Tutoring groups are helping students catch up in math
SEATTLE
Students across the country were struggling with math before the pandemic, but the COVID-19 disruption caused their scores on national exams to plummet to historic lows.
The struggle is resurfacing an age-old question: Could math be taught in a more engaging way?
The leaders of two smallgroup, after-school tutoring programs – The Math Agency and School Connect WA – say the answer is yes. And these two nonprofits are seeing results.
The key, they say, is providing both context and practice.
Traditionally math has been taught procedurally, meaning students learn a rule or path to get to the right answer. With this method, students don’t always learn the concept behind the formula.
Here’s an example: It’s the difference between memorizing three multiplied by four is 12 versus understanding that when you multiply three by four you are actually creating three groups of four, and adding them all up.
Educators agree that students need to be learning not just the procedure but also the conceptual part – the why behind the work they are doing.
“The pandemic probably pushed people more towards procedural instruction,” said Elham Kazemi, a University of Washington professor of math and science education.
When school buildings were locked down and teachers were teaching remotely, they “weren’t able to walk around and watch over kids’ shoulders or get them to discuss,” Kazemi said. It was an impossible time to teach math.
Nina Nguyen, 8, is a third grader who participated in The Math Agency’s summer tutoring program. She learned that she needs to be able to explain how she got an answer to a math problem, even if her teacher doesn’t require it.
“If you keep getting the same answer but not explaining then when you grow up you won’t know how to explain it,” Nguyen said.
There can be a power dynamic in any classroom, but especially in a math class, where a professor is telling students how to do a problem and students don’t feel like they can speak up if they get the answer wrong, said Charles Camacho, an incoming math assistant teaching professor at UW.
This lack of acceptance of the wrong answer can cause students to lean too heavily on approaching a problem procedurally, Camacho said.
The Math Agency and School Connect WA focus on both the procedural and conceptual approach, but they lean on procedural because Seattle Public Schools uses a math curriculum called enVision which emphasizes the conceptual approach, said Roy Chang, the executive director of School Connect WA.
“So after school we are going to lean more heavily on procedural, on actually doing the problems and repetitiveness,” Chang said.
The Math Agency uses Khan Academy, a free online educational tool, to teach students a concept – multiplication, for example – but Khan Academy also has practice questions to help students master the procedural part.
The agency also uses a program called IXL for weekly assessments and extra practicing drills.
“It is sort of a false choice of having to choose between understanding how to do something and the ability to do it effectively and skillfully,” said Mike Preiner, the founder of The Math Agency.
Fifth graders who are two or three grades behind in math will walk in on the first day of tutoring and say “‘I hate math, I don’t like school, I’m not good at math,’ ” Preiner said.
You won’t hear that from third graders, who have not yet developed their own view of themselves academically, Preiner said.
“I’m not a math person” or “left-brain vs rightbrain” are all common ideas students embody as early as the third grade.
Educators aren’t exactly sure why math, of all disciplines, divides students into two camps, but the fact that it’s been taught procedurally – with only right or wrong answers – can leave some students feeling intimidated.
Camacho thinks this is part of why students can develop a fixed mindset, meaning they believe their math abilities cannot grow.
With reading, Kazemi notes, people say “reading opens up new worlds to you. That’s not usually the discourse around math. Nobody is constantly saying math is going to open up new world worlds for you.”
She believes students take this messaging to heart, and it can leave them feeling close-minded about math.
The Math Agency’s way of combating this fixed mindset is to help students build the skills, so they feel confident, and then show them their own growth.
“If you get kids to be good at math, they will then think they are good at math and then they will enjoy it,” Preiner said.
The agency does very specific things to highlight progress, such as stickers and prizes.
Nguyen, the 8-year-old Math Agency student, had a hard time focusing in class, which made it hard for her to get better or build confidence, Preiner said.
Stickers, prizes and a good relationship with her math coach got her on task, and once she was practicing consistently and getting answers right, her confidence grew, Preiner said.
At School Connect WA, Chang says often a student will act out or refuse to do the assignment if they feel like they can’t do the math.
“That to us is a telltale sign that there is some emotional negative connection to this particular thing [math],” Chang said. “We give them something easier to do at first or give them something fun to do.”
Both The Math Agency and School Connect WA prioritize tracking students’ progress with online tools to identify which math concepts students aren’t understanding.
And just working oneon-one with students helps teachers see where the gaps are.
From there they lay out a plan for each student.
“Every kid is different,” Preiner said. “One thing that might work really well for one kid isn’t going to be the best way for another student to learn.”
Both programs work with students in small groups so that the tutoring is individualized to each kid.
“In a classroom with one teacher and 30 kids … [it’s] almost impossible to do a complete job of personalization,” Preiner said.
Math loses meaning for many students when it’s stripped of meaning and context.
“Your students need to say, ‘I see a reason why I would want to know this,’ ” said Camacho, who was a leader of the university’s State Academic RedShirt (STARS), a program designed to onramp students into college-level math classes, for years.
He sometimes tries to tie math into current events or other happenings going on in a freshman college student’s life to make math feel more relevant.
Camacho said students are “much differently prepared” than before the pandemic. There’s a lack of confidence and a lack of curiosity about why they got the answer wrong, Camacho said.
At School Connect WA, they build in that realworld application by focusing on STEM.
They do projects involving rockets, robotics, puzzles and some outdoor games to see how math might be used in the real world.
Now that Nguyen is more confident with math, her father sees her using it outside the classroom.
“She loves math more now than she did two years ago,” Quan Nguyen, Nina’s father, said. “When she was in first grade she didn’t really like math.
Now we drive on the road and everything she sees she gets a number in her mind and uses math.”