The Confidence Gap in Secondary Math

Schoolin' Around

• 39 min

Play episode

In this episode, Kristen Smith, author of Cultivating Math Confidence and a secondary math teacher in Washington State, digs into the distance between a student's math skills and their belief that they can do math at all. She and Larissa examine what district leaders miss when they hand a teacher a curriculum and ask for fidelity, why a popular approach to personalized math practice may be undercutting the very thinking it was meant to build, and how something as small as saying a term out loud shapes what a student can do with it. Essential listening for curriculum and MTSS leaders planning secondary math PD. Resources: Cultivating Math Confidence: Teaching Strategies to Boost Proficiency in Grades 6–12 by Kristen Smith — publisher or Amazon page Kristen Smith's Substack, mentioned in the close Illustrative Mathematics — the curriculum she uses and critiques Implementing MTSS in Secondary Schools Addressing the Top Four Challenges in Secondary Math Intervention Math Intervention Strategies for MTSS Takeaways: Math confidence is built through repeated experiences of earned success. Students who cannot say a math term out loud struggle to use it. Curriculum fidelity assumes prior-grade mastery that most students do not have. Probe for prerequisite skills in the lesson launch, before the curriculum task. Reteach a missing sixth-grade skill on the spot, then continue the lesson. Write your own spiraled review questions when the curriculum omits them. Call on every student to use math vocabulary rather than letting them opt in. Empower teachers to add access points instead of demanding strict fidelity.