The 5 Big Ideas for Teaching Math Mastery

Watch and listen here.

It’s no secret: a lot of students and even teachers are anxious when the topic of math comes up. 

And chances are you know someone that has always struggled with math no matter how hard they tried to improve on it, or maybe you were that individual. In this series of OG Academic math insights  I’ll examine  some key ideas about why math is challenging for some students.  I’ll list some general guidelines for teaching math that include new strategies to reach all math learners including students learning math for the first time. And finally, I’ll outline ideas from the Orton Gillingham Math approach that are effective for teaching foundational math skills and engaging students as they learn.

But not everyone knows that there are 5 Big Ideas in math instruction.

We call them the secret sauce of the OG Academic Math Approach and that is where we will start.

The 5 Big Math Ideas are:

1. teaching for mastery

2. a clearly defined instructional structure

3. build fluent and automatic skill

4. develop Deep Mathematical thinking and understanding

5. incorporate conceptual variation in instruction

Mastery and Instructional Structure

From the very start we are building for success and teaching for mastery.

The phrase teaching for mastery describes the instructional structure, practice and organization that combine to give students the best chances of mastering mathematics. It means a secure and adaptable understanding of the subject.

 It means being able to say, “I know how to do this”.

 Build fluent and automatic skill

Math ideas becomes fluid and automatic. The steps click-in once students start. For example, it’s like riding a bike. That is why it is an advantage to have muscle memory involved in instruction.

With mastery, students can feel good about doing math.

They can show someone else how to do it…

For the teacher. This means taking longer to teach key math topics. Providing time to go deeper and embed learning…

Deep mathematical thinking and understanding requires the development of factual procedural and conceptual fluency.

Because mathematics is structured, within each sequence of skills there are rules to be followed in doing things such as: naming, writing, solving and inferring.

OG Academic Math is adaptable for students learning math skills for the first time and for students who need to fill gaps in their mathematical knowledge. It includes variation by incorporating C.R.A.  instruction (concrete, representational and abstract) so that concepts are taught and learned in more than one way so that students will continue to develop a deep understanding of the simplicity and clarity of math.

So where does math instruction go so wrong?

The next math insight will examine why math is so difficult for some students.

Learn more about OG Academic Math here.