Principal: Everyday Math Will Up MCAS Math Scores

With math scores needing a dramatic increase this year at the Avery School, the Dedham School District signed off on implementing the Everyday Math program district wide in all classrooms through fifth grade. It existed in many as pilot programs before, but now every child in the district will learn math from the same program.

Developed by University of Chicago researchers in the 1990s, Everyday Math, like anything, has its supporters and detractors. Dedham Patch sat down with Avery School principal Clare Sullivan in a question and answer session to discuss the program and how it will affect the MCAS scores that have plagued the school for two years now.

Editor's note: Questions posed have been edited for style and brevity.

Dedham Patch: Explain a little bit about Everyday Math and how it will be applied here.

Clare Sullivan: The district implemented Everyday Math a few years ago. We started in kindergarten and first grade and it went in across the town. At the time, we also piloted it in second grade. I used my budget to put it into both second grades. My last year's third graders have had Everyday Math every year they've come up.

They benefited from it for several years, and my third grade teachers were amazed at the math that these kids can do. The kind of math they can do, the way they can explain themselves, it was far beyond what it was under our old program.

It is a research-based program. There are studies on how successful it's been in the country, so it's not a program that is a brand new program. It is a program that has a history.

It is very much a hands-on problem-solving type of program, which is really where math needs to be right now. If you look to businesses, they're looking for people to solve problems, and not necessarily just be able to solve little math problems on a paper with calculations. They're looking for people to sit down, look at a problem and say 'what is it that I need to do to find the answer,' and then actually do it. This program addresses that. There is a lot of group work that is used as well.

DP: Where is it new this year?

CS: This year it is going in to fifth grade.

DP: If I was a parent and I heard it this program emphasized the social context of learning, but taking a test is individual, how does Everyday Math address fill-in-the-bubble state tests?

CS: The learning activities that are done socially are only one part of it. There is a teacher-directed lesson, where you are getting actual face-to-face instruction. There is a lot of assessment that goes along with it.

DP: What do the multiple types of activities do for a child's learning?

CS: You want the thing to be taught to them, first. There is the whole idea about memory. Most people do most people if they practice something and study it as they go along. The idea is that they are introduced to a skill, and they have practice in a lot of different varieties.

They have the games, the cooperative activities, they have the teacher interaction, they have the paper-pencil part of it, and they write and explain what they are doing. And then a couple weeks later they'll come back to that skill again. So you continually are going back and tweaking the memory on those things. So over the long term, with repeated practice in a lot of different manners, that's what helps them learn.

DP: Would is the district's and your position on saying this is going to improve us, and this is going to get us out of the current status?

CS: It is a research-based program. In any adoption of a new program, implementation of a new program, you expect it to take a dip, because you are learning new terms, new strategies.

But, it is a program that is well known that has a lot of different components, and it's a situation where we have one math program across the whole district.

With the institution of this program, it will be especially good at the middle school because students across the district are using the same program.

Last year, [we put in] fast math, which practices math facts, which one of the criticisms people have of [Everyday Math] is it doesn't drill enough on math facts. The district put in fast math in second through fifth grade, and students practiced their math facts at least twice to three times per week.

Editor's note: Clare Sullivan emphasized that all teachers received proper training in years past with Everday Math, and new teachers have already had training with the program.