Mrs Rowntree

When Students’ Can Follow the Rule…But Don’t Understand Why!

20/09/2026

Do you teach rules and formulas that students can follow, but are frustrated by students forgetting the rule or formula?

You notice that your students can follow the procedures, but don’t understand them. Perhaps its that they don’t understand the mathematics that makes the procedure work.

I’ve noticed this many times! I’ve taught the rule and then thought: “why are students mixing it up?” or “why don’t they remember the rule?” “How come students can learn that multiplication makes whole numbers bigger and division makes whole numbers smaller, but then struggle when the maths doesn’t fit that rule?”

Well, I’ve learned that if students don’t have the conceptual understanding of the why’s and how’s of the rule or formula the whole foundational understanding is flawed. If we rush the learning, the foundation is weak, cracks form and later learning can be impacted.

No teacher wants their students to struggle. Everyone wants to set their students up for success. Now and in the future.

Often, well meaning teachers want to tell their students the answers when students don’t understand. Teachers understandably want students to make those conceptual leaps, but doing the mathematical thinking for students isn’t the same as creating space for them to make the connection.

Instead, let’s investigate the rule and provide students a structured opportunity to investigate why the rule works.

This is why I’ve built bounded investigations to explore the mathematics behind the rules.

Don’t remove the struggle.
Structure the struggle.
Then explicitly consolidate the mathematics.

Bounded Investigations begin with a rich mathematical task. Boundaries and constraints are applied to direct students towards particular mathematical patterns, relationships, or conceptual ideas.

The mathematics isn’t left to chance.

The boundaries are intentional.

Students still have space to explore, represent, reason, test and explain their thinking — but the investigation has a clear mathematical purpose. It’s not open-ended for the sake of being open-ended. The investigation is bounded by the mathematical intention.

Take doubling.

We can teach students their doubles facts.

We can teach them that doubling is the same as multiplying by 2.

But knowing the relationship isn’t necessarily the same as understanding it.

But what happens when we ask students to investigate what happens when we double even and odd numbers?

What patterns do they notice?

Can they represent what they see?

Can they explain why the pattern occurs?

Can they connect doubling to multiplication by 2?

Now we’re moving beyond knowing the rule. We’re investigating why the mathematics works.

And that’s where Double Trouble: Investigating the Rules begins…

Written with love, because I care about you and your students!

Explore my resources:

TeachBuySell — Mrs Rowntree

Teachers Pay Teachers — Mrs Rowntree – Primary Maths

Mrs Rowntree

Facebook — Mrs Rowntree
Are We Really Teaching Doubles for Transfer?

13/09/2026
Do you ever feel like you are doing all of the right things when teaching doubles, but you’re not seeing transfer?

A student can know their doubles facts and still not use doubling as a mathematical strategy.

But what does it actually mean to know doubles?
- Is it getting 10/10 for facts?
- Is it answering quickly?
- Recall over consecutive days?
- Applying doubles to near doubles?
- Recognising patterns?
- Is it using doubles as a tool to solve other problems?
- Is it that students showed it worked once, so that proves the rule works every time?
- Explaining why doubling works?
Because these are not necessarily the same thing. A score can tell us whether students can recall a fact. It doesn’t necessarily tell us whether they’ve built a usable strategy.

We know as teachers we have to teach doubles. It’s in the curriculum, they’re important for developing fluency, and we want students to be increasingly efficient with them.

I don’t want my students to simply memorise doubles and move on.

We’ve got the students who rattle off doubles facts instantly, but can’t relate doubles as a strategy to figure out near doubles.

We’ve got the student who needs to count all from one, students who know doubles but don’t see the link to doubling odd & even numbers to get even numbers.

Students who know some of the doubles facts but not double 7, 8 & 9.

Students who require visual supports and others who appear not to.

Then we have the students who recognise that 4 + 4 represents two equal groups of 4. Can they connect this to 2 × 4?

How do we guide them towards that all-important mathematical jump to multiplicative thinking, where they make the conceptual connection, rather than us immediately making the connection for them — and then wondering why they don’t remember it?

So goodness knows how teachers cater for all those needs at once! How on earth are teachers supposed to differentiate all of that simultaneously?

Make the differentiation invisible.

But of course, teachers don’t want more work to differentiate, like, six different worksheets for six different students! No way!

Rather, we want the mathematics to stay the same while the sophistication of the thinking changes.

I want your students to understand why doubling behaves the way it does. I want your students to notice particular patterns when doubling.

This is why I built my Doubles Fluency Program.

I didn’t want students simply to practise doubles until they could recall them.

I wanted them to build doubles into their mathematical toolbox — something they could retrieve, represent, reason with and eventually use to solve something they hadn’t been explicitly taught.

Because the goal isn’t simply:

“Do you know your doubles?”

It’s:

“What can you do with what you know?”

The constraints I impose allow your students to truly zoom in to investigate the numbers in context, and draw out those explicit lessons, otherwise missed if we looked too broadly.

Here are some ideas about how to use my Doubles Fluency Program:

Day 1: dice + Unifix cubes → model → explain
Day 2: counters + five frames → represent → explain
Day 3: ten frames → draw → compare
Day 4: array representation → connect equal groups
Day 5: equations/reasoning → articulate the mathematical relationship

Each fluency routine lasting a maximum of 10 minutes.

Here is a snippet of my Year 2-6 Doubles Fluency Program, or you can purchase and download the whole program and begin using it tomorrow.

Written with love, because I care about you and your students!

Explore my other resources:

TeachBuySell — Mrs Rowntree

Teachers Pay Teachers — Mrs Rowntree Primary Maths

Mrs Rowntree

Facebook — Mrs Rowntree
Frequent Foundational Fluency For Flow!

06/09/2026

Do you find yourself contemplating how to make fluency fast, differentiated, routine and progressive so it fits everyday? Do you want to teach fluency at the beginning of each lesson but find you can’t fit it in or it takes up too much instructional time? The pressure is on to fit curriculum content in.

The term goes by so quickly and before I know it I haven’t included the fluency. Assessment is looming and I know I’ve lost that precious, quick routines that support students to retrieve and consolidate their learning. I know you understand that guilt and shame that often comes with beating yourself up over not allowing enough time for fluency. Assessment is looming and you know you were meant to include fluency but either didn’t know how, couldn’t fit it in efficiently, or were overwhelmed by the pure amount of content which requires such big thinking and planning. Oh, and don’t forget to include the differentiation! No wonder it becomes so overwhelming!

Such a simple routine, and yet so hard to get it right – fast and purposeful! Hard to find time to think about a simple routine that makes sense and is easy to implement, but really, simplicity is actually super hard to achieve.

I’ve often found in my classroom that I’ve battled with fluency integration. When I include fluency it can take up too much time of my lesson and I cant fit in my content into the lesson time frame, or I drop fluency to teach my curriculum program, but then regret losing those small, repetitive moments of practise that are precious moments to build automaticity.

To miss fluency means I loose those repetitive opportunities to develop consolidation, confidence and progressive growth. To combat this I’ve been planning structured, differentiated fluency programs that are quick, routine and build progressive depth and automaticity.

Fluency matters!

Fluency matters because it supports students to work with increasing confidence, efficiency and flexibility as mathematical demands become more complex. This is why I’ve begun building fluency programs.

I’ve begun building a multiplicative series because I’ve listened to teachers pain points. Multiplication requires substantial conceptual understanding alongside purposeful practice before facts become increasingly efficient and automatic. Many high school teachers tell me that their biggest challenge is to get students up to speed with multiplication so they can handle the curriculum without being stuck on the multiplication facts they should be increasingly familiar with.

To develop these fluency programs I’ve taken steps to move beyond rote learning and provide students with multiple opportunities to learn about ‘groups of’ through the integration of many representations.

You may be thinking, well, hands-on and different representations is fantastic, but how does that fit in as fast practise so I still have time to teach the progressive content I have to cover?

I agree that this is a daily challenge. However, I’ve also designed my programs with this in mind. I suggest teachers use common classroom materials wherever possible. We don’t need the next fancy, on trend product, just the regular classroom materials found around school. Familiar routines reduce the cognitive demands associated with managing the routine itself, allowing students to focus more of their attention on the mathematics.

In my classrooms, I often build student packs of materials students require for routines for the term. Just ready to grab and go! I build these packs in the first lesson of the term with the kids. All I need to organise is the container or the button sleeve folder and the shopping bag or clear shelf to store the materials.

Students get use to the routines quickly. Resources and representations are at the ready and then all that changes is the mathematics. Support staff and I monitor this sustainable system to keep materials topped up and ready to reuse, working like a well-oiled machine!

Our fluency remains fast and frequent, allowing students to practise skills, consolidate their learning, strengthen retention and build automaticity.

Written with love, because I care about you and your students.

To explore my resources:

TeachBuySell

TeachersPayTeachers Mrs Rowntree – Primary Maths

www.mrsrowntree.com.au

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The Mathematics is the Hero of the Plan!

30/07/2026

When planning a mathematics unit, what is the hero of your planning? Is it the problem or activity? The worksheet? The lesson sequence? Or is it the mathematics itself?

From surface level to mastery, to what extent do we plan? Or are we simply assembling a sequence of activities that align with the curriculum outcome?

For me, planning begins with conceptual clarity around the mathematics and my purpose. This depth of understanding, for myself, comes way before effective instruction. Clarity about the big mathematical idea, what the concept or skill is, or isn’t, common misconceptions, likely learning progressions, potential real-world contexts and an appropriate pitch for the concept or skill come first. The curriculum often helps set the pitch, yet learning progressions determine the depth and breadth of students’ understanding.

Purpose asks a simple question: What am I trying to achieve? Am I introducing a new concept? Developing fluency? Building automaticity? Encouraging reasoning? Supporting transfer? Providing exposure? Filling a gap? Building vocabulary? Building systematic skills? Each purpose requires different instructional decisions.

I presented at the Mathematics SA Association Conference recently and was asked about my thoughts on explicitly teaching Maths. I responded: “It has its place”. Upon reflection, I clarified my thoughts about it and concluded that explicit instruction is determined by the purpose in which I choose to use it. Each of those purposes listed above are fundamentally different instructional goals, yet we often plan for them as though they are the same. For this reason, I ask: what’s our intended purpose?

Many teachers begin a unit with an explicit lesson, a task, an activity, or a worksheet. Yet, what if teachers instead began with the mathematics itself? Most teachers know the curriculum outcome. I’m less convinced we always know the mathematics deeply enough to anticipate the thinking it will produce. Sometimes that amazing lesson we planned didn’t work out the way we thought. What if this was because the thinking behind the planning wasn’t clear enough?

When clarity exists, the experiences appear with logic! When using the principle of conceptual clarity preceding effective instruction, teachers hold the response for the student with the misconception. The questioning lines are already clear and ready. The model or support a student requires is ready and unfolds logically and consistently as the learning happens. Teachers become more responsive to the student in the moment, and after. Imagine what this does to the depth of learning! All because the mathematics is foregrounded.

Now, we don’t always determine all the challenges students may face. Nor am I saying we are perfect. There is almost always a surprise.

One time I had a Year 6 student who could systematically list all the answers to a bounded differentiated problem I set, along with representing each of their listed answers with maths manipulatives, yet they could not name the rule they used. It left me baffled, their counter representations on the floor each grew by a multiple-of-three in systematic order! Meanwhile another student had named the multiple of three rule, but couldn’t represent it with more than one answer, nor name the next possible number. Neither student was “right” or “wrong”. They simply revealed different aspects of their understanding. Had I only been looking for the correct answer, I would have missed both opportunities to teach responsively.

Centering the mathematics itself before determining the activity provides so much more opportunity to provide feedback, differentiate and to teach deeply.

Next time you are popping together a unit plan, have a think. What’s the big idea? What’s the desired outcome for this particular group of learners? Where should the pitch aim? What is a likely learning progression for this group in this year level? What misconceptions, or errors, are likely? What thinking will students likely produce, and how does this learning connect to what students already know?

Perhaps the quality of our teaching isn’t determined by the activity we choose, but by how clearly we understand the mathematics beneath it.
Bounded Problems: Strengthening Rich Tasks with Boundaries

21/06/2026
Have you ever experienced a rich task which redirects learning away from the intended outcome? I have!

I love rich tasks and find them extremely valuable & highly motivating for students. However, at times the learning intention can get lost, the learning becomes a little fluffy and I realise that the maths experience has taken our learning off in a direction which will cost us valuable learning time!

I value clarity around learning intentions & success criteria, rich tasks, I value differentiation, real-world connections, along with the use of manipulatives, visual models, student drawn representations, reflection, meta-cognition & intervention. So you can imagine the Homer Simpson moment of ‘D’oh’ when learning has gone off on a tangent and I was actually wanting a clear progression!

In the classroom, rich tasks without constraints has been something I have been reflecting on for quite a while. Popping in some constraints, rules and/or routines around rich tasks allows me to ensure the learning direction remains intact. Boundaries intentionally limit choices. Rather than reducing thinking, they help focus attention on the mathematics you want students to notice & represent. An example in division students might include sharing 2 colour counters, or to extending to 3 colours. It could include a number range choice such as choose between the numbers 8 and 15 counters and find all the possibilities.

My general rule of thumb:
- Don’t start with the algorithm.
- Start with the mathematics.
- Let the need for the strategy emerge.
- Use constraints to surface important ideas.
- Allow capable students to generalise while others are still building understanding.
This is how I position my lessons. It allows differentiation to evolve easily and reveals student thinking.

Differentiation isn’t three worksheets. It’s one worthwhile mathematical experience with deliberate supports, constraints and extensions.

In future posts, I’ll share examples of bounded problems from my classroom, the constraints I use, and how small adjustments can create differentiation without needing three different worksheets.
Before the Formula: Why Hands-On Maths Still Matters | Building Trust in Maths

29/04/2026
In many classrooms, mathematics quickly becomes all about getting the right answer. How often do students come to you to simply ask “Did I get it right?” If yes, they are ecstatic, if no they can often give up on the spot!

But what if we thought about the process: before students can confidently apply formulas or follow procedures, they need to understand the “why” the maths works the way it does.

That understanding doesn’t come from following a formula or from worksheets alone—it comes from experience.

We Build Understanding Before We Build Efficiency

I’ve been spending a lot of time in Foundation Year classrooms lately and I know that before a student can recognise that a group shows “6”, they need to count it.

More than once!

They need to move it, rearrange it, and see it from different perspectives and in different forms.

Over time, this learning becomes automatic—and in the teacher world, we call it subitising—but it all begins with repeated, hands-on exposure. And it’s the same for older year levels too.

This is what I mean by building trust in the maths.

➔Trust that the equation means that both sides are equal

➔Trust that equal parts really are equal

➔Trust that the equation is true, even when it looks different

➔ Trust that the formulas work

Without that trust, formulas feel like rules to remember—not tools to understand.

Yes, It Can Be Messy… But It Matters

Hands-on maths isn’t always neat and easy —and honestly, most days it isn’t .

It looks like:
- It looks like cut-up paper everywhere, bits on the floor, and students halfway through rebuilding something they just pulled apart.
- Students moving pieces around
- Materials being shared, dropped, and rebuilt
- Conversations between peers about maths on the side
- Somewhat a little louder and a little busier classrooms
- The teacher working with a group of students
And yes—it often takes more time.

But this kind of learning is doing something very important:
- Strengthening memory through movement
- Connecting ideas through visual and tactile experiences
- Building curiosity and engagement
Students aren’t just seeing the maths—they’re experiencing it.

But What About Traditional Methods?

Shading diagrams, drawing models, and completing structured worksheets all have their place.

➔ They are efficient.
➔ They are familiar.
➔They are easier to manage.

But the question is:

➔ Do they work for every learner?

For many students, these methods often come after understanding—not before it.

Without the hands-on foundation, some students learn to follow steps without ever truly understanding what they’re doing and why.

From Hands-On to Abstract: The Missing Link

The goal isn’t to stay in the concrete stage forever.

It’s to move through a clear progression:
1. Concrete – students build and manipulate
2. Visual – students represent what they see
3. Abstract – students use numbers and symbols
When this progression is intentional, students don’t just memorise—they understand.

And when they understand, they’re far more likely to:
- Retain what they’ve learned
- Generalising their learning and applying it in new situations
- Feel confident in their thinking and confident in their exploration
Where This Fits in My Fraction Lessons

This thinking sits at the centre of how I design my lessons.

In my fractions unit, students don’t always start with numbers on a page.

They begin by:
- Physically partitioning wholes
- Exploring equal parts
- Building number lines through hands-on tasks
Only then do we move toward representing fractions numerically.

➔ Because the goal isn’t just to do fractions
➔ It’s to understand fractions

Hands-on maths takes time.
It can feel slower.
And yes—it can be messy.

But it builds something that worksheets alone often can’t:

➔ Confidence
➔ Depth of understanding
➔Trust in the mathematics

And that’s what makes everything that comes after—formulas, procedures, and problem-solving—actually stick.

The lesson that inspired my blog today can be found on my site at TeachBuySell https://teachbuysell.com.au/l/free-fractions-as-collections-non-unit-thirds-year-4-lesson-ready-to-teach-differentiated/68e257bd-fef6-4b52-ac75-cf0c1dbbb0bd

And what’s even better is that this lesson is FREE
Teaching Maths & Best Practice!

14/11/2025

There seems to consistently be so much debate around the best practices in Math teaching. We can always seem to find research that supports different pedagogies, but what if at the end of the day it all resolves around teacher judgement, teacher skillsets, within particular contexts and within diverse student cohorts. Class complexities include an array of influences such as class size, behaviour needs, EAL/D students, mixed-year classes, and even school priorities which require teacher judgement, multiple pedagogies and balance.

There is still so much value in explicit teaching and I love explicit teaching. I love it because it is clear and concise and supports everyone, but I also love problem based-learning because it allows students to apply learnt strategies with depth. Same goes for project based learning and maths inquiry, however I am also a strong believer in clarity around outcomes. If the outcomes are clear then the direction of the learning is clear and so to is the guidance and accumulation of skills and strategies. That way, learning doesn’t get “fluffy”, it is not by chance that students learn the skills and it certainly is not up to the student to direct learning in its entirety. Kids don’t know what they don’t know. How do they know the next steps if they don’t know the content or possibilities? Teachers still have to direct the next steps and this might look like adjustments, scaffolds, flexible groupings, or tiered tasks. We must note that the value and the learning in lots of these various instances can be profound!

Teachers draw on their professional judgement to decide when to use explicit instruction, when to shift into inquiry, and how to balance both based on the curriculum goals and the needs of the class. A balancing act that all teachers consistently grapple with! The questions and judgements begin to roll in: Is this the right way forward, is it too soon, do I have enough time, how long do I need for the next unit, will it all fit, is my plan clear enough, what else do they need, have we covered the content in enough depth…

It takes a lot of planning to be clear, concise and on track. Simplified programs and learning progressions look easy and they look like they took no time at all, but they take extensive time to collate. These plans and units are by far very intentional, very well thought out and very time consuming. The lessons and units are meant to look easy, be easy to teach and designed to be as easy as possible for children to grasp the concepts. Yet, to get the time to truly collaboratively plan every maths unit clearly & concisely and to a high standard is super hard. It takes me & other curriculum content creators quite some time to plan out units and design lessons. Thoughtful sequencing, intentional fluency loops and balanced pedagogy are signs of high-level teacher skill, opposite of just “following a program”.

Considerations are so important to integrate cyclic learning so that learnt skills remain in the mind and are not forgotten. Practise and fluency are super important and time also needs to be allocated to fluency. Teaching isn’t about who has the best idea, or who has the fanciest way of teaching, or even who has the most engaging lesson, it’s about pedagogy, passion and persistence. Reteaching and fluency integration are also required, so that skills and strategies remain in the memory for children to recall.

So the next time you are looking at various “best practices”, remember that you have great skills to teach the content if you have the passion to improve your pedagogy. Plan to reteach, plan to work on fluency, plan to improve. Once you have completed your unit, know that there is still fluency work to be done, it’s not all over and ticked off at the end of a unit. Continue to teach the maths, continue to show up for your students and continue to improve.

Teachers are incredibly capable, they have great intentions and they must trust their judgement within their contexts. Go and be amazing at your maths teaching, check in and learn from your colleagues and remember, if you would like some units check me out at https://teachbuysell.com.au/store/Mrs-Rowntree
Connecting More & Reducing the Marking Load!

29/10/2025

Feeling buried under assessment lately? Between endless marking, data entry, and generating purposeful feedback, it’s easy to lose sight of what is really needle moving for students’ learning. Over the years, I’ve found ways to make assessment more meaningful and manageable, especially in maths lessons.

It’s so easy to feel overwhelmed by assessment! I’ve worked in continuous reporting systems and I’ve even made precious time in my lessons for students to review the feedback I gave, just so that my efforts haven’t gone into the never-never & so that my students can use the feedback to improve.

I used to think the only way to be thorough was to mark everything. I’d stay late, chasing the feeling that I was accountable and had to complete more marking. I thought this meant better teaching because I had all this data, but the truth is, it often meant more burnout and less impact!

A lot of the time, students are still strengthening their mathematical conceptual understanding. Much of the assessment we do through the year is still formative to guide the learning through to the end of the year. This is why I design open-ended maths tasks for students to work through. These are designed to strengthen conceptual skills and build flexibility in thinking broadly around the topics.

Each week, I go in with a clear student schedule. I plan for who I’ll work with, when I’ll work with them & how often. Not planning to just work with the students who need extra help, but those who need extending too. Each student is a little different and some require more scheduled times with me than others, but all students are worthy of regular teacher time. I keep a simple table with names, dates, and next steps. This helps me stay responsive without getting stuck with only the loudest or most demanding learners. I will often timetable maths lessons when I have some support so that I am free to work with students.

Now I hear you when you say, it gets tricky to schedule group work when there is not much in the way of support staff in your classroom. That’s when I train the kids in what to do when I’m working with others. You’ll have all those great strategies and routines that support working with small groups!

Having time to work with everyone, enables me to formatively assess in the lesson, not after! This kind of formative assessment in maths helps me decide what comes next, not just what to record. I’m not having to mark every piece and instead I can quickly glance over books at the end of the lesson. Couple this method with insisting upon a whole class reflection time after every lesson ensures I have a sound understanding of where my students are at and what’s necessary for tomorrow. These are the meaningful assessment methods I’ve found to save me bucketloads of time, as these two methods alleviate sitting at my desk marking away, providing feedback to a book or a computer that no-one ever looks at!

I don’t believe we need to mark more, I believe we need to connect more, observe more, listen more and teach responsively more!

Why not try it tomorrow?
Finish your lesson ten minutes early for reflection, or line up your maths block with a time allocated with a learning support person, so you can observe and collaborate more freely. Small shifts like these can make a big difference , not just for your marking load, but for your peace of mind too and your students learning.

Ps: If you’d like more, you can find my maths lessons here
Maths and The Productive Struggle!

22/10/2025

‘I don’t know what to do”, ‘I can’t do this’, ‘It’s too hard’! Sound familiar in your maths lesson? As teachers, we can give into productive struggle and guide children explicitly through the maths process all the time and often we regularly need to. But what about problem solving and students sitting in the uncomfortable feelings of learning. Teachers don’t want to rob them from the triumph that comes with solving successfully. Are we stretching their learning if we provide all the answers? How will they transfer the skill if we do?

To experience true triumph in the light of problem solving, I believe that students need to build upon their bravery, persistence and resilience. Don’t get me wrong, there is a delicate balance with managing this and I don’t advocate for teachers to leave struggling students sitting in spaces beyond their learning capability. Our expertise informs us to judge accurately, when to hang the carrot, and when to step in.

Explicit teaching is also so very important. Juggling the need to teach explicit strategies, concepts and skills to problem solve are also important. However, through this post I am referring to providing the time for the application of skills. Where children have opportunities to practise, develop and stretch their skills beyond their capabilities because they are trusted & guided to try.

In some classrooms I’ve stepped in to teach in this way, my style of teaching is not received well by students. These are the places where students have not had much opportunity to problem solve, or are not used to having to sit with the uncomfortable feelings associated with learning maths and applying, generalising and problem solving. When I have persisted with this teaching style in the room, it has not taken long for the mood to change and the motivation to kick in. It works, children want to strive to improve, they want to be inspired and they want to succeed when presented with real and engaging maths. We can’t and shouldn’t spoon feed everything; we don’t want to destroy the joy of learning, instead let’s nurture, inspire and grow it.

I’ve left you a 3 Tiered Task here from my Year 3 & Year 4 Lesson Pack on Fractions: Equal Distance. You can grab the full Freebie here https://teachbuysell.com.au/l/1-freebie-year-3-year-4-fractions-equal-distance-lesson/68b7a216-a89c-4a9c-a508-1663fcc0a115

Give it a go tomorrow and let me know how it goes…

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Pitch-Perfect with Ultimate Balance

15/10/2025

How much time do we waste in interpreting the Australian Curriculum and pitching the learning at the appropriate balance? I mean, getting the pitch absolutely right for the year level intended and yet being responsive for the class cohort! How do we revise content without lowering expectations? How do we challenge every student without losing half the class in the first ten minutes?

I have to admit, in the past I’ve struggled at times, wondering if the learning progression is at the right pitch. Not too easy that I am wasting learning time and boring more able students, but not too high that I lose most of the kids, and too many would require support. Often when beginning a unit, the initial lessons can easily become a little too easy, yes, we need to revise content quickly, but I’ve really been thinking about this and how to maintain a high level. How to really strike that balance where review happens but stretch and intentions are set in the learning progressions projected for that year level, where they don’t stoop below, is challenging and a skillful balance.

I know that when I have been planning and collaborating on lesson learning progressions in the past, there have been great conversations about the level, and always supporting students to meet the lesson objectives at a high expectation and a high intention.

I don’t want to cram in too much content into any single lesson, but review, plus stretch is a real wrestle I’m sure others battle with also. It requires looking at the learning progressions, projections for the year level, unpacking the achievement standard, and aligning with content descriptors whilst taking into consideration elaborations, and/or previous exemplar tasks. Wow, now there’s some significant time gone into research! All of this even before establishing your students’ variety of skillsets!

One reliable classroom tool I find very handy to use is a well constructed anchor chart! It’s not just a visual its also a reference tool for kids to use later to revisit the learning. When I present it, I ask what students notice, and it’s an instant conversation starter. I can use it to gauge where students sit on the progression: who’s confident, who’s unsure, and what ideas need unpacking.

That’s exactly why I’ve included an anchor chart in my free Fractions lesson — it’s a tool for clarity, conversation, and confident pitch. The anchor chart generally allows me to get a sense for where the kids are at and what concepts/skills require more clarity, more explanation, or extra examples. It helps me differentiate content to extend high achievers. My goal for high achievers is to think about concepts flexibly, broadly & with increased depth, rather than accelerating them into the next year level curriculum.

I’ve attached a link to my anchor chart here on Fractions 0-1 Number Line from my Year 3 & Year 4 Freebie lesson: Equal Distance, available for download on my TeachBuySell site. Find it here and let me know how your planning or your lesson goes!

And, the next time you sit down to plan, I ask you to ask yourself — are my students practising something they’ve already mastered, or stretching what they know into new territory?

Let’s keep the conversation going about what pitch-perfect really looks like in practice!