The COVID-19 pandemic presented challenges for school districts all over the country. Many educators pivoted to adapt their curriculums and technologies to fit a new remote/hybrid learning model. However, with so little time to prepare, many districts felt overwhelmed and under-resourced. Questions arose: what if students don’t have access to high-speed internet to succeed? How can we support students without a personal connection? Will students continue to be engaged and invested in their success amidst the chaos? How can we evaluate new resources and platforms in the face of such uncertainty?
There were no easy answers, and little innovation. Schools stuck with free resources or simply worked with what they already had in place.
Today, as vaccination rates rise and life returns to normal, we have an opportunity to celebrate our pandemic successes. We can also reflect on what we learned and explore how to improve the process of teaching and learning so that teachers feel truly empowered and students are more likely to succeed.
One of the areas where students particularly struggled throughout the pandemic has been math. According to research by the NWEA, the effects on minority and economically disadvantaged students may be greater than we even know due to the lack of access to technology and spotty attendance.
Sadly, research also shows that frustrations with high school math lead to an increase in dropout rates. With so many students struggling with math during the pandemic, and so much unfinished learning, districts and educators need better ways to help them persevere and succeed. Today more than ever, district leaders and teachers need tailored, personalized resources and technologies. No two schools, classrooms, teachers, or students are the same—“one size fits all” approaches are simply obsolete.
The pandemic has also exposed the shortcomings of “artificial intelligence” as a replacement for teachers. It’s not reasonable to park a student behind a computer and expect them to learn as well as they can with a teacher in a classroom. From an educational standpoint, “artificial” is about as nourishing as artificial sweeteners are in soft drinks. Better to have the real thing.
The following are some of the best ways to help math students catch up as they return to the classroom.
Reevaluate Student Needs
Given the widely varied impact of the pandemic, it’s more important than ever to understand and respond to divergent needs from the outset. Of course, there’s no one better equipped to identify what students need than their teachers, and it’s important to equip teachers with efficient, aligned formative assessments to help identify priorities. These assessments should be designed and implemented in conjunction with educators in the classroom, informed by their experience and the technologies/infrastructures in place.
Once instructional priorities have been identified—school by school, classroom by classroom—educators, using modern tools, can efficiently build tailored instructional resources and strategies to optimize the opportunity for success. Essentially, this will lay the groundwork for the rest of each student’s high school math education, giving them the skills and the confidence that they will lean on now and well into the future.
Creating Engaging Mathematical Discussions
Google Classroom and other online teaching tools have been a significant asset in the absence of in-person classes. However, many students have found it challenging to attend class or even pay attention while learning online. The classroom discussions that were once commonplace were met with awkward silences, leaving teachers unsure what was happening on the other side of the screen.
For many students, discussions are what make mathematics accessible and understandable, and teachers are the single most important factor in their success. A school year with fewer discussions and little to no in-person interaction has left some students without a vital tool to best absorb the materials and its key concepts.
Walch’s programs are deliberately designed to spark meaningful and engaging discussions about mathematics for students and educators. In turn, students learn to collaborate, persevere, problem solve, and understand the relevance of the mathematics. Uniquely, Walch resources can be tailored to students’ instructional needs from the outset and throughout the school year.
Empowering Teachers to Adapt
Before the pandemic, educators by and large were forced to settle with the traditional model of instruction: teachers and students engage with “one size fits all” curriculum, no matter what their starting point was or how they were progressing. However, when courses shifted to online or hybrid modalities and learning became even more fragmented, it served as a wakeup call that much more was possible.
Curriculum Engine® offers educators an easy one-stop-shop to tailor and deliver aligned, coherent math courses in-person or online. Using pre-built instructional components,, wizards, a robust learning object repository, Walch’s services, and districts’ and teachers’ own resources, Curriculum Engine® makes the transition from “one size fits all” education to teacher-led, dynamic, personalized education, both in person and remote, straightforward and cost effective. Teachers are empowered, and students succeed. It’s not just online: print, online, or hybrid, the patent-pending Curriculum Engine give educators the ability to rapidly tailor and disseminate instruction, empowering teachers so students can succeed.
Conclusion
Even before the pandemic, the shortcomings of “one size fits all” curriculum were widely recognized. Districts and teachers were forced to fill gaps and write their own resources—an onerous process that distracted from other priorities. The pandemic has accelerated the need to personalize resources and supports, and made it clear that we need to be able to support the continuum from in class, to hybrid, to remote learning with dynamic tailored resources.
