Rounding Up

Rounding Up

Welcome to Rounding Up, the professional learning podcast brought to you by The Math Learning Center. Two things have always been true in education: Ongoing professional learning is essential, and teachers are extremely busy people. Rounding Up is a podcast designed to provide meaningful, bite-sized professional learning for busy educators and instructional leaders. I'm Mike Wallus, vice president for educator support at The Math Learning Center and host of the show. In each episode, we'll explore topics important to teachers, instructional leaders, and anyone interested in elementary mathematics education. Topics such as posing purposeful questions, effectively recording student thinking, cultivating students' math identity, and designing asset-based instruction from multilingual learners. Don't miss out! Subscribe now wherever you get your podcasts. Each episode will also be published on the Bridges Educator Site. We hope you'll give Rounding Up a try, and that the ideas we discuss have a positive impact on your teaching and your students' learning.

Episodes

December 4, 2025 34 mins

Tutita Casa, Anna Strauss, Jenna Waggoner & Mhret Wondmagegne, Developing Student Agency: The Strategy Showcase

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 4 | EPISODE 7

When students aren't sure how to approach a problem, many of them default to asking the teacher for help. This tendency is one of the central challenges of teaching: walking the fine line between offering support and inadvertently cultiva...

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Christy Pettis & Terry Wyberg, The Case for Choral Counting with Fractions

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 4 | EPISODE 6

How can educators help students recognize similarities in the way whole numbers and fractions behave? And are there ways educators can build on students' understanding of whole numbers to support their understanding of fractions? 

The answer from today's guests ...

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Ramsey Merritt, Improving Students' Turn & Talk Experience

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 4 | EPISODE 5

Most educators know what a turn and talk is—but are your students excited to do them? 

In this episode, we put turn and talks under a microscope. We'll talk with Ramsey Merritt from the Harvard Graduate School of Education about ways to revamp and better scaffold turn and talks...

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Pam Harris, Exploring the Power & Purpose of Number Strings

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 4 | EPISODE 4

I've struggled when I have a new strategy I want my students to consider and despite my best efforts, it just doesn't surface organically. While I didn't want to just tell my students what to do, I wasn't sure how to move forward. Then I discovered number strings. 

Today, we'r...

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Kim Montague, I Have, You Need: The Utility Player of Instructional Routines

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 4 | EPISODE 3

In sports, a utility player is someone who can play multiple positions competently, providing flexibility and adaptability. From my perspective, the routine I have, you need may just be the utility player of classroom routines.

Today we're talking with Kim Mon...

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Sue Looney, Same but Different: Encouraging Students to Think Flexibly

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 4 | EPISODE 2

Sometimes students struggle in math because they fail to make connections. For too many students, every concept feels like its own entity without any connection to the larger network of mathematical ideas. 

On the podcast today, we're talking with Dr. Sue Looney abo...

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Christopher Danielson, Which One Doesn't Belong? Routine: Fostering Flexible Reasoning

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 4 | EPISODE 1

The idea of comparing items and looking for similarities and differences has been explored by many math educators. Christopher Danielson has taken this idea to new heights. Inspired by the Sesame Street song "One of These Things (Is Not Like the Others)," Christo...

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William Zahner, Understanding the Role of Language in Math Classrooms

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 17

How can educators understand the relationship between language and the mathematical concepts and skills students engage with in their classrooms?

And how might educators think about the mathematical demands and the language demands of tasks when planning their instr...

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Tisha Jones, Assessment as a Shared Journey: Cultivating Partnerships with Families & Caregivers

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 16

Families and caregivers play an essential role in students' success in school and in shaping their identities as learners. Therefore, establishing strong partnerships with families and caregivers is crucial for equitable teaching and learning. This epi...

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Ryan Flessner, What If I Don't Understand Their Thinking?

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 15

"What do I do if I don't understand my student's strategy?" This is a question teachers grapple with constantly, particularly when conferring with students during class. How educators respond in moments like these can have a profound impact on students' learning and their mathematical ident...

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Dr. Cathery Yeh, Supporting Neurodiverse Students in Elementary Mathematics Classrooms

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 14

What meaning does the term neurodiverse convey and how might it impact a student's learning experience? 

And how can educators think about the work of designing environments and experiences that support neurodiverse students learning mathematics? 

<...

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Assessment in the Early Years
Guest: Shelly Scheafer


ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 13

Mike (00:09.127)
Welcome to the podcast Shelley. Thank you so much for joining us today.

Shelly (00:12.956)
Thank you, Mike, for having me.

Mike (00:16.078)
So I'd like to start with this question. What makes the work of assessing younger children, particul...

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Dr. Victoria Jacobs,
Examining the Meaning and Purpose of our Questions

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 12

Mike (00:03):
The questions educators ask their students matter. They can have a profound impact on students' thinking and the shape of their mathematical identities. Today we're examining different types of questions, their purpose and the meaning students make of them. Joining us for th...

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Dr. Karisma Morton, Understanding and Supporting Math Identity  

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 11

In this episode, we will explore the connection between identity and mathematics learning. We'll examine the factors that may have shaped our own identities and those of our students. We'll also discuss ways to practice affirming students' identities in mathematics instruction.

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Sue Kim and Myuriel Von Aspen, Building Productive Partnerships  

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 10

In this episode, we examine the practice of building productive student partnerships. We'll talk about ways  educators can cultivate joyful and productive partnerships and the role the educator plays once students are engaged with their partner. 

BIOGRAPHIES

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Dr. Kasi Allen, Breaking the Cycle of Math Trauma  

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 9

If you are an educator, you've likely heard people say things like "I'm a math person." While this may make you cringe, if you dig a bit deeper, many people can identify specific experiences that convinced them that this was true. In fact, some of you might secretly wonder if you are a math person...

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Dr. Rebecca Ambrose, Helping Our Students Build a Meaningful Understanding of Geometry  

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 8

As a field, mathematics education has come a long way over the past few years in describing the ways students come to understand number, quantity, place value, and even fractions. But when it comes to geometry, particularly concepts involving shape, it's often ...

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Dr. James Brickwedde, How You Say It Matters: Teacher Language Choices That Support Number Sense

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 7

Carry the 1. Add a 0. Cross multiply.

All of these are phrases that educators heard when they were growing up. This language is so ingrained that many educators use it without even thinking. But what's the long-term impact of language like ...

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Summer Pettigrew and Megan Williams, Building Asset-Focused Professional Learning Communities

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 5

Professional learning communities have been around for a long time, in many different iterations. But what does it look like to schedule and structure professional learning communities that help educators understand and respond to their students' thinking ...

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Drs. Jody Guarino and Chepina Rumsey, Nurturing Mathematical Curiosity: Supporting Mathematical Argumentation in the Early Grades

ROUNDING UP: SEASON 3 | EPISODE 6

Argumentation, justification, conjecture. All of these are practices we hope to cultivate, but they may not be practices we associate with kindergartners, first-, or second graders. ...

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