I was reading a great post [on LinkedIn] by Nathan Burns earlier about the use of bought-in curricula and the challenges around them. I found myself nodding along to the post and the replies while drinking my morning brew (Yorkshire Tea, of course) and it got me thinking.
As someone who creates maths resources and schemes of learning, I think the use of bought-in curricula and how to support teachers in implementing them is such an important area to explore. Over the years I’ve spent working in this field, I’ve often found myself thinking how strange it feels to say, on one hand, “I’ve created this, I think it’s pretty good and you should use it.” while also saying, “But you will need to put in effort into changing bits of it to make it really work well.” I wonder how many other jobs feel like that.
And that’s when I got thinking about my cup of tea and the similarities with creating lessons. The memory of trying to do a tea order for the whole family over Christmas came rushing back. The same thoughts and feelings I get when I’m trying to plan a lesson that is going to work for all the students in front of me.
Years of building knowledge and experience goes into knowing how to make an effective version of each element – whether that is a PowerPoint, a worksheet, an activity, a tea bag, the milk. Without having those starting points it would make the process of making a brew/creating a lesson a far more complex job. And of course it also saves time – something we know as teachers there is never enough of. Imagine how long it would take to make my brew if I had to start with the cow and some leaves from a Camellia Sinensis (yes, I had to google what plant tea comes from).
But then I need to know what to do with those elements to make the cup of tea (or is it a lesson?) and that’s where professional development comes in. From a complete novice who has never made a cup of tea or designed a lesson to those who have been making them for years. Even knowing what to do with the different elements, in what order etc. can require support (I do actually have a friend who when he tried making his first brew put the tea bag in the kettle!)
And that’s before we even consider the fact that everyone’s perfect cup of tea is slightly different.
- How hot should it be? Where do I need to pitch this lesson?
- How long do you leave it to brew for? How long should I spend on my explanation and modelling?
- How much milk do I add? (And when!) How much fluency practice do they need?
- Do I need to add sugar or a sweetener? Do I need a nice, open-ended problem-solving task at a certain point to really deepen understanding?
- What brand of tea bag should I use? Actually, the answer to this one is obvious!
And that is all before we even consider individual needs. What if you have an intolerance to dairy like my wife does? I need to adapt even further and use different ingredients. This might be using a different manipulative to the one that is used in the resource. Perhaps the resource uses place value counters when really Base 10 would better support learners in my class, helping them see the proportional sizes of the units. Rather than clicking through a PowerPoint that models a concept with place value counters, I may be better off following the same structure and highlighting the same key points but live modelling with Base 10 instead.
This is probably easiest if we zoom in on just one part of a lesson: a worksheet. As a designer, when I am creating a worksheet for example, I am thinking about both the students and the teachers. I need to ensure that the questions in my worksheet are appropriate to the learning objective. I need to ensure that there is a range of fluency, reasoning and problem-solving questions. I need to ensure that there is a range of complexities in the questions to provide support and challenge. I also need to try to make the questions engaging and interesting.
For the teachers, I am also thinking about trying to support their subject knowledge. Have I included examples of different methods that could be used so that teachers have a range they can choose from. Have I used a range of representations? For example, not all classrooms have access to a rekenrek so I need to ensure I have used other representations. Have I used questions that address common misconceptions? And those are just a few examples – there is a lot to think about in the design process.
But then when it comes to teaching using that resource even more questions appear. Even though I have created hundreds of widely used worksheets, I would never go into a class and use them exactly as they are. That is not because I don’t think they are good, but I know every student and every class is different. So what questions do I ask myself to help me adapt when I am teaching?
- Which questions are essential for where my students are at and to achieve the objective of the lesson?
- What is the best order and best time in the lesson to get students to answer the questions I have chosen to use?
- Are there too many models/methods used? Will they confuse my students? Do I need to leave some out?
- Are there enough basic fluency questions or do I need to add some more?
- Does the worksheet use variation theory and in the way I would want or can I adjust the questions?
- What follow up questions can I ask verbally to prompt deeper thinking or rich mathematical discussions?
- Can I make one of the questions open ended so there are multiple solutions?
- Do I want my students to do all the questions independently or would some work better as a paired/group task?
- Do I need to add a visual support such as a bar model to help students who are struggling to access this question?
- What manipulative might support a student with this question?
These are not easy questions to answer. And these are just some of the things we need to think about regarding just one aspect of the lesson, the worksheet. What about the rest? This is where CPD can be so powerful. Giving teachers the tools, subject knowledge and, most importantly, the confidence to be able to adapt because they know the needs of the students sitting in front of them better than any resource creator ever could.
To sum up, I think carefully crafted resources and schemes of learning are a great thing (a good job really given that is how I earn a living), but to make cups of tea or learning journeys that are perfect for all the individuals in front of us requires adaptation. But that’s not an easy thing to do and is where I think should be the real focus of CPD in schools. So, do bought-in curricula make the situation worse? No, but poor implementation and underinvestment in CPD might.
And I’ve not even thought about different types of tea – Peppermint, Rooibos etc. – not sure where they fit into this but I’m sure you get the picture!
