• Bright Spot schools’ educators, students, families, and communities believe in universal math potential, and that everyone can be a “math person” with the right support and relevant material.

The award-winning teachers and Bright Spot school instructional leaders who spoke with us described how, with the right support, all students can access and master grade-level material, build procedural fluency, develop complex problem-solving and critical thinking skills, and become “math people.”

Decades of rigorous research confirm what Bright Spot educators believe: all students can learn mathematics when they have access to high-quality mathematics instruction and are given sufficient time and support to master a challenging curriculum.

Many schools follow UnboundEd's GLEAM framework (Grade-Level, Engaging, Affirming, and Meaningful) for math instruction, which provides a holistic approach to teaching that is more than just technical actions or skills. The framework focuses on educator mindset and planning to ensure that instruction provides all students with grade-level content that engages and affirms their identities and experiences.

• Bright Spots utilize daily and weekly scheduling and data to ensure students receive real-time support and intervention.

A major challenge to accelerating students’ math growth is maximizing the amount of effective math instructional time each student receives. Part of that calculus for DC’s Bright Spot educators is to ensure every student is exposed to high-quality, grade-level instruction while receiving individualized opportunities to improve their skills. Educators use student data and intentional scheduling of math and intervention blocks, including opportunities for small group, blended learning, and one-on-one tutoring, during the regular school day to address this challenge.

The award-winning teachers we interviewed for this report attribute some of their success to having daily intervention classes or blocks in the schedule to bring students up to speed. They utilize every available minute with intentionality to practice math skills, integrate problem solving across the curriculum, and provide more time for creative instruction.

Bright Spot schools use assessments for multiple purposes, well beyond informing educators about student learning and progress. In their classrooms, students receive the results from assessments quickly, accelerating their ability to correct student- and classroom-level misconceptions immediately.

• Bright Spot schools implement high-quality curriculum with collaborative district-level support and supplement with personalized learning platforms to accelerate learning instead of remediating.

Instructional coherence focuses on the alignment of curricula, educator professional development, student assessments, and accountability systems to high academic standards. For math learners, this means that the conceptual and procedural strategies for learning a math skill are aligned across days, weeks, and years. It also means concepts are aligned across different types of instruction -- offered by lead teachers, as well as support provided through interventions, tutoring, and other individualized practice.

A coherent approach from the system to the classroom level, inclusive of curriculum, professional development, and observation tools, can improve student achievement by 0.14 standard deviations on the state test. At the classroom level, a large-scale longitudinal study in Kentucky found statistically significantly greater improvement in math achievement for struggling students when intervention initiatives focused on both the quality of pull-out intervention and coherence between pull-out intervention and classroom instruction, suggesting the alignment of daily lessons and student interventions may be more important than simply choosing an evidence-based intervention strategy. Moreover, instructional coherence can enhance student motivation, engagement, and self-regulation, as well as teacher collaboration and professional.

Bright Spot educators use curriculum that is designed to let students discover, inquire, predict, explain, share, and explore. Just like mathematical content, problem solving must be actively taught; curricula and instructional materials must make space and time to build those skills just as they make time to teach addition or algebra. Educators reported that they implement Eureka Math, Illustrative Math, and Building Blocks as their core curriculum along with online supplemental learning platforms from i-Ready Learning, Zearn, and Teach to One Roadmaps. Each of these curricula and tools meet the standard for being considered high quality by Ed Reports, a nonprofit curriculum and tools review organization.

• Math instructional time prioritizes conceptual understanding and blends in procedural knowledge with math fact fluency to build mathematical thinkers.

Effective math teaching does not adopt the “drill-and-kill” tactics that were pervasive in classrooms most of us attended when we were kids. Nearly every DC Bright Spot school instructional leadership team and math teacher interviewed for our report discussed the importance of integrating conceptual and procedural knowledge using examples and problems with which their students could identify.

Before students can learn how to perform mathematical procedures, they need to understand the concepts and ideas behind them. Teaching procedures and concepts together in ways that make sense to students helps them learn math better and faster.

When we interviewed Burroughs Elementary, a Bright Spot school for math growth, we learned about their weekly practice of having teachers deliver upcoming math lessons with a coach and fellow teachers present. Their peers provide feedback about the possible student misconceptions that could result from the lesson and how they can adjust to improve. Several other Bright Spot DCPS elementary schools shared about a similar practice in interviews for our report.

Similarly, teachers come together at KIPP Promise once a week on Tuesdays for “math meeting,” a very structured and supportive environment where teachers prepare their lessons for the next five days. Prior to joining the meeting, each teacher completes all the upcoming assignments, independent practice activities, and exit tickets themselves. They discuss the big ideas of upcoming math lessons, scale the rigor of each proposed lesson from high to low, and identify the common misconceptions that may arise together. During the day they analyze exit ticket data, diving into students constructed responses and scratch work, to formulate a plan to reteach or accelerate learning using the intervention block later in the afternoon.

• To limit student misconceptions, Bright Spot instructional leadership teams provide ongoing support for teacher implementation of curriculum and conceptual understanding.

Bright Spot teacher panels were asked the most effective support they have received, as well as what their peers might need to improve. These are topics they raised as promising practices:

• Have more than one person in the classroom at a time. Some schools include math coaches, specialists, or interventionists in the classroom to provide individualized or small group instruction in classes where students have a wide range of understanding. Others use co-teachers or rotating teacher teams, especially for teachers who are new to the profession or school. Not only does this give students the attention they need, but it also creates consistency in instruction—if one teacher is absent, there’s no interruption to learning.

• Allow and encourage educators to be flexible and innovative. Bright Spots educators have the time and ability to make decisions, choose tools, and adapt curricula and instructional materials.

• Develop skills and content knowledge but use “person power” wisely. All the Bright Spot teachers are experts in their content. Some use professional development during the summer and some during the school year, but all report that constantly pursuing knowledge and skills is essential to their practice.

• Plan ahead, and plan together. Making, executing, and adapting daily lesson plans takes a lot of preparation and planning. On top of that, Bright Spot teachers have strategic long-term plans, which they report is key to keeping them organized and making sure they can cover the content, leave time for students to practice new skills, and discover where re-teaching is needed – all while building fluency and problem-solving skills along the way. Educators at Bright Spots engage in collaborative planning across grade level and content teams, or even with other schools if their grade-level team is small.