Lesson Study in Mathematics

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Lesson Study in Mathematics
Camden School Improvement Success for all

• Nigel Bufton
• Anna Middleton
• Rachel Fort

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Context
Camden School Improvement Success for all

• Camden sought to develop Lesson Study approach
  across primary schools
• Keen to improve progress in mathematics across
  Years 2, 3 and 4
• Invited group of 7 schools to participate
• Importance of head teachers involvement
• Schools meet half-termly, self funded
• Develop case studies to share practice

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Progress
Camden School Improvement Success for all

• First meeting with heads and teachers
• Schools identified focus on learning from
• Core Skills of Number
• Language, dialogue
• Problem Solving
• Ongoing input of ideas to explore
• Updates on learning and practices
• Focus on writing case study
• Phase 2 schools about to be invited

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How Lesson Study has helped to improve learning
in mathematics
Camden School Improvement Success for all
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Beckford Primary School

• Inner-city school
• 453 pupils on roll
• 42 eligible for FSM/ Pupil Premium
• 67 of pupils do not have English as a first
  language
• 19 of pupils are on the SEND register
• Attainment low on entry
• Progress over KS2 is improving

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Focus and Aims for lesson studyTalk in
Mathematics

• Our aims were that our children would be able to
• talk confidently about learning and explain
  thinking.
• make links across learning and derive new facts
  from know secure facts.
• We wanted to use the project to
• generate resources and ideas that best supported
  children with EAL.
• explore the way pupils learn, thorough discussion
  and explanation of their mathematical thinking
  and reasoning.

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Our lesson study format was flexible to suit our
needs and focus

• Who? Maths Subject Leader/Year 2 class teacher,
  parallel class teacher
• What? Lessons with different foci but planned for
  maximum maths talk and explanations
• Where? Year 2, observing children from parallel
  class
• When? 3 lesson cycle, over a 2 month period
• Why? A need to identify barriers to embedded
  learning
• How? Class teacher cover made easier with
  supportive Leadership team and available GTP
  student

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Lesson outlines

• Lesson 1 Mental Maths session Odd and Even
• star words for key vocabulary to include in
  explanations
• Sentence prompts I know..because I knowso
  is not
• Conclusion Lack of structure to childrens
  explanations prompts needed. Without the frames
  find it difficult to structure thinking. With
  frames, the thinking is modelled. Was excellent
  way to assess true understanding of the concept
  e.g. Its a little bit odd!
• Lesson 2 Reasoning about number, finding
  possibilities
• Envelope challenge to find hidden numbers with
  differentiated clues, clues given sequentially
  and then reasoned as to which numbers can be
  eliminated
• Sentence prompts I know..because I knowso
  is not
• Developing resilience in approaching a problem
• Conclusion Children could answer questions like
  How do you know that? or Can you explain your
  answer? using the frames as starting point.
  Developed possibilities.
• Lesson 3 Division
• Contextualised examples involving making into
  groups and the link main back with earlier x
  learning. Use of I know ... so prompts, oral
  rehearsal alongside practical solving
• Conclusion Using context that children
  understand and beginning practically whilst
  developing language alongside meant a quicker
  move to using abstract symbols than with previous
  Year 2 class. Oral rehearsal gives children
  confidence very useful AFL.

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What has worked for us?

• Speaking prompts we used
• I knowso ...
• I knowbecause...
• ...is not
• ...is not but...is...because...
• Set high expectations through
• - Framing explanations
• - Full sentence responses
• Accurate vocabulary, explanations
• Star words to be included in explanations
• Allowing sufficient thinking time

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What has worked for us?

• Talk rich activities planned e.g. More opening
  ended/using and applying activities/supportive
  grouping
• Greater ownership of assessing own learning and
  next steps
• Shared language - Speaking prompts used
  throughout school now and in other curriculum
  areas e.g. Explanations of character I
  knowbecause
• Emphasis on inverse relationships and links to
  known facts
• Maths opportunities beyond the maths lesson

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Impact?

• Greater confidence in approaching and talking
  about maths
• More accurate assessment of childrens
  understanding
• More secure with inverse relationships, use of
  known facts to derive new facts
• Increasingly making links across mathematics
• Talk prompts adopted as whole school focus -
  noticeable improvement from Summer group of
  children to Autumn term group increasing
  confidence and articulation with introduction
  into Year 1
• Whole school use of shared language
• Whole school use of tested activities
• What next?
• Lesson study extended to other year groups as a
  key to identifying gaps in childrens
  understanding and barriers to learning.

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Carlton Primary School

• Inner-city school
• 400 pupils on roll,
• 79 eligible for FSM/ Pupil Premium,
• 75 of pupils do not have English as a first
  language
• 35 of pupils are on the SEND register
• 79Historically low but rising attainment
• Significant progress KS1 to 2 last year

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Focus and Aims for lesson study

• We wanted to use the project to
• identify barriers in number for those stuck
  children
• identify why some children were having so much
  difficulty in using a number line
• Our aims were that our children
• could overcome the barriers that were holding
  them back

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How our lesson study operated

• Who? Maths Subject Leader, experienced Year 3
  teacher, NQT Year 4 teacher
• What? Lessons with a focus on calculation and
  place value
• Why? Support core group of children struggling
  with calculation and not making progress, a dip
  in Year 3 that follows some children through to
  Year 6
• Where? Year 3 class, taught by class teacher and
  subject leader
• When? 3 lesson cycle, over 2 terms

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Lesson outlines

• Lesson 1 Calculating with TU numbers
• Offered children a range of models, images to
  represent 2-digit numbers and use for
  calculations with 2-digit numbers
• Wanted to investigate exactly what the
  difficulties were
• Conclusion our focus group had some shocking
  gaps in their understanding and basic skills - we
  didnt know what they didnt know!
• Lesson 2 Breaking down skills needed for
  calculating, splitting class according to need
• Two mini lessons first adding multiples of 10,
  second adding units to multiples of 10
• Wanted to go back to basics with focus children
  where understanding was muddled
• Conclusion stuck children need precision
  teaching splitting according to their needs
  worked well
• NB Before Lesson 3, focus children had additional
  intervention from subject leader
• Lesson 3 Applying skills to data handling
• - Children calculated with 2 digit numbers
  through interpreting a bar chart question
  language
• Wanted to investigate impact of intervention on
  focus children
• Conclusion improved recall of number facts made
  huge difference, more competent calculating
  improved understanding of place value?

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What worked?

• Time and space
• Lesson study gave us the time and space to
  really observe the children and unpick their
  difficulties
• Breaking down skills
• Required careful thought about number of
  separate skills needed for a simple calculation
  each part needs to be mastered
• Intervention group
• Children most at risk of not making progress
  given opportunity to catch up put them in a
  much stronger position
• Matching teaching effectively to gaps
• Teaching more needs led different groups can
  go off objective if thats what they need to
  support learning

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Wider impact

• Key skills
• Identified importance of key skills such as
  number facts and place value, to ensure children
  make genuine progress throughout school
• Progression
• Dialogue with current Year 2 teachers on how to
  avoid same difficulties being repeated
• Wider professional development
• Lesson Study rolled out across school every
  teacher involved in some Lesson Study focus

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Camden School ImprovementSuccess for all
What factors contributed to a successful lesson
study group?

• Supportive Leadership team
• Two-form entry school was useful in having a
  partner from the same year group.
• Cover to allow observation (e.g. GTP student)
• Time to feedback the same day
• PPA time used to reflect on findings
• Continued focus/theme through lessons, allowing
  it to develop
• Trying something new that wouldnt be done in
  normal practice
• After school staff meeting time given to group
  meetings for review, sharing and further planning
• Working with same class for consistency
• Subject leader able to share findings beyond year
  group

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Camden School ImprovementSuccess for all
What to avoid?

• Going alone without the support of senior staff
• Having too many people involved at once
• Not providing participants with sufficient
  explanation about or background to the purpose of
  Lesson Study
• Treating the process as separate learning
  sessions needs continuation between lessons to
  see development over time
• Not sharing the responsibility for planning and
  delivering the lesson as the process unfolds
• Focusing planning on the teaching rather than
  expected learning
• Observing teaching and not learning of children
• Delaying post-lesson discussions and review
• Being too cautious