What high-performing countries are doing in maths. With Liana McCurry

In this episode, we have Liana McCurry back to talk about her Churchill Fellowship findings on what the top PISA performing countries are doing with maths instruction and how we can use that information to improve outcomes for kids living with learning difficulties.

Show notes

Liana McCurry’s Churchill Fellowship has come just in time. Liana travelled abroad to investigate best practices in teaching mathematics that provide the best outcomes for all students.

Australia’s PISA ranking plummeted from 10th internationally in 2003 to 30th in 2018, where it fell below the average for the first time. How we teach mathematics in Australia is the prime suspect for this decline. 

Dyscastia Episode 14 was recorded prior to Liana’s departure, where we discussed intervention in Maths. 

Early in the conversation, constructivist learning theories are discussed as a big part of the problem in the context of how this approach to learning and teaching exacerbates cycles of social disadvantage. Anyone who taught in the late 80s and 90s in Australia has (tried) to work with curriculum frameworks that are broadly based on constructivist theories. 

In discussing the differences between the curricula of the countries Liana visited and Australia’s mathematics curriculum, Ben Jensen’s work was mentioned. The ERRR Podcast #77 is well worth a listen if you want to know more about the shortcomings of Australia’s curriculum. 

Greg Ashman gets a mention, as Greg is an outspoken critic of the direction of the Australian maths curriculum. Greg recently gave an excellent interview on the Science of Reading Podcast, where he gives a stunning account of cognitive load theory. Greg also sits on the other side of the mic in his own podcast, where he and Amanda VanDerHeyden talk maths instruction.  

 

  Comments and questions are welcome!

We would love to hear about your experiences teaching mathematics directly and explicitly as opposed to other methods. We’re also interested in your experiences with bringing review and maths fluency into your instructional approaches. If you’ve taught in any of the countries Liana visited, we’d love to hear your reflections. 

 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Music.

(00:06):
Welcome to Discastia, a podcast for parents and teachers about the best way
to support kids living with learning difficulties.
I'm Michael Shanahan. And I'm Liana McCurry.
I always do that, don't I? And I mean to do it. I'm Bill Hansberry.
Sorry, everyone. I'm Bill.
Thank you, Bill. And I'm Liana McCurry. Yes, she is.
Welcome, Liana. Thank you both for helping me remember names.

(00:30):
Thank you, Mike. And we're casting to you today from the lands of the Kaurna people.
We are. We are. And we want to, like always, pay our respects to elders past, present and emerging.
And I do want to acknowledge that this has always been, is and always will be Kaurna land.
And I think we need to also acknowledge that colonisation and dispossession

(00:53):
are both, sadly, ongoing processes. Thank you, Bill.
Liana, welcome back. Thank you very much for having me again.
We had to have you again. Oh, we've been waiting. And people listening,
if you haven't listened to our previous episode, you really do need to listen
to that in conjunction with this. Probably not before. You can listen to this one first.

(01:16):
But Liana had a fantastic episode with us last year where she shared her scope
and sequence and insights into teaching maths.
And that's where she let us know that she was going on a Churchill Fellowship
research research study tour to work out how the best countries in the world teach maths.
And we said we wanted to get you back when you're finished and you've done it.

(01:39):
I have. I have gone. I can't believe that it's been done.
It's amazing. But yes, so my project idea was looking at best maths practices
in countries who perform consistently well in the PISA assessment.
So I went to Singapore who consistently perform at number one.
I visited Japan, I visited Finland, which was an interesting one because they

(02:01):
are very highly regarded in the world of education.
However, they have actually declined at the same rate as Australia.
So they are doing research over there into what has caused that decline as well.
I went to Estonia. So Estonia is one that surprises people a lot of the time.
So the first seven countries in the results are Asian countries or provinces

(02:23):
in Asia, and Estonia is the first non-Asian country on the list.
Wasn't Encino Man from Estonia? He was indeed.
We's the juice. That's the one. I don't know that. You don't know that reference?
Yes, yes, I know exactly what you're talking about.
And then from Estonia, I went to Vancouver in Canada and the reason that I went

(02:46):
there was because Canada was the first predominantly English-speaking country
on the list And they ranked at 12th overall, whereas Australia ranked 30th overall.
So this is the whole idea behind it is because back in when PISA started in
2000, 2003, we ranked 10th overall in the world.
We then into 2018 ranked 30th overall.

(03:09):
So we have had a massive decline and particularly in the area of maths.
So after Vancouver, I did visit Hawaii, which also America isn't a high performing country.
However there are pockets that are doing great things
and Hawaii is where Ron
Yoshimoto who is an Orton Gillingham master

(03:31):
is from and so he has worked with a lot of schools over
there so I was able to visit a school that he'd worked
with they're all been trained in their literacy and they have very strong
maths practices and I was able to visit Montessori school
over in Maui as well so wow it was an incredible experience and Hawaii was a
lovely place to finish on that's for sure that's amazing terrible place yeah

(03:52):
I know and so those just I just had a quick question about those PISA scores and the fact that we have.
So dramatically dropped in such a short period of time.
I'm wondering if you know whether we have declined or whether other people have got better?
We have declined. We have declined, right. So, in 2018, for the first time,

(04:15):
so there is OECD average.
So, about 80-odd countries perform in the PISA assessment, and there is an average score.
So, in 2018, for the first time, we fell below the average.
Okay. So, and, you know, America's interesting as well because America's obviously
not a top performing country.
However, they have stayed consistently the same over that 20-year period.

(04:37):
So, the wheels have come off in Australia. Yes, definitely.
So, and I think, and what we talked about in the last podcast as well is that
idea of constructivism that is, you know, was taught at uni.
Certainly, when I went through, SAXA had started here in South Australia,
which was a constructivist approach.
So, remind us what that means. What is a constructivist approach?

(04:59):
So, it is about the students constructing their learning. It's very inquiry-based.
It's very, you know, the students need to discover the knowledge for themselves.
And I think that the research has really, I guess, caught up or we're listening
more to the research where that approach has not worked.
It shows in our results and we need to move to a more explicit instruction approach.

(05:23):
Can I just pull the threads on constructivism just a bit longer?
So, was that the one that some people refer to as a failed educational experiment
in Australia, the whole constructivist notion? Is that?
I'm not sure. Because I've heard it tied to balance literacy and whole language.
So, constructivism is – because it actually really changes what the teacher's

(05:45):
role is if you teach in a constructivist way.
It is the student building new knowledge onto their own experience of the world.
It was very heavily based on prior knowledge.
Yeah. Which also creates issues between your high socioeconomic and your low
socioeconomic because,
you know, know, depending on what's happening in the home, depending on,

(06:06):
you know, their experiences can create a big discrepancy there in the experience
that they're bringing and then the experience that they're able to build onto.
So, in a constructivist learning model, the teacher is not so much teaching,
they're more directing and the students are picking up from a point of their
understanding and their prior knowledge on something?

(06:26):
Yes. It was very much about the teacher being the facilitator of the learning
rather than, I I guess that, yeah, guide on the side, notion. Yes, yes, exactly.
So, kind of as a student, what you come with is your starting,
you know, your starting point limits how far you can progress because the whole
system is relying on you having some sort of knowledge to begin with. Exactly, yes.

(06:50):
And I think, Bill, you were mentioning to me on the way here that your experience
in childhood was that you didn't get maths. No.
And your parents didn't either. And so, you didn't have an environment at home
where you could develop your math skills and bring those to school.
So, you'd kind of be an example there.
I'd be a brain surgeon if both my parents had been math teachers. That's right.

(07:12):
You know, a kid coming to the school with very little knowledge to begin with
or perhaps even misconceptions about maths. Yes. And math.
Kind of having to have that as their starting point rather than helping them,
you know, the teacher bringing them up to a certain level, you know,
with what I think we're going to be talking about today, which is how do we go about that?

(07:33):
How do we go about increasing kids' knowledge and not just relying on them solving
the problems or discovering it for themselves?
So, within a constructivist framework, the teacher's job is very different.
Am I right in assuming the teacher has to try and pick up on where 25, 30 kids are,
teach in quite a broad investigative way where each of those 25 or 30 brains

(07:58):
can kind of jump off from where they're at, but where they're at is so very different.
That is true. And I think as well, we've all seen it, we've all done it.
Who stood in front of a class and said, who can tell me about this?
Or who knows about this? you're going to have the same you
know if you're lucky five kids who are going to answer you every time
and then the rest of your children are sitting there because they don't

(08:20):
have the knowledge so then they can't engage in the conversation which kind
of becomes double whammy for kids living with learning difficulties because
often their parents do as well yes and i know you know from my personal experience
living with dyslexia and having kids that live with dyslexia was like you you know,
I couldn't give them any support.

(08:41):
Yeah. And so they would have come to school with less knowledge than your typical
kid, not just because they live with dyslexia but because their parent did as well. Yeah, yeah.
And so, yeah, it's kind of double whammy, isn't it? Yes, it is.
You know, it would do, kids who come to school with a lot of prior knowledge would do well. Yes.

(09:02):
And like you say, you know, they'd be the same five people putting their hand
up in the class and solving the problem. Well, the other kids kind of sit there and think I'm dumb.
Or they think that, absolutely, or they think there and think,
oh, I'm just going to sit quiet because that kid's answering everything.
I'm not going to put my two cents worth in.
And then, you know, I'm at a site where we have 70% EALD, so 70% as an English

(09:25):
additional language or dialect.
So a lot of our students go home to parents who don't speak the language,
like they don't speak English, they speak an additional language,
and so they can't help their children either.
So for some of our students or a lot of our students they're only getting english
here at school so there's that that they're also contending with as well and particularly,

(09:49):
get my words out, depending on where they've come from will depend on the experience they've had.
We're talking a lot of trauma-based problems and so maths was not the priority.
So for them, if we're asking them to bring their prior knowledge and they don't

(10:10):
have any, exactly as you say, they're going to sit there feeling like, I don't get it.
And we know that maths anxiety is a very real thing. and it happens from a very
early age when you don't experience success.
So, if we get it right from the get-go, then, you know, it's proven that they
will have more success later on as they continue up through schooling.
So, I know we have spoken, yeah. So, I know, I mean, that was a bit of a sidetrack, wasn't it?

(10:35):
Yes, it was. But I think it's worth exploring because it kind of explains why
perhaps we might be going backwards because if that's our approach,
then it's no wonder kids are not progressing and picking up what they need to
pick up because it's so complicated, isn't it?
And, you know, you were talking about English as a second language and I was

(10:57):
mentioning dyslexia, even though this is about maths.
Maths is a second language. We know that language is a huge part of maths.
Literacy is a huge part of maths and you can't succeed in maths alone.
Without the literacy background. In fact, some of the most complex sentence
structures that you will ever come across, you find in maths. You do.

(11:21):
Not in English. I like that parallel.
Or in NAPLAN in particular. That's where you find them. But yeah, exactly.
Vocab is so important because, you know, when we're talking about change,
often children hear the word change in science.
You know, we change from a liquid to a solid, a solid to a gas.
But when we're talking about change in terms of money, it's a completely different

(11:44):
context and we can't assume that the kids are just going to pick that up.
We have to explicitly explain what that means and that's why,
you know, maths vocab has to be such a big part of instruction.
We need to break it down and explain it. All right. So, we know you did not
see constructivist-based pedagogical models.

(12:05):
Teacher was at the front the whole time. Yes. Yes.
And Liana, take us through, where do you want to start? Conclusions or recommendations?
I'll start with my conclusions, I guess, from the experiences,
you know, what I witnessed, what were the commonalities between each of the places that I went to?
And I guess what I went in thinking I was going to see, I actually sort of came

(12:29):
out with some different ideas.
Okay. So, what were you thinking you were going to see?
What was your kind of hypothesis or the thing you're investigating?
So, I guess my thing was that I was going to see explicit instruction and use
of multisensory materials, which I definitely did.
However, a few countries in, I realized they were very fascinated by the fact

(12:51):
that I was fascinated by textbooks.
Every single country had textbooks in primary schools for all subjects.
And so, the teachers not having to create textbooks.
Those resources. They're there provided for them. And I think that here we have
been sold a live autonomy.

(13:12):
When you really break it down, it's actually not achievable because as a teacher,
especially in a primary school, when you're teaching seven, eight subjects,
I'm expected to read the curriculum, interpret the curriculum.
We'll get into that in a bit as well.
And then work out what I'm going to teach, what it's asking me to teach.
Sometimes it's not clear.

(13:33):
What am I going to teach? Now, I've got to break that down into lessons.
How am I going to teach that? What resources do I need? How am I going to assess
that? Creating assessments.
And I'm expected to do that for a number of subjects.
And often at 3 a.m. Exactly, because that's when your brain is working,
right? You just said the lie of autonomy. I did.

(13:56):
So, let's go there. Yeah, I know. It's a big statement, I think.
Like I said, we're always into bold statements here. I've said it before.
I just think that there has been this expectation of teachers having to create
everything from scratch and it's been sold as autonomy.
You have autonomy in your classroom. And I think that that's a lie because if

(14:18):
we're working towards a curriculum, we're teaching children,
we're all supposedly teaching the same thing.
Why am I creating different resources to the person down the road?
So why is a child at this school getting a different education from the child
in the school down the road?
Because I personally love maths and I love teaching maths.

(14:41):
However, not everybody feels that way. So if you're not as confident,
then perhaps the level to which you're teaching it, well well-intentioned is
not as high a level as it needs to be.
But we've been told, oh, but you have autonomy, right?
So, you know, you make it up or why am I making it up?
I don't think that that's right. And, you know, as a teacher walking in,

(15:06):
had I had a textbook that told me what to teach, you know, so I met with a teacher in Estonia who, again,
she was just fascinated by how fascinated I was by this textbook.
And she said, because I have that, I don't have to worry about what to teach.
I can worry about how to teach it.

(15:27):
And that was such a powerful statement for me. Put down your glasses. Yeah, exactly.
Because I thought we're so invested in the planning and the creating of the
resources and the materials that often the delivery is lost,
which is what they're able to focus on because the materials are there for them.
Did you see any teachers using Teachers Pay Teachers or Twinkle resources on

(15:50):
your travels? I did not because they had textbooks and programs that they had access to.
Okay. So, and that's the thing, you know, that's not to say that they couldn't
supplement things with their own activities,
tasks that they had found, but the base was there for them that they weren't
having to, because this is the other big part of the report.

(16:13):
Curriculum is so important. And for us, you know, we have a content descriptor
and then a number of elaborations and it's not clear in what you're teaching.
So, if you're looking at reception, you're looking at maths,
it's, you know, teach numbers to at least 20.
Well, what does at least mean? That's autonomy, Liana, right there.
Well, my at least is different to your at least. And, you know,

(16:36):
and so, it's just not clear.
And then, so, they're not having to interpret their curriculum.
It is written. And the other thing is, for a lot of these countries,
those textbooks are actually from, like, the department.
The department pay for them. the
department provide the schools with those resources and for a lot of them,

(16:57):
Those textbooks, there were programs attached that they had,
you know, online components that they could bring up, that they could talk through.
So, it was an all-encompassing program and they often also offered professional
learning and professional development around that as well.
But it also means consistency within year levels, within whole schools,

(17:19):
but then within schools across the whole country.
We're talking lowered curriculum variance. Yes, exactly.
This is how we overcome not just the school lottery, but the classroom lottery.
Yes. And isn't it funny? We don't have to explain this to parents.
They go, of course, that makes sense. But we're having to explain it to each other. Yeah.

(17:42):
Anyway. Yes. Yes, exactly. And that's the thing. You know, I think that they're
having the results that they're having because there is low variance.
All of their schools are, you know, they're getting the same education level.
They're getting the same resources.
They're getting the same curriculum.
Just kind of on a clarification of that because part of me, and perhaps this

(18:07):
is because of the era in which I did my teacher training, part of me kind of
goes, but I like that autonomy.
Like, you know, you talk about being sold the lie of autonomy,
I think, but I like having that autonomy as a teacher. I'm a professional.
Yeah, and I think actually I really, you know, sometimes I see resources and
I think that's terrible. I can do better than that.

(18:29):
So, you just get to treat anyone however the hell they like,
don't they? Yeah, you know, I make my resources...
If I think they're better than the ones that are provided, for example.
And so I'm just kind of wondering on a little bit of the more detail of that autonomy picture,
what I'm picking up is it's not so much that is like a strict mandate,

(18:51):
or is it, that you will teach this in this lesson and then this lesson,
this lesson, you must not deviate.
Was it like that or was it like- In some places it was. Here is all the resources you need to teach this.
So you can choose to do nothing but use the provided resources.

(19:13):
Yes. But was there a freedom there to say, but actually, you know,
I've got a great lesson that I teach on X, Y, Z. Yes.
I don't want to do this one. I want to do the one that I've always done because I know it's effective.
Was there some autonomy there in what you saw? In some places,
absolutely. But in some places not?
In some places, I think that perhaps Singapore and Japan seemed quite more rigid,

(19:39):
I guess, in following this to the letter. They also have a very tight curriculum.
But then in Finland, Estonia, there was that, like, here's the resources, but you can add to that.
That's your base. You can do more there. But I think the other thing is,
this is what I want you to teach. You can have the autonomy,

(20:01):
but you're not having to work out what to teach. So, here's the lesson.
You want to do your own activity you want to do. That's fine.
Throw in a joke or use a different example or whatever.
Exactly. But here's the content. Yeah. This is the thing that I want you to
teach. Okay. And that's different to our curriculum.
I think ours is just far too open and too open to interpretation.

(20:25):
And I think that it needs to be much more rigid and just the,
like, we have elaborations within the Australian curriculum and,
you know, the amount that you have to read.
So, part of the report breaks down just an example from each of the curriculums
from the places that I went to, like, here is ours and here is theirs.
And a lot of the time, like, ours is just so wordy. Yeah. And so,

(20:48):
theirs says so much more in much fewer sentences.
Yep. So, I just think teachers want, well, what do you want me to teach?
Like, I shouldn't have to read it and think, like, even as a confident maths
teacher, I have read the curriculum and thought, I don't understand that.
Like, what do you mean? What does that mean I teach? Yeah. Like,

(21:09):
I don't know what to teach.
Yeah. And even if you do understand it. Mm-hmm.
There can probably be 10 valid different understandings of what it says.
Yes, exactly. You know, even if you have a level of confidence that,
oh, yeah, I know what they're getting at with that.
Someone else may think the same thing, but actually they're talking two different
things. Because it is very vague, isn't it? It is indeed.

(21:31):
So, the Australian curriculum is loose and it's fluffy. I'm just going to go there.
Ben Jensen, we talked about him last time we were together on episode 14,
I think. He pretty much says the same thing in far more eloquent language.
And the curriculum that you saw is much more prescriptive and descriptive.

(21:52):
Teach this to this extent at this point. Yes. Right. Exactly. Yes.
And this was number one on your conclusions and recommendations,
wasn't it? Yes, it was. About curriculum.
Yes. And so, now I think to myself, okay, I accept that.
Yes, we've got a fluffy curriculum and it's difficult to deal with.
And I accept that because I have difficulty dealing with it and understanding

(22:14):
it and even just clicking through that website.
It's so complicated. This is why teachers put it down and go to Drinkle.
It's very tricky. Absolutely.
And to be honest, I actually bought from Officeworks of all places,
a little curriculum summary book. Right.
And I've actually used that because it's like, oh, thank goodness,
someone's explaining this to me. Yeah.

(22:36):
You know, it was a commercial product, but it just broke down the maths curriculum.
Beautifully, but I needed that.
And so, but this is the curriculum we've got. Yes.
And so, what can we do about that? So, you know, I'm teaching now,
you're teaching now, that curriculum is not going to be changing anytime soon.
So, did you pick up any kind of tips or tricks or advice that you could give

(22:59):
teachers now to say, well, what can we do about that low variance?
How can we combat that? I think, like you said, from the last podcast,
I did give out, obviously, my sequences and then there's some breakdowns there of what to cover.
But I think, you know, for anything to be effective, it has to be whole school.
So, my first point would be, as a whole school, you need to sit down and go,

(23:23):
okay, well, if we're teaching this here from reception, your next step is this
and your next step is this and looking really at how it sequences.
Because the other thing is there's a lot of assumption. assumption
so you know we cannot assume that children
understand that skip counting is multiplication you know is
the beginning of multiplication so that needs to be
explicitly taught so you know making those

(23:45):
connections and saying okay well if we're doing this then we need to be making
sure that before they do this they're doing this or you know after they've done
this we need to explicitly explain these connections so looking at the connections
and also I guess really really just honing in on like what's most important, what's most important.
So, and like I was reading something and.

(24:07):
Recently that said, you know, like conceptual development is super important in mathematics.
However, it shouldn't be at the cost of procedural fluency. Right.
So, procedural fluency is very important as well because as we know that when
children move up, particularly to middle and upper primary, if they don't have
procedural knowledge and if they don't have fact recall,

(24:32):
then everything is much harder. harder.
Because what should be automated is not, and it's using up working memory resources.
Now, you said Japan was pretty big on fluency. Did I say that?
Yeah, I think that Singapore and Japan in particular, very big on,
so it was very clear that their children had the procedural fluency.

(24:55):
They were good with the procedures.
So, for Singapore, they were very big on the procedural fluency.
Kids had that. they knew that but what they
were then focusing on was the thinking aspects
and the metacognitive strategies which and what
i noticed in japan as well was like it was the same thing so when i went into

(25:15):
the classroom in japan he did a lesson around metacognitive strategies gave
them a question to do and they could all access the task it was a year five
class and there was no question of them being able to do the math.
They had the prior knowledge of the math. They had the knowledge to do the math.
So, he wasn't, the teacher wasn't having to go around and work with students

(25:38):
on how to access the task because they had that. So, this was Mr.
Umahara? Yes. And that's interesting we raise this because I was reading this
and he set them off on a task, which was one, add two, add three, add four.
And I thought- Up to nine. Up to nine. Yep.
But he sent them off to have a crack and I thought, oh, this is open-ended.

(26:02):
But this guy is a highly successful and decorated maths teacher. So what's he doing?
Because this sort of teaching I don't think works as well in Australia.
No. And I know it's not to do with how close anyone is to the equator.
So what's Mr. Umahara got with his kids that ours or some kids over here might not have?
Yeah, so they were all in, they have those individual single desks that you

(26:25):
see from, you know, photos from the 60s in schools, like those.
And they were in little groups of three, maybe four. but it was do the task
yourself, then discuss in your groups.
So, they were doing that pair share stuff. And then he pretty much said the
answer, told them the answer.
The answer is this. The answer is, I think it was 45.

(26:46):
So, this was 1 plus 2 plus 3 plus 4 plus 5 plus 6 plus 7 plus 8 plus 9.
That's correct. And I thought, I wish he added 10. Yeah.
Because that's 55. That's my favorite number. There you go. You've just been
stuck on 10 over there, haven't you, mate?
So, that was the question. So, we added one to nine. Added one to nine.

(27:07):
Cumulative, yeah. Gave them the answer.
Said the answer's 45. I don't care about the answer. What I care about is how
you got there. What was your strategy? What was your thinking?
And that was what the children discussed. And then he got children to come up,
explain their thinking whilst he scribed on the board.
And then he wrote their name up above it as well so that there was that ownership.

(27:28):
Entrepreneurship and then got children to, you know, is there anything they
want to change? Is there anything they want to talk about?
And it was interesting because there was a girl who came up and she said, I've done this.
I know it works. I don't know why.
Yeah. This makes me think about Greg Ashman referenced some experiments that

(27:49):
Sweller did right at the beginning of cognitive load theory.
Do you know the one I'm talking about? Oh, not the experiment.
Okay, so students were asked to, this is in the late 70s, gave students the
answer and a number they had to get to and they could get to by either doing one of two operations,
multiplying by a certain number or taking a certain number. It might have been

(28:11):
multiply by three, take 25. Okay.
So, most people got to it. They got to the target number, but what you had to
do was do those two processes alternatively.
Got to the end of it, his question was, did people know how they solved it?
No one realized that they had done that, done one after the other,
that use those two procedures, multiple by three, take 25.
And that was the beginning of cognitive load theory because he said,

(28:32):
they were so loaded up by trying to discover that none of them could tell him how they did it.
And this is kind of where it grew from. And that's exactly what you made me
think about. Oh, there you go. Yeah, that's what he did. Right.
Yeah. And so, were they so loaded up here?
Well, again, because they could access the maths, that wasn't the focus of the lesson.

(28:54):
The lesson was the discussion around the strategies that they used.
And, you know, it was just really clear that it was an environment where they
were all safe to make mistakes and, you know, do all of that stuff.
And the relationships that he had with his students was exceptional.
Exceptional but it was just interesting because they
just just the discussion of the strategies and

(29:17):
you know and i always say to people like kids are going to think of things that
i don't think of they come up with things that are just amazing and you think
you know i've changed some of my teaching based on responses i've gotten from
kids because i've thought well that's genius yeah you know now i'm going to
do that for you know so but he also said that because the curriculum is so rigid,
he only gets to do those lessons a few times a semester, so not as often as

(29:41):
he would like, but he has won an award for his maths teaching because it is
very different to a traditional Japanese classroom. Okay.
So, this guy is a great maths teacher who says he would rather do that more often, but.
I'm going to be controversial here. We are in an environment that basically goes teach first.

(30:05):
Yeah. Right? He didn't teach first in that lesson.
So, my question is, what did he get away with and why did he get away with it?
So, yeah. So, this reminds me of, so I went to a conference in Singapore and
I went to see a professor who's actually from Queensland, University of Queensland
or Sunshine Coast or somewhere up there.
And she said, imagine going to learn to play soccer and you go out every day

(30:30):
and you learn to dribble, you learn to shoot your goals, but you never actually play a match.
That's essentially what we're doing to our kids in maths.
And that was really powerful for me because I was like, you know,
Ben Jensen talks about moving away from skill-based curriculum to a knowledge-based
curriculum. You know, we need to build the skills, but then we also need to

(30:53):
make sure that they're applying the skills.
So, there are two aspects there. And so, for me, what Professor Umahara was
doing was getting them to apply the skills that they'd learnt.
That's how I look at it. So, it's about that mathematical thinking.
Yes. He wasn't doing that to teach them what addition was. No, exactly.

(31:15):
They already had all that down pat. So, the actual math kind of algorithm part
was actually very simple for them.
Exactly. That was not… That's not the focus of the lesson.
Nothing to do with it. It wasn't like kids in there… It wasn't like the kids
who struggled, they struggled because they didn't know how to add one and two. Yeah.
Actually, it was more about how do you think strategically?

(31:38):
Yes. How do you solve problems? It was more of a kind of a problem-solving strategy lesson.
Yes. And I always, you know, when I've done those particular types of lessons,
it's important for your more capable students because they often,
because if you find mathematics easy,
they'll go, well, there's straight to one way to do it, you know,

(32:00):
and so they don't often see that there's other strategies.
So, it's important for those students to see that there are multiple ways that you can do something.
But then it's also good for your lower students because they may be thinking
of something in a far more complex way than they actually need to.
And they could look at something and go, oh, well, that makes sense to me.

(32:21):
Yeah. I can do that. So, it works at both ends as well.
So, it's a, yeah, it's, again, it comes to that. that we teach the skills,
but we also need to do the application stuff as well.
That flexibility of thinking and that problem solving.
And as adults, I think it's easy to assume that kids know how to solve problems.

(32:41):
My experience is they don't necessarily have very good problem solving strategies.
You know, they kind of guess or they add stuff up on their fingers,
but they're not really thinking about it.
They're just scratching for stuff they already know.
Yes. Yeah, absolutely. And I kind of, I mean, I really like that approach because
I think if you talk about the point of maths, you know, beyond us learning these basics, it is...

(33:09):
Finding those new discoveries. You know, if I become a mathematician,
my job is to solve problems that no one's been able to solve before.
And this is the kind of thinking you need, isn't it? This is the skill you need to do that.
But as you say, that's not the focus of the lesson because our students are novices.
They're not experts. So, if we come back, you know, maybe one day they will

(33:30):
be mathematicians and that will be amazing.
Yeah. But we don't expect them to think like expert mathematicians.
Yeah. at school and this comes back to that cognitive
load theory that Greg Ashman's talking about you
know and that's where that inquiry stuff comes from
as you know that the focus of the lesson was the thinking because they had the

(33:50):
strategies to do the addition whereas if we we're not using it to teach addition
because that would be you know an inquiry very confusing it'd be very confusing
for students and as you say particularly for kids with learning difficulties
and you're Setting them up for failure too.
Exactly. And humiliation in front of the class.
Yes. Yes. But we actually don't need them to, you know, do the hard thinking

(34:14):
of mathematicians, but we need to give them the skills that if they one day
get there, that's great.
Yeah. So, I'm just, so we've talked about curriculum. Curriculum,
yes. Which led us into resources.
Yes. Now that we've started to talk about this idea of problem solving and getting
kids to to think like mathematicians, I'm looking at explicit instruction because

(34:37):
here lies a clear tension for me.
My guess is that the Australian curriculum is very focused on trying to get
these flexible – kids to think flexibly about how they approach mathematical problems. Mm-hmm.
However, what I've heard you talk about, Liana, is that to approach mathematical

(34:59):
problems in a strategic way, you need to have a lot of knowledge up in long-term memory to draw from.
Absolutely. So, this whole idea of thinking like an expert or doing maths like
an expert doesn't just come with maths. I talk about how does an expert write, you know.
It's got a big gaping hole in it from what I can see and you started touching

(35:21):
on it. You said novices do not think like experts.
So, what's the difference between how a novice thinks and an expert thinks?
Because you're pretty good with this stuff. Can you break it down for us?
Good question. I think I would direct people to the Greg Ashman podcast that
we were talking about, really.
Yeah, put that in the show notes. Because I think that he really just explained it best.

(35:42):
But he talked about, you know, we had this idea that for students in science,
for example, they need to think like scientists. Well, actually,
they don't need to think like scientists because scientists are experts and
students in schools are novices.
And what we need to do is we need to build the skills.
So, you know, we need three things. We need the conceptual understanding.

(36:03):
We need the procedural fluency.
And then we need math recall, fact recall to automaticity.
So, you know, if you have those things, then you will be able to access your
maths and be successful.
That's our goal. Well, we've been kind of working through your conclusions and
recommendations and we've spoken about curriculum and the fact that, you know,

(36:26):
the places you visited that are really successful have the lowest curriculum
variance and the most explicit curriculum.
And I remember when we were back there and I was saying...
You know, was there wriggle room? I think it's interesting that the ones who
had the least wriggle room, I think you mentioned Singapore,
are actually the ones at the top of the charts.

(36:46):
Yes. You know, probably too much of a jump to say it's all because of curriculum,
that they're there, but I think it's interesting that, you know,
maybe that's a little bit counterintuitive for us in our culture to be thinking,
oh, actually lower variance gets better results.
I think, like, as a teacher in the classroom, you know, you open the curriculum
and I think, just tell me what you want.

(37:07):
Like, honestly, just tell me what you want. I'm like, why am I spending my nights
and my weekends trying to work out what you want? Yeah. I don't know.
Yeah. Yeah, that's right. It's discovery curriculum. It really is.
It's frustrating. It's discovery learning curriculum, yeah.
Yeah. And we've talked about having high quality resources, which are kind of

(37:29):
rolled into that curriculum discussion, weren't they?
And that's one of your recommendations is that really we want teachers to have
everything they need available to them.
So, they can worry about the delivery and the how, not the what.
Yeah. And put some creativity and their own touch onto the delivery.
And that's the thing I think like, yes, they may have had textbooks.
Yes, they, you know, had those resources.

(37:51):
But you can't, you are still the teacher.
How you deliver that, you know, how you deliver that and how you bring that in, that's still you.
So it's just providing high-quality resources in the hands of teachers,
hopefully as well to give them back their weekends and their nights and,
you know, how about some time?

(38:13):
That's right. We have thousands of people out there reinventing the wheel every night.
You know, all planning lessons from scratch that have been planned a thousand
times before. Why are we doing that? Why?
That's my question. I'm a far better teacher when I'm well-slept and I know
exactly what I'm teaching. Exactly.
And so I think we've,

(38:33):
I think we get that, don't we? The curriculum and the resources,
that kind of base level information for teachers, and I think that would make
things easier for parents as well.
If there was some sort of structure they could follow and they knew where their
kid was going and what they were doing.
And then we started talking about explicit instruction.

(38:54):
I don't think we've really spent much time on that yet. So, I'm kind of looking
and thinking that's next on the list of your conclusions and recommendations.
So, can you say a little bit about that and what you discovered?
And I think that, you know, you can't talk about explicit instruction without
talking about cognitive load theory.
And, you know, that is, you know, explicit instruction is based on cognitive load theory.

(39:18):
So, it's the idea that we present new information in small scaffolded steps
to really ensure the success for our students.
But because so the resources that I
saw in schools they are stepped out for teachers so it's literally a lot of
them were scripted but a lot of them were you know here is your introductory
you're activating prior knowledge activity here is the bulk of your lesson which

(39:41):
is based on the I do we do you do gradual release of responsibility but it's also got in there so So,
the most effective teachers that I saw,
it's about great questioning as well.
And asking great questions in a maths lesson is often very difficult.
It's not an easy thing to do. And some people are just good at picking their

(40:03):
times and they know that.
But for these teachers, it was written in there for them. You know,
at this point, ask this question.
So, that checking for understanding, which is part of explicit instruction,
that's built in for them. Yep.
So, again, it's taking away that load for the teacher so they can worry about the delivery.
And then you've obviously got your, you know, finishing up sort of activity

(40:28):
before the students do some practice in their own books, whether it be textbooks
or their workbooks, that they could practice the skill that they've been taught.
Yeah. So, yeah. So, there was a lot, I think all of the schools that I saw had
some explicit instruction in one form or another. And sounds very structured. Very structured.

(40:49):
And, you know, from the intervention perspective and working with kids living
with disability, structure is very important.
Exactly. Maybe more important because it gives that kind of reliability, that sense of security.
And, you know, you were talking before about kids living with trauma.
Structure is comfort. You know, structure means that I'm not so anxious.

(41:13):
I know what's coming next. Even if I don't like this bit, I know it's only going
to go for a few minutes and then it's going to be a bit that I like.
So, that kind of predictability and structure, you know, from intervention is incredibly important.
And it sounds like in the classroom as well. Absolutely. They were doing that.
And it sounds like perhaps we don't have that kind of structure here unless,

(41:36):
but it's up to the teacher, isn't it? The teacher provides that structure or not.
Yeah. And I think that we're on a bit of a, whether it's explicit instruction,
I know we use explicit direct instruction here at Salisbury,
we're on a bit of a revolution, I think. I think the tides are turning back
towards that explicit instruction.
And I think we've done so much work in the literacy space around,

(41:56):
this is how children with dyslexia learn best.
Best it's exactly the same in maths this is
how children with dyscalculia learn best because as
it is currently if you read a fact sheet for dyscalculia there's most of the
children that you work with but it's not that they have a learning difficulty
it's that the instruction hasn't been strong enough in in tier one in in classrooms

(42:20):
currently yeah hopefully we can change Yes.
Okay. So, explicit instruction and, you know, all that involves was a component
in all the successful places. Yes.
And then I see you were talking multisensory. Yes.
So, what is it about multisensory that the places that are doing it well are

(42:43):
doing that we're not, perhaps? apps.
I think coming back to resources, consistency of resources as well.
But when you're talking multisensory, I went in to the University of Helsinki
in Finland and they teach their pre-service teachers how to use manipulatives.
So they were using the place value, the base 10, sorry, base 10 blocks,
but they had base 10, five blocks.

(43:05):
So they were getting the students, because they said they're all familiar with base 10.
They were getting them to try and think in in base five because they wanted
to put them in the role of the student.
Oh, so the student teachers had to think in base five. The student teachers
had to think in base five so that, sorry, yeah, when I say students,
I meant student teachers at university because they're all comfortable with that.

(43:28):
So how do you put them in the mind of a child who struggles and,
you know, take them out of their comfort zone and give them something else?
And so they're very big on the multisensory approach at the university level, which was amazing.
But I think that also in Helsinki, I actually went to a special school with

(43:48):
a majority of students who are non-verbal.
And so, how do non-verbal students show you their understanding? Through multisensory.
So, this is use of manipulatives? Use of manipulatives, use of anything that's
tactile, really, just to show understanding.
So, like at the special school, for example, they were doing addition with egg cartons. So, and...

(44:09):
Kinder Surprise eggs they were putting in there. But it comes back to the CRA methodology.
So, the CRA methodology, which is big in Singapore as well, is that you begin
with the concrete materials, then you go to a representation,
whether it's a visual representation, whether it's a picture,
and then you go to the abstract concept.
So, what often happens in classrooms is we move to the abstract concept far

(44:30):
too quickly. Or immediately.
Yeah, or immediately when there hasn't been that concrete and the concept understanding.
Because the teacher is suffering the curse of expertise where that's all easily
accessible from their long-term memory.
They can do it abstractly and make an assumption that children can as well.
But it could also be a case of they don't have the resources to do that,

(44:53):
you know, because there's not a consistent approach.
You go to any school, maths equipment is a mess, you know, there's just stuff everywhere.
Everywhere so yeah that methodology was really
big in in finland when i went to the university they
do practice that and they went through those steps within that
lesson that i saw we'd better just define what we mean by

(45:14):
multi-sensory that is teaching engaging visual
auditory and kinesthetic they call them channels yes but in layman's terms it's
seeing it hearing it talking about it touching it moving it so those those kids
in that special school the The auditory part of the VAK was not available to them.

(45:34):
So, the only way they could show their learning was by actually manipulating
those math manipulatives.
Yeah, right. Absolutely, yes. Okay. And, you know, and I think that it was really
powerful because, you know, those children had additional needs.
However, the way that they're showing their learning works for all children,
you know, not simply children with additional needs.

(45:56):
So, it's just, again, it's just good structured learning.
And I think I remember you mentioning in your report that.
You think that here we take those manipulatives away too quickly.
Too quickly, yes. In the places you saw, they kept using manipulatives.
Yes. Well, they didn't stop. They didn't stop. They were always there and always available.

(46:19):
So for me, so I went to a Montessori school in Tokyo, which was an international Montessori school.
So it meant that most of their children were children of people who were coming
to Japan to work. so there weren't Japanese children in that classroom.
And then I also went to a Montessori school in Maui.

(46:40):
And, you know, the resources are the same completely, but they are huge on multisensory.
And their maths equipment is just amazing.
And they have books where they have 200 lessons to follow for each of their students.
But even the children who were at the abstract stage were still checking their
work by using the manipulatives. Yeah, because working memory can become overwhelmed

(47:04):
and you need to get it back in front of you sometimes, don't you? Yes, yeah.
Liana, I'm looking at my notes about the Montessori School in Tokyo and I've
got use of manipulatives, not just any, same ones, precisely organized.
And you saw something about no digital devices in rooms there too.
Not any, not any at all, not a board, not anything.

(47:24):
So, it's just a very different approach. So, they have classes where they have
a three-year band within that class.
So the class that I was in was ages six to nine, and it is very self-directed, but,
you know, they had expectations of what they needed to work on whilst the teacher
works with a small group of children on whatever lesson they're up to.

(47:48):
And then, so they were grouped by age, but also by the lesson that they needed.
So there was a group that the teacher worked with on maths. and then whilst
those children were working independently, he walked around with things like flashcards.
They'd done work on shapes, checking for understanding with the children on
their shapes and whether they could name the shapes or checking with another

(48:10):
group with flashcards of times tables.
So, yeah, doing that, checking in whilst walking around.
So, it was a very different environment but between that school and the school
in Montessori, all of the resources were the same. They were organised the same way and, yeah, so...
Their maths resources, they're just amazing. So, those Montessori schools have

(48:32):
been very deliberate about which resources, when to use them,
which lesson plans to use them with? Yes. Okay. Absolutely. Yeah.
But again, because they have the book of lessons, they're not having to make
it up or work out what comes next because it's progressively written out for them.
So, the scope and the sequence is taken care of. Yes, absolutely.

(48:54):
Okay. So, those manipulatives I think are even more important for kids living
with learning difficulties because as Bill said before, and I think this relates
to the working memory, they free up your working memory.
And the fact that you can see what you're doing means you don't have to be thinking
about it. You can lay it out and that bit's done.
So, it frees up a bit more of my brain power to solve the problem or do the

(49:18):
next bit. And I think, yes, we take manipulatives away from kids,
but my experience is they replace them with their fingers.
And so, kids that I see are in that dreaded cycle of being stuck with doing stuff on their fingers.
And, you know, I explain to them that's fine. You know, it works as a strategy.

(49:41):
But the problem is it's really slow and error prone and they actually work harder
using using the counting on your fingers strategy than if they,
you know, got a few facts under their belt and, you know, freed up their working memory.
And so I think that's a bit of a sign here that we do take away those manipulatives

(50:01):
too soon because the kids kind of solve the problem by replacing them with their fingers.
Absolutely. And I think that we have sort of moved away from that fact recall
as well because, you know, there was that understanding or, no,
No, they need the conceptual understanding, which they do.
But there's a lot of power in just being able to recall facts.

(50:21):
So, when you get up to year four or five and you're doing fractions,
you're doing area and perimeter, if I can just recall the facts,
it's going to make my life much easier.
And there's also addition factors.
You know, again, we've got older kids who are using their fingers,
which is fine as a strategy when you're learning, but we want those facts to
automaticity and, you know, or with multiplication, their times tables,

(50:46):
they're reverting back to skip counting using their fingers.
So we do want that focus on that fluency.
And I think that having those under your belt, it makes things so much easier.
And, you know, and that's what we're seeing like in the upper years.
Our kids don't have that.
So, that's a real focus for us. So, you did see that fact fluency having more

(51:09):
of a focus in the schools you visited than we have here?
Yeah, well, I think particularly in the younger years, there was that fluency
because, you know, when I got it up into the older years, again,
there wasn't that question that the kids could do the maths. They could do the maths.
Yep. So, you know, that was a focus in the younger years, you know,
Get that right, get that in.

(51:30):
And the curriculum supports that as well. The curriculum was like multiplication
to nine times nine by year two in Japan.
Our curriculum says two times tables in year two. So why are our children doing just two times tables?
And in Japan, they're doing up to nine times nine. Because they want those facts
in as quick as possible because it's going to make everything easier.

(51:51):
And, of course, people living with dyscalculia and dyslexia even,
times tables are the killer. Yes, absolutely.
They are the, in my experience, the biggest cause of stress,
you know, aside from fractions perhaps. Yes. But I think they're related.
Yes. And so, this is difficult, isn't it?

(52:12):
And, you know, even if you look at social media discussions,
they are often around how do I get my kid to learn these facts?
Yes. these timetables facts.
And so that's a tricky one, I think, because you really do need to be fluent
in those facts to be able to move away from using your fingers and so on and to be accurate. Mm-hmm.

(52:35):
But learning those facts is really tricky. Yeah, it is. Absolutely.
Did you see when you were over there any kind of intervention approach?
You know, what was their approach? I think you mentioned they had testing,
like early testing and screening for kids.
Yeah, yeah. Who, you know, to prevent that falling through the cracks.

(52:56):
So, I know in Estonia particularly, they did like a NAPLAN style test.
However, so they're in e-country, so they do everything online.
Line so the children sit this test at the beginning of the year
i can't remember off the top of my head what year levels do it but they do
it at the beginning of the year and the results come to teachers almost immediately
so they're using that data to

(53:16):
then plan for the next steps i think you know
for us that nap plan between when we do nap plan and when we get the results
is often quite a big distance between them so yeah so being able to have that
data and then i mean singapore seemed seemed very assessment-based and there's
a very big end of year six exam that they sit that's very important.

(53:38):
So, yeah, I think that, again, consistency of assessment.
So, you know, assessments were in the textbooks that they had as well.
So, the teachers aren't, again, having to create assessments or buy things off
of teachers pay teachers or, you know, because it's all there for them.
Yeah. So, there's just more consistency, I guess, in the data that they're collecting
as well between a site, one school itself, and then between.

(54:02):
Schools you know and did you
see any intervention strategies or anything
over there there weren't so singapore was interesting because
in singapore they have excellent one of the or
the next the next point on the conclusions is early intervention so
in singapore in particular they have a lot of policies and procedures in place
from a very young age for students that they are identified with learning difficulties

(54:27):
quickly and then they are they have a list of recommended providers and and
agencies that parents can take their children to to access intervention.
So, Orton Gillingham is one of the people on the list and that's who I went to visit.
So, and in speaking with the director there, she said that currently they didn't
have any students doing maths intervention.

(54:47):
Orton Gillingham do offer multisensory maths training for anybody that's interested.
And, but they have the procedures like right back from preschool,
you know, their teachers are looking for a particular thing.
So, this is part of my conclusion was that we need early intervention and we
need to train our teachers in preschools, kindies, and, you know,

(55:08):
our reception, our junior primary teachers in what to look for,
you know, for students with learning difficulties.
This is a stark contrast to the fact that in Australia, we are still dragging
some states kicking and screaming to a phonic screening check, right?
Because what precedes early intervention is good screening. Yeah.
And these guys just do it as a matter of course. Yeah. Yeah.

(55:31):
So, you know, so that was a really big thing for me. And then following on from that as well,
one of the discussions I had with a teacher in Estonia and I said to them,
so if you have a child that you suspect has learning difficulties, how long does it take?
For you to get them assessed. And they thought about it long and hard and they

(55:51):
said, oh, three, maybe four weeks at the absolute most.
Our current waiting time is 18 months. It is an absolute disgrace.
So, you know, the difference in, you know, you would know best,
Michael, a child with learning difficulties, if I can get an assessment in four
weeks as opposed to the amount of learning that they're going to lose in 18 months.

(56:14):
It's just, you know, we're talking world-class education.
That's world-class. Put the resources in where they're required.
Yes. You know, I'm so angry about that because that shreds education that way in time.
In that 18 months, that kid is forming all sorts of ideas about themselves as a learner. Yes.
You know, they talk about school

(56:35):
to prison pipeline. It is not overly dramatic to bring this in here.
No. When a kid decides they're not a learner and they can't,
their life outcomes are seriously, seriously affected.
And that impression of themselves as a learner is formed very quickly.
Yeah. It doesn't take much. And if you're, especially if you're talking about
something like maths, you know, yourself as a maths learner, it's fine.

(56:58):
You know, kids go, or even adults, I'm not a maths person or I'm not good with numbers.
You know, that's somehow allowed and okay. okay, but it's not okay to go,
no, I just don't read. Yeah.
I'm not good with letters and sounds. Yeah, I'm not good. These things on a
page, no, it just doesn't make sense to me, no.
You know, that's not acceptable. So, why is it acceptable for people just to

(57:21):
go, no, I'm not a maths person?
So, 18 months is a long time to struggle.
It is. With no intervention. And then, unfortunately, I think the story is even
worse than that because let's say you.
Get that assessment 18 months later, well, I dare say it might take you another
18 months to find someone to tutor you or to do that intervention with you.

(57:45):
Yeah. And then often it's a struggle with the school to say,
well, you know, can the kid have time off to do the intervention and usually they can't.
It is a real mess, isn't it? And it does mess with kids. Yeah.
And why does the intervention have to be outside of school?
Well, it shouldn't. It shouldn't be in a country like ours. But currently it just is.

(58:06):
And there are very few schools that offer maths intervention.
You'll find literacy intervention, and I know we talk about this at StudyTour,
often in the hands of SSOs or ESOs, people who aren't trained, unfortunately.
So that can also be damaging. We need to put those, you know,
our most vulnerable children in our most highly skilled expert teachers.

(58:30):
Teachers, but also it's a tier one issue across the board.
That's what we're finding in, you know, literacy, maths is exactly the same.
It's classroom practice that needs to change.
And I think when I was in Singapore, it just seemed a much tighter connection
between the research and what was happening in classrooms.
Whereas I think that we're quite separate from the research.

(58:53):
And I mean, teachers don't have time to read the research for one,
you know, and also there's only so much you can do as a teacher in a school
if your school's not on that journey,
you know, so then you become that one person in your classroom trying to do
all of these things, but you're not getting the support,
you know, for, it could be for lots of reasons, you know, so there needs to
be more consistency within schools and then across schools as well. Mm-hmm.

(59:19):
Yeah, it's a really tricky one, that whole intervention. And,
you know, you mentioned that self-concept.
It forms quite quickly. You know, kids start thinking, I'm dumb, I can't do maths.
It gets to the level with some kids, I think, where it is traumatic.
Yes. You know, I have some kids
that I work with where I have to do multiplication kind of by subterfuge.

(59:42):
Like, I can't tell them that it's multiplication because if I do,
they just shut down and they won't do it. but they're so horrified,
you know, terrified of it.
And that doesn't happen instantly.
Like there's a story behind that. You know, that kid has probably struggled
for a long time to get to the point of giving up on that.
And then I think the other issue with that is you spend a lot of time building

(01:00:06):
their confidence up to the point where they can do it, but that confidence is very fragile. Yes.
And sometimes it only takes even an offhand comment from a teacher or me or
anyone to have them plummet down again and start thinking they're dumb again.
It's a very simple instruction.
Yeah. And it's so preventable. Yes, it is.

(01:00:29):
You know, one of the other things like coming back to resources and the curriculum,
the curriculum's written in strands.
So you've got your number in algebra, your measurement, geometry,
and your statistics and probability.
There's no scope and sequence. There's nothing to tell you teach this,
then this, then this, then this, which is why I created them because there wasn't anything.
So, you know, yeah, if it's not sequenced in the right way and the children

(01:00:50):
aren't being explicitly taught the connections between the concepts,
then you're left thinking that everything's separate when all mass is connected,
you know, and that, yeah, that creates massive issues.
Yeah, it's really tricky. Yeah.
So, there is scope there for improvement and there are models out there that work.
So, you know, that early intervention, we have the phonics screening check.

(01:01:14):
Why don't we have a numeracy screening check and get kids that support before
the damage is done or to at least minimize that harm?
Yeah. What else have we got on the list? We've got pre-service training.
Yes. We touched on that a little bit. A little bit, yeah. We've got an episode on it.
We have, yeah. Yeah. So, you know, I think that I can talk to my experience

(01:01:39):
of when I went to university, it was that constructivist approach and that's
where education was heading.
I think that some things are starting to turn slightly, but we need to be a
bit more severe in that turn.
And I think that, you know, teachers are coming out, finishing uni,
everybody will always tell you that what they learned most was when they're on prac, right?

(01:02:01):
Yeah. That's number one. As provided you've got a good supervisor.
Exactly. Well, that's the thing. It's completely dependent on your supervising
teacher. It's dependent on the direction of the school.
You know, so there's too many inconsistencies there.
And so we need to make sure that when mathematics is taught at university level, how do you sequence?

(01:02:22):
How do you break concepts down? What is the CRA methodology?
What does that mean? What are effective resources? sources? How do I plan?
Well, you know, how do I plan a unit? Because the thing is, if they're planning
them, then ideally that shouldn't change.
You know what I mean? Like, because the concept doesn't change.
So, you know, just really giving them, you know, how do I teach using an explicit instruction model?

(01:02:47):
What is concept development? How do I teach it?
You know, I think that we just need to really make that focus rather than,
you know, like, here's a bunch of shapes.
Tell me what's the same about them all. Do you know what I mean?
Like, we need to build those explicit skills.
Yeah. And so, we need to teach teachers how we build those explicit skills.

(01:03:08):
If any cashed up listener wants to put some money into a project,
we're up for it. Absolutely.
We'll start our own teacher training program. Yes. Yes. Absolutely.
Salisbury could become one of those teacher trainer schools.
Should be. Yeah, yeah. That'd be a great project.
So, honestly, I'm feeling a little bit overwhelmed.
There's so much there, isn't there? There's so much. And there's such a gap

(01:03:30):
between what appears to be kind of best practice and the countries and the schools
and the systems that are doing really well.
Yeah. And what we're doing, there's such a long way to go, isn't there?
And it can seem very overwhelming and very like, oh my gosh,
where do we start? Exactly. What do we do?
Even this conversation we have found difficult to structure because there is

(01:03:55):
so much to talk about. There's so much in it, yeah.
And it's so complicated. And so can we simplify it for people who are listening
and say, well, what, you know, I'm not going to, I can't change the curriculum. No.
What can I do? You know, what sort of simple practices can I start doing in

(01:04:15):
my teaching that are going to start to address some of this?
I think you've mentioned it and, you know, people should go back and listen
to the last episode where we
talked a lot about, you know, within your school, lowering the variance.
So, within your school, you know, we're not given a scope and sequence.
So, let's make one for ourselves and let's stick to it.

(01:04:37):
And at least in the school and for our students year to year,
we can give that kind of consistency we've been talking about today.
So, there is that level of control at the school level.
If you have a whole site which is on board as well. If everyone's on board,
that's right. Yeah, exactly, which is the other thing that can be really difficult.
Yeah, when you're one person in your four walls, it can be incredibly difficult. So, yeah.

(01:05:01):
So, what about for that one person? So, one person in those four walls and they
think, yep, I'd like to improve.
Yes. What are some of the things people could start doing?
And I'm thinking here about best bang for buck, you know, because they can't
do all these things we've talked about. No, you cannot at all.
Well, you know, from what you saw and your experience, what do you reckon –.

(01:05:24):
It's the first cab off the rank for your typical teacher. Yeah,
I was going to say, which I think that Bill could probably talk about a lot
as well, but I think that teachers need to understand cognitive load theory.
I think that just building your own knowledge around cognitive load theory,
and if you want a framework like explicit direct instruction,
the framework there changed my teaching because it gave me the structure.

(01:05:47):
Yeah. And that's what I was craving as a teacher.
I wanted a tight structure. So, they would be my two starting points.
I would say be kind to yourself.
You can't do it all and you want to do the best for your students.
Every teacher does, but building your own knowledge around that is going to help. Can I add to that?

(01:06:09):
Really simple stuff. Get the students facing you.
When you look at what you're teaching, work out exactly what you have to teach
and what you want your kids to be looking at and thinking about while you do
it. so there's that controlling attention bit which is really important,
The other bit, oh, shivers, it's now escaped me. It was in working memory and it was great.

(01:06:31):
It was amazing and life-changing. It will come back to me though at some point.
But there are some basics here about teach it well.
Yeah, I've got it back. Build review in.
We are notorious in maths in teaching, say, fractions in term whatever and then
they don't get touched again. Again, look at your sequence and see if you can

(01:06:54):
keep coming back to things.
Build yourself a lattice. They call it an interleaving model.
And don't be scared to review stuff using slides. People are brushing to the OCA resources.
Now, that's review. It's strong in review, is it? There are review and lessons in there as well.
So, what we did as a starting point for us was every year level,

(01:07:16):
the teachers looked at their year level curriculum for maths and we picked out our non-negotiables.
What is it that your students must have by the end of that year level?
And it's probably a good starting point, even if you are that one person in
your own classroom. Decide that for yourself.
Decide that for yourself. What are your students not leaving without?

(01:07:36):
You know, they are going to have that no matter what because that's what is
going to be most beneficial for them moving forward.
That's important. So, that's going, I couldn't put it any better.
What must they have? Yes. Yes. So, like I always say, you know what,
like I'm sure it's lovely that students know names of different triangles or something like that.

(01:07:57):
But if they don't have their number facts, that's not going to help them.
So, my focus is the number fluency, that fact, that automaticity, fact recall.
But then we're also working on the building the concept and that understanding
of the concept doesn't change.
Yeah. So, I'll take that stuff over. So, tessellations, okay.
Yeah. So, what that means is teachers are making some decisions about what they

(01:08:20):
leave out, Liana. Yes. Yeah.
And I always say to people, do
you know what? To be honest, there's some things, if you don't have time….
There's some things I can leave out, you know, like, I mean,
I taught year one and during COVID, you didn't get to everything and you had
to make those choices about what you're going to leave out.
Will something happen? Won't something happen? Do you know what?
That's not my priority. I'm not going to spend, you know, a week looking at scenarios.

(01:08:44):
In fact, we're going to go back and do our numbers because that's what's most important to me.
So, yeah, I think just because the curriculum isn't sequenced for you,
have a look. look, what is most important and then build that into your review.
Yeah. I really love the fact you brought up review. And for people who are listening
and might have missed it, our last episode was on – was that our last episode?

(01:09:06):
Yeah, it was on review with David Malkunis.
And he is interested in maths as well.
And one of the things he said, you know, his absolute kind of go-to things that
you have to know were the four operations, you know. Absolutely.
Addition, subtraction, division, multiplication.
Procedural fluency. You've got to know them. And so, you know,
in his review, and we had a similar conversation about you can't cover it all.

(01:09:31):
You know, he always made sure kids got that and that that was constantly reviewed.
Yes. I think that review is so important. I have kids, you know,
in maths who have a memory of being taught stuff that I'm talking about,
but they kind of say, oh, yeah, I remember that.

(01:09:52):
You know, I say, do you remember what, you know, such and such is?
The other day I was doing like bed mass, you know, with a kid.
And I was saying, oh, I think I've heard this before.
And I was saying, oh, what is it? And they told me a long story and it was completely unrelated.
And so, they had clearly been taught it.
But I dare say it had never been reviewed since they'd been taught it.

(01:10:16):
And so, they'd forgotten it. Yes. Yes, our 5-6s currently have that in their daily fluency.
Because it's that flexibility with the operations, you know,
and so it's really important to the point where kids are asking for more because
they're enjoying it so much.
Because it solves such a mystery, doesn't it? Exactly.
I think kids like it too. They understand it. It's like, oh,

(01:10:37):
there is a scratcher. Yeah, and, you know, maths is fun when you're successful.
When you can do the maths, it's fun.
Yes. You know? Can we just paint the context as well? Well, Salisbury is a low
socioeconomic educational area.
It's what they call Category 2 of disadvantage, which is the second highest
disadvantage category.
So we're not in some leafy green, folks, and these are kids asking to be taught

(01:11:01):
more bed mass or bod mass. Yeah.
Just to straighten that one out. Yes. Yeah, and so I think that review,
you know, because we are talking now about what you can do as a teacher to,
You know, or a tutor or even a parent. Yeah. And we discussed this with David,
you know, as a parent, you may not understand the maths or know it,

(01:11:23):
but you could take a role in review.
Yes, absolutely. With your kid, you know. Well, four operations doesn't change,
right? Yeah, that's right. That's right. Practice the times tables.
Yeah. Do you know, and the biggest thing for me is what our children,
like they say that it's actually easier to do multiplication as opposed to addition
because you can fall back on your skip counting, right? right?

(01:11:44):
So, which is not what we want because we want them to know their multiplication
facts, their timetables to automaticity.
But what we're finding is that just single-digit addition, children don't have to automaticity.
You know, when you're going over 10, they don't have those facts to automaticity.
And then, so if I don't have addition, subtraction looks like some crazy,

(01:12:06):
mysterious thing that I don't understand.
Multiplication, I don't know what you're talking about. Divisions,
like, because they're not seeing the connections between them,
but because that time hasn't been spent in cementing those facts,
and then it just makes everything, it's a snowball effect. Everything's harder.
So, you know, I'm very big on let's get that right at the foundational levels,

(01:12:28):
and that's why we talk about our non-negotiables.
Like you're saying, yeah, tessellations are fun, and I can do that in art,
that's great, but in maths, I need to make sure they have their number facts.
Yes, yes. And they're probably more fun lessons to teach. Yeah,
they are. I know. Than getting the kids to do their tables again. I know.
You take your autonomy in your art. You knock yourself out. It's not about us.

(01:12:50):
It's what the kids need, mate. That's right.
That's the standard line, isn't it? It's not about you. Yeah.
Liana, just out of your knowledge, you're our first ever reporter.
Guests. Oh my goodness. On Discast. Oh really? Yeah. Do I get balloons and streamers?
Oh they're just out before, they're just being set up now. So yeah.
Wow, thank you. Brilliant. Yes, again.

(01:13:13):
And so when the report comes out, when you finish that, where will it be?
How can people access it?
Yeah, so I might send it your way to put on the show notes, that would be amazing.
It will be published on the Churchill Fellowship website.
If anyone's interested in Churchill Fellowship, applications are currently open.
It doesn't have to be education-based. It can be whatever tickles your fancy.

(01:13:37):
As long as you have a project idea that will support or help the community in some way.
What is the purpose for when you return? That's the biggest thing.
But, yeah, if anybody's interested. And then I will, I guess,
push it out on my social media as far and wide as I can take it.

(01:13:59):
Ask Bill to push it out on his. I will push it.
And we feel honoured that people got a sneak peek into your fellowships.
Depending on when we get this out, Michael, we'll do our best. Yeah. And we've tried.
It may be published by the time we get this out. Yeah, it could be.
It could be. That would be great.
And, look, we've tried really hard today to summarise it. but there's so much in it, isn't there?

(01:14:22):
And so I would recommend people take the time to read it, you know,
because I've read it and I think your report does a better job than perhaps we did today.
I'm trying to put some structure to it. Because you've got great examples in
there and I think they're really good, you know, those actual kind of anecdotes

(01:14:43):
of this is what you observed and what you saw. Yeah.
They're great because they paint a really good picture. Sure do.
And so, yeah, I think it's amazing, amazing piece of work that you've done.
Thank you. And I'm so grateful that you can share it with everyone.
Yeah. You know, because I'm sure people will get a lot out of it.
Yeah. And teachers, when you get it, put it in front of your leaders.

(01:15:06):
Seriously, leave it on desks. Pester people. This is too important not to be
paid attention to. And, you know, I know that literacy is in quite a focus at
the moment in schools, but we're still teaching maths. Yeah.
It's not, you know, it really can't be left aside, you know, we'll get to it.

(01:15:27):
We're still teaching it, so what's happening in classrooms? Yeah.
So, yeah, I think that. It's a difficult, the whole thing's a difficult space,
isn't it? It's difficult to find a maths tutor if you do need intervention.
There's not many of us out there compared to literacy, but hopefully we'll catch
up. Yes, we will get there. Because you know what, maths is fun.
It is fun. It is. I love it. Yeah. Yeah, and, you know, and I think when it's

(01:15:52):
taught in the right way and when children are successful, they do enjoy it a whole lot more.
I remember I had a 4.5 class a few years ago and at the beginning of the year
I'd be like, okay, it's time for maths, and they'd be like, and I was like,
no, no, no, that's not allowed.
That's not the maths we're doing here. That's not happening.
But by the end of the year you'd be like, okay, you know, they'd be asking me

(01:16:13):
for it. When is maths time? Are we doing maths now?
When do we do this? You know, they wanted it because they were successful.
And that's, you know, that's what all teachers want.
They want their children to be successful. So that's why, you know,
teachers are well-intentioned, but the workload is unsustainable.
And you, you know, teachers are being asked to do far too much.

(01:16:36):
That's why I say there's a lie of autonomy because we're doing the work that
we shouldn't have to be doing.
It's not our job to interpret a curriculum.
That's the job of the experts. Tell me what you want me to teach.
And it would also be why, if you're not strong in maths, you'll spend your precious

(01:16:56):
amount of time that you have, you'll probably spend it doing the things you
are stronger in because...
Who has the time? Exactly. Exactly. In your own cognitive load.
To learn something new. Yeah. Absolutely.
And, you know, even like as a, you know, I'm very confident in teaching maths
and putting things together, there's still a lot of thought that goes into it.
And the thinking that you have to do to plan the lesson, and this is the problem,

(01:17:20):
is the thinking's going into the planning rather than the delivery.
Yeah. And that's what we're missing. And I think there needs to be more of a
focus on the how rather than the what.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, brilliant. What a beautiful way to sum it up. Okay.
Well, thank you, Bill, once again. Thank you, Michael. Wonderful to have your insights.
Thank you so much, Liana. Thank you for having me. Coming back for a second time.

(01:17:43):
We've had such fantastic feedback from the first episode with you and from people,
you know, using your scope and sequence.
And some people have been in touch. So, I also encourage people,
if you have questions, please email and ask me.
That's very generous of you. My pleasure. All the show notes and your scope
and sequence are still there on our previous episode.
Thank you, everyone, for listening. I hope you got something out of it.

(01:18:06):
You can connect with us on social media. You can make comments on the website.
You can subscribe to our newsletter. So if Liana's paper's not published by
the time the episode goes out, if you're on our mailing list,
we will let you know when it is.
And we always love comments and conversations. so if you've got something to

(01:18:27):
say or a question to ask don't hesitate to get in touch with us yes thank you thank you thanks.
Music.