And how does that relate to your own mathematical experiences?

Think back to your time as an elementary school student. How would you have defined "mathematics"? How did you feel about math class? There's no monolithic experience for teachers. When we ask this at professional development, we have heard teachers say things like:
Math was always about getting the right answer. No collaboration or sharing out our thoughts. Now that I am a classroom teacher, I ensure students get think time and encourage group work. We all have something to learn from each other. I also don't want my students to think I hold all of the answers. We are a team. I thought I was a good math student and smart, because that's what I was told. I knew my math facts and I completed assignments fast. That stopped when I was sitting in an Algebra I class with no reasoning skills. I didn't know what to do or how to ask for help. Math was fun! It was a different game every game. We had to work together to solve math mysteries. My teacher kept everyone engaged so we learned without knowing we were learning.
The kind of community we want to create rarely happens by accident. As educators, we can make deliberate choices that support and sustain our math communities. To support this, the authors of IM K-5 Math (currently in beta pilot across the US) embedded plans to build community into the first two weeks of lessons in the curriculum. This work then continues and is regularly reinforced throughout the school year.

At the Heart of Building a Math Community

Students need to feel ownership and agency within the math community. IM K-5 Math builds in opportunities for students to explore what it means to learn math by doing math, identify the associated actions, and relate the actions of doing math to norms that support that work.

There are two important considerations when planning the student experiences used to establish norms:

1. The experiences should be reflective of how learning math will look, sound, and feel all year.

2. The experiences should be connected to convey the message that learning math is a coherent journey.

Understanding What It Means to Learn Math by Doing Math

The work on community in IM K-5 Math is not a detour; it fits seamlessly into the curriculum. Lessons provide students opportunities to build on their prior understandings and experiences, to share their thinking, and to interact with the thinking of others. They begin with an invitational warm up, like the one below.

From IM K-5 Math, Grade 2, Unit 1

After engaging in authentic and meaningful mathematical ways, students are asked to reflect on what it felt like, looked like, and sounded like. The teacher records this in a T-chart titled "Mathematical Community," like the one below. For the first 3 days, the focus is on the left side of the chart: Doing Math.

Students mathematize. This might be in a classroom, or at home, or anywhere in between, but first things first: students must do some math!

Afterwards, students contribute to this chart in person or virtually. In the virtual environment, students might share out during a synchronous session while the teacher records responses on a slide, doc, or even paper or chart paper that the teacher is able to show on the camera. Students could also contribute ideas asynchronously that the teacher then consolidates into one chart.

Here is an example from a IM K-5 Math alpha pilot classroom after the first day.

Photo c/o Viri Hawkins, Grade 5

Identifying Actions Associated with Doing Math

The work continues the next day. After the second lesson of the unit, which again follows the same design structure as all IM K-12 Math curricula, students are asked to review the chart, and to revise or add to it based on their experience during the second lesson. The process continues on day 3, as students are prompted to think about the actions associated with doing math. What specifically did students and teachers do?

For classes that are meeting in person, the T-chart can be hung up in the room for students to review. The teacher should direct students to it before the lesson. After the lesson synthesis, the teacher may again direct students to review the chart, but this time to consider any revisions or additions.
The teacher may make similar moves in a virtual setting. The teacher can show the slide with the chart at the start of the lesson, and lead a brief reflection. The teacher cues the class to revisit the chart to close the lesson, as well.

Affirming and Reaffirming Norms

After the class has spent a few days fleshing out the Doing Math side of the T-chart, it is time to discuss explicit norms that make these actions possible. For example, "it may help us share our ideas as a whole class if we have the norm 'listen as others share their ideas.'" It helps to spotlight different norms, and to pause the class while working to call attention to them.

Photo c/o Valerie Effland, Kindergarten

For classes that are held in person, it is helpful to continue to reference the physical recording of the T-Chart. For virtual classes, the teacher can make the decision to show the entire record of the T-chart, or just the one norm in focus that day.

By week two, the teacher can start the class with a quick refresher of the agreed upon norms, and then end the class by asking students to share what norms they experienced during that class session. Or the teacher may ask students, "which one of the norms did you feel was most important in your work today, and why?" This could be done as a journaling exercise, or, e.g. in a synchronous setting, a class or small group discussion.

This work is not completed in September. Classes should revisit the T-chart throughout the year, to reflect on the state of collaboration and discourse, and recommit to class norms.

Impact on Classroom Community

Co-crafting explicit norms alongside students does more than create shared ownership and a productive atmosphere. This process is designed to promote equitable teaching practices, and impact teacher beliefs.

Co-crafting norms honors student voices. It centers student ideas, and positions teachers as learners, too. In a recent professional learning session with IM K-5 Math beta pilot teachers, one educator stated that they "[couldn't] think of a math training that talked about giving a voice to marginalized students the way [IM] did." Other teachers noted that crafting norms builds community, and that this work echoes how lessons emphasize community, from the invitational warm up to the lesson synthesis.

Co-crafting norms with students also asks a teacher to examine their own beliefs about math learning and teaching. "IM's curriculum is different," a teacher shared. "Different in a good way. Being forced to think about my beliefs and positioning can only make me a better teacher. I think we call that humanizing math."

Resources

There have been two IM featured blog posts about co-crafting norms with students: (1) Building a Mathematical Classroom Community; and (2) Co-Creating Classroom Norms with Students. The first post offers a downloadable resource that is similar to what is written into IM K-5 Math. Educators participating in the beta pilot benefit from having this built into their lesson plans, but it would be easy enough to incorporate into any lesson!

Next Steps

If you use this process, we would love to see your students' ideas and hear about your experience. You can share your pictures, blog post links, and reflections in the comments section below, or on Twitter using our #LearnWithIM hashtag and tagging @IllustrateMath!

Get more support with IM's collection of distance learning resources. This includes curriculum adaption packs for the 2020-21 school year that incorporate this work.

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Helping Elementary Students Cultivate a Strong Math Community - IM CERTIFIED® BLOG

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by LaToya Byrd and Jenna Laib School looks different this year. It's easy to focus on the changes that will need to be made-the new practices, the new routines, the new technologies-but we must first focus on our central beliefs about teaching and learning, and use those beliefs to determine what's important.

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Watch to learn more about how students learn math in a problem based learning curriculum.

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Assessments
Illustrative Mathematics offers opportunities for both formative and summative assessment that empower teachers to measure student understanding and progress against learning goals.

Data Reporting
Real-time reporting gives teachers access to actionable data. The data dashboard and display lets them track student progress.

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Use the login below to explore the IL Classroom Platform with Imagine Learning

URL: https://imdemo.ilclassroom.com/

Username: imdemoteacher@example.com

Password (5/1 - 5/14): #Flowers9!

Password (5/15 - 5/31): #Instruction10!

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Amisha Patel

amisha.patel@imaginelearning.com

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Kori McAbee

kori.mcabee@imaginelearning.com
714.300.8373