December 27, 2023 • 43 mins
Tune in to Episode 8, where we chat with guest and former grade 1 teacher, Jody Guarino, Ed.D., about how math teachers can collaborate to develop math fact fluency at the building level. Listen as Dr. Guarino talks about what it takes for schools to do this successfully, and her key takeaways from her own experience.
For more from Dr. Guarino, check out the following resources:
- Follow Dr. Guarino on X: @jody_guarino
- Learn more about Dr. Guarino and her work by checking out her University of California Irvington page.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Dr. Jody Guarino (00:00):
I can remember a particular
note-taking protocol that wehad, where teachers would set
smart goals (00:06):
By whatever date this percentage of kids would
be fluent. And then we wouldreflect on like, Did we get
there?" And it was always thisreally positive celebration of
like, "Wow, it can be done."
Dan Meyer (00:17):
Welcome back, folks, to Math Teacher Lounge. I'm one
of your hosts, Dan Meyer.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:21):
And I'm Bethany Lockhart Johnson .
Hi, Dan.
Dan Meyer (00:24):
Hey, Bethany. We are currently motoring our way
through our season on fluency,but before we check in with a
new fantastic guest, just wannasee how you are doing in the
world of math and education andlife in general. Take it
however you want to.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:39):
I mean, any day that I get to
talk about math with you andwith our guests, especially in
our current season of fluency,is a good day. But I am fine. I
love counting with my toddler.
I love trying to build on thisidea that math is everywhere.
And you know, sometimes he'sinto it. But I, I gotta tell
(01:05):
you something my toddler lovesmore than counting is saying
"NO" to everything. Just "No,no." I'm like, wait ... but ...
this...! Dan, I don't know whatI'm doing! Just in general. I
don't know what I'm doing.
Dan Meyer (01:22):
Yeah, yeah. I mean that's the most honest thing a
parent's ever said."Dunno what I'm doing." Don't
trust the parents who say theydo know what they're doing. I
have a question for you aboutthis. Can I ask you — I've been
on a parallel track here, onthis fluency season, trying to
think about fluency with my ownschool-aged kids. And the other
day, yesterday, last night, asa matter of fact, I had this
(01:42):
kind of math-y game book —really thoughtful book; I love
it with the kids so far. Thefirst time we used it, this
thing happened where like itwas like, "OK, the problem said
there's 17 hippos and one ofthem doesn't have a block of
cheese, or something. How manyblocks of cheese are there?"
(02:03):
All right? You see what'shappening here, right? You see
where this is going? It'strying to like get the kid to
like say, "Oh, 17. I'll justlike think backwards, one on
the number line, or countbackwards one, or something.
There's a bunch of these. Andone of my kids — or both,
rather — would keep ondirect-counting from one every
time. And I'm trying toinsinuate myself a little bit
(02:26):
in the process, but definitelynot trying to say this is the
wrong way to do it.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (02:31):
Yeah.
Dan Meyer (02:31):
It's, you know, effectively got the answer. But
like how do you as anelementary math educator/expert
think about helping the kidmake their way up the ladder of
abstraction towards moreefficient methods? So, I just
let this play out. What's mymove here?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (02:47):
You know, it's interesting, you've
mentioned that before, aboutthe counting-up or the
counting-all. I think it getsyour goat a little bit, Dan.
'Cause you see where they'reheaded and you see the power in
like not counting-all. You seethat power. And for me, having
(03:08):
been a teacher of children yourkiddos' age, I think if they're
counting and they're countingaccurately and they're making
sense of the problem, Icelebrate that. Right? I would
then try to pose a problem of areally high number, where it
would make no sense to count,like, 89 hippos, right? There's
(03:31):
90 hippos! So they're probablypracticing decade numbers,
right? So maybe there's 90hippos and one of them doesn't
have a block of cheese . Wouldthey start at one or would they
start at 90? And then maybehave a hundred chart there.
Because counting backwards froma decade number, especially a
high one, is tricky, right? Sothen they could find 90, and
say, one of them does see whatthey do with that. I mean,
(03:55):
personally, I wouldn't worrytoo much. I would say the fact
that you are counting andcelebrating math with your
kiddos and doing it in a waythat builds connection through
fun stories is what reallymatters here. But in terms of
wanting t o support your kiddosin growing towards more
efficient methods, that wouldbe one suggestion. I know in my
(04:18):
classroom, I would choose sothat one of the share-outs
showed somebody counting-alland one of the share-outs
showed somebody who startedwith that number and
counted-on. But not in a waythat would say, "Look at this
kiddo who w orks so much moreefficiently!" Just, like, "Oh,
you solved it differently." Youknow? Does that make sense?
Dan Meyer (04:40):
Yeah. No, I basically do that except the
the share-out is me, and I'msharing out the right method.
Bethany Lockhart Johns (04:45):
The right method.
Dan Meyer (04:46):
And I'm making sure that that my kid knows that
it's right. No, I hear you onthat, and I really appreciate
the craft , that cognitivelyguided instruction work does
this really well, and all kindsof other areas where it's like,
you gotta give the kid anexperience where this more
efficient method makes sense,and it feels really hard to
rush it. And I'll be totallyclear that this is not going
(05:08):
on, and I'm like, "Oh no, likewhat future will my kid have?"
Bethany Lockhart Johns (05:12):
A little bit, you are!
Dan Meyer (05:13):
"If by age five and a half, they're not..."! It's
like, really, not even a littlebit. But I do think it's
interesting —
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (05:20):
It is interesting.
Dan Meyer (05:20):
— he's so excited to count-all! He's just like down
with it! And I'm just curiouswhat it takes to, you know,
make that seem a little lessappealing, or make other
methods seem a little moreappealing.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (05:31):
My dear friend is an amazing
teacher. She has three girlsand when she had her first
girl, she was so excited. She'sa teacher, has all these
resources, was so excited towork with her daughter and play
math games and do these phonicsgames. Her daughter wanted
nothing to do with any of it.
And she had made some fungames! So my kiddo, I
(05:55):
recognize, toddler, it is verymuch developmentally
appropriate that he is like,absolutely defiant,
especially if it's time toleave the park. But what if he
doesn't wanna play these coolmath games, Dan, what do I do
then?
Dan Meyer (06:09):
Yeah. I wish I could tell you that that fear is
unfounded, but it is foundedwith me, also. I share that
fear, to some degree. I havethe fear that my enthusiasm
will be the thing that turns mykids away from mathematics. Not
that my kid wouldcoincidentally be cold on math,
but uh ... I'm not worried foryou. You've got that verve,
that vibe.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:26):
Oh, thanks, buddy.
Dan Meyer (06:27):
I have every confidence. And that is as
sentimental a vibe you'll everget recorded on the pod with
me, anyway. And Bethany. Sohope you enjoyed that while it
lasted. I'm pumped that we haveour own areas of expertise and
experience and I just lovehaving the excuse on this pod
to bring people on who haveother kinds of expertise. And
(06:48):
we've had chats so far thisseason with people like Lauren
Carr, who have experience inindividual classrooms at
developing fluencies in waysthat are humanizing for
students. We've had people talkabout assessment and how to
assess fluency, with Val Henry,Dr. Val Henry. And of course
people like Jason Zimba, whocame on to talk about how to
define fluency itself.
(07:09):
Super-helpful. And today we'retalking with someone who has a
lot of experience with mathfluency at the school level.
What does that look like, whena school decides, "Hey, all of
us, not just one individualhero teacher, but all of us,
are gonna do something heroicand try to take on fluency as a
project and make it apriority"? What does that look
like? What kinds of moves areeffective?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (07:29):
So for all of those reasons, we're
very excited to have on Dr.
Jody Guarino, a formerclassroom teacher of 18 years
who most recently taught firstgrade. She also served as a
math coordinator through theOrange County Department of
Education and she's now part oftheir Teaching, Learning and
Instructional LeadershipCollaborative team. And I have
(07:52):
a personal connection to sharehere as well, because not only
was Dr. Guarino my professorfor many classes at UCI, but I
was a teacher at the schoolwhen she was spearheading this
project that we're gonna talkabout today, about fluency. And
so before Dr. Guarino joins usin the Lounge, let me just give
a little, brief summary of thisproject. So, K–8 public charter
(08:17):
school. And basically K–5, theprincipal had made a commitment
that we were gonna focus onfluency all year long. So as a
teacher, I was told, "Thisyear, we're gonna be focusing
on fluency, not only withinyour grade level, but we're
gonna be building verticalalignment and talking about it
(08:39):
with teachers K–5." So, frombefore school started: "Hey,
this is our big project for theyear, and we're gonna be
crafting the story of fluency."What did fluency look like at
this school for students? And Imean, that commitment is, I
think, incredibly powerful. Andto involve administration, but
(09:00):
then also someone from outside,Dr. Guarino, who brings that
like system-wide expertise andwill be able to come in with a
fresh vision and help guide ourprofessional development. I
just thought, "What a coolproject, and how e xciting to
be a part of it." And I'm soexcited to welcome Dr. Guarino
to the Lounge to tell us moreabout it. So let's welcome her.
Dr. Guarino, hi! We're soexcited to have you in the
(09:23):
Lounge. Welcome.
Dr. Jody Guarino (09:24):
Hi, thank you for having me.
Dan Meyer (09:27):
We're thrilled you're here and we're always
curious, for our guests whocome on, about your own journey
in fluency. Thinking about mathfluency conjures up lots of
prior images for people, thatcan get a little bit
challenging to untangle andmesh with research. So we love
to just say, "Hey, outside ofmath, in your own life, as
personally or professionally asyou want to get, where is an
(09:49):
area that you've been trying todevelop fluency? And what's
something you've done to try todevelop that?"
Dr. Jody Guarino (09:56):
Sure. So , I love this question.
When I listened to the firstepisode and heard Jason Zimba
talking about roasting chicken, he got me thinking. So for
me, I started doing Pilates afew years ago. And at the time,
I was like learning vocabulary,and I would listen to the
instructor cues and interpretthem and attempt to do them.
And often my attempts would befollowed up with some immediate
feedback from the instructor: "Make sure your knees are (10:18):
undefined
aligned with your ankles," ordifferent feedback. And now,
having practiced a few years, Iwouldn't say I'm fluent, but my
form has certainly improved,and I think it's just been
practice over time andcontinuing to engage in the
work.
Dan Meyer (10:34):
Super-helpful illustration here. Tell me
about the feedback a little bitmore. Have there been moments
where there's feedback thatworks and doesn't work? And all
the meta-analyses say, like, athird of attempts at feedback
do worse than no feedback atall. So can you say what's been
good and great feedback for youin Pilates?
Dr. Jody Guarino (10:56):
So I think there's a mix. There's
certainly verbal feedback.
Sometimes it's helpful toactually show people. Like,
actually come up and model themove. Or reposition. So I think
the feedback looks all sorts ofdifferent ways ... but it's
immediate. And I think that'sthe big thing. And that's
something that I love aboutPilates. There's an instructor
walking around giving everyonefeedback all the time, and it's
(11:17):
sort of an expectation to helpus all get better so we're not
injuring ourselves.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (11:23):
Well, iit sounds like some of those
moves that took up so much ofyour thought processes, so much
of your working memory, that Ihave to like, "What am I doing?
Wait , where are my knees?"Some of those things are now
incorporated into your work,right? Like the fluency we hope
for our kiddos.
Dr. Jody Guarino (11:41):
Totally.
Yeah.
Dan Meyer (11:41):
It's awesome. The stuff that used to be hard is
now your fluent edit. Whichallows you to do, I assume,
more complex ... Pilate moves?
I call them "Pilate moves"'cause I don't know what I'm
talking about.
Dr. Jody Guarino (11:53):
That
works.
Dan Meyer (11:54):
And just to squeeze a little more juice out of this
orange, I love theseconversations about
extracurricular fluency. But Iwonder if, with Pilates,
there's ways that your own bodygives you feedback that's not
related to the instructor.
Like, "Ah, this doesn't feelquite right. This feels a
little bit awkward or evenpainful." And that's its own
form of feedback.
Dr. Jody Guarino (12:13):
Totally.
Dan Meyer (12:14):
And if and when that's possible in math
education. Or when you can lookat a co-learner and see when a
co-learner is doing the samething a little differently, and
how that happens in matheducation with a group of
learners together. Anyway, allvery interesting. Thank you for
sharing.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (12:32):
I don't know, my sweat and tears
in my high school math classwas giving me a lot of
feedback.
Dan Meyer (12:39):
A lot of negative feedback?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (12:41):
In the thick of the deepest part
of my math anxiety. But I lovethat, and I'm picturing you —
you go to that first class,you're nervous, and of course,
next to you on the Reformer issomebody who you know is five
years ahead of you, 10 years,20, whatever, in their
practice. And how, if it's agreat instructor, they're
(13:02):
making space for everyone. Andmaybe they're physically
manipulating your body in a waythat you're like, "Oh, that's
what it feels like. OK. OK."I'm digging it. I love it.
Thank you for sharing that.
Thank you f or, I'm tellingyou, I wanna go to class with
you and I want to have someroast chicken with Jason Zimba.
Dan Meyer (13:19):
. Wait, is
it actually called the
Reformer?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (13:22):
It is.That's the machine .
Dan Meyer (13:23):
OK, so you're manipulating your body in the
Reformer. This sounds like theSpanish Inquisition, that
torture device .
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (13:30):
It actually kind of looks like
that.
Dan Meyer (13:31):
Cool. Good to know.
Bethany Lockhart Johns (13:32):
Anyway, as much as I have a lot more
questions about your classes,what I'm so excited to share
with listeners is I got to be aparticipant in this project,
but I don't know anything abouthow it came to be. I know that
as a teacher, our principalbasically had total buy-in and
(13:56):
was like, "Guess what we'refocusing on in our PD sessions,
K–5; it's fluency," and it wasjust such a unique experience.
So before we talk about thedetails of the project, I would
love to hear a little bit ofthe backstory. How did it come
to be that you were leadingwith the principal this
(14:16):
yearlong fluency study?
Dr. Jody Guarino (14:19):
Sure. So at the time I was a math
coordinator, contracted to workwith the school. And there were
some comments, actually, fromupper-grade teachers, like, "My
students aren't fluent; I'm notsure if they can do this other
thing, because kids are comingto me not knowing their math
facts." So there had been thisdiscussion, which I'm sure
we've all sort of heard indifferent spaces. And so the
(14:40):
principal identified this needto work on fluency. For me, it
was sort of the perfect storm,because at the time I had
already been working with ValHenry — who was on one of your
episodes — and doing work in myown first-grade classroom in
prior years based on her work.
So she had done some fluencyresearch and it had amazing
(15:01):
results. Like, the effect sizewas over 1.0, and even higher
for Spanish-speaking kids. So,super interesting that it had
strong results. So myfirst-grade team and I started
this work. And we had workedwith Val for probably a few
years. And once we got itgoing, we saw amazing results.
So this was before Common Core,and our kids would leave first
(15:24):
grade proficient up to what'snow the second-grade fluency
standard. And we had seenresults that we'd never seen
before. So prior to that wewere doing, I think, really
traditional practices — thingslike flashcards and timed
tests. So, working with Val asa teacher really shifted my
understanding of fluency. So,when my job was supporting
(15:47):
teachers, supporting schools ,supporting districts as a math
coordinator at Orange CountyDepartment of Ed, at that
point, the leadership of theschool I had a contract to work
with had identified the need towork on fluency. So when the
principal of the schoolmentioned that, I was like, "Oh
my gosh, this is great. We needto bring in Dr. Henry's work."
Because I'd had such positiveexperiences over the last few
years in my own classroom.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (16:09):
So, what I think is interesting
here is you had experiencedwhat it looked like when as a
grade level you worked onfluency, right? You experienced
that. So you mentioned thatsocial setting, you had
partners, accountabilitybuddies, to work with and say,
like, "OK, I'm having thisissue," or, "Whoa, this really
(16:30):
worked well." So how did youtake what you experienced in
that setting? How did you usethat to create something that
was gonna span K–5?
Dr. Jody Guarino (16:44):
Yeah. So, I think the social nature of it
was critical to me, thinkingabout how do we do this both as
grade-level teams and a wholeschool? And that was something
that I hadn't experiencedbefore. When we did, it was
just my first-grade team. So Iwas really thinking about, "How
is this relevant to every gradelevel at the school?" And
(17:05):
luckily enough, upper-gradeteachers saw this as a need.
Like, everybody wanted fluency,and fluency for kids. That sort
of made the perfect storm ofeverybody was in and had a
shared interest in doing thework together. The school also
was a very collaborative spacealready. And they had
structures like professionallearning communities; students
(17:26):
went to specials. So there wascollaboration time built into
the day. So all of thestructures were already there.
It was more a matter of, "OK,how do we do this together?" We
also ended up talking aboutwhat spaces were common. So ,
at this particular school, Ibelieve Wednesdays were
early-out days. So what wouldit look like for the whole
staff to engage in this, once amonth? It didn't feel like each
(17:50):
team working in isolation, buteveryone together. And in that,
we also came up with the needof, like, "How would we
communicate about this? Andwhat protocols would be
helpful, school-wide, so thatwe're all using shared
language? And using language inways that we also have shared
meaning? So how do weco-construct ways that we're
(18:12):
gonna talk about things, andeven develop a shared vision?
What does fluency look like andsound like? What do we want for
kids and what do we wanthappening in classrooms?" The
school was a project-basedlearning school, so everything
was very like hands-on, reallythinking about all of those
things as well. At thebeginning, there was a lot of
(18:33):
development. One of the thingswas about, "How are we gonna
know if students are makingprogress? What would assessment
look like?" And for that, I canremember, Bethany being in your
classroom, kids were playinggames and we were just
listening in, like, "Oh mygosh, did you notice what that
student just did?" They wereplaying the card game Go Fish.
And if they were playing Fishfor five, instead of asking for
(18:55):
pairs, if they had a three,they might ask for a two. So
things like, "How are we goingto watch kids doing the tests
they're doing, but how will wecollect and keep track of
information in ways that'sthat's humanizing?" So we
weren't gonna do any timedtests or any sort of written
things that you wouldtraditionally think about
measures. But how would we dothat? And how would we keep
(19:17):
track of that information? Andin terms of assessment, also
thinking about, we can gaininformation on kids from
engaging with them inactivities. And then there are
probably some kids that we werelike, "Ooh, I'm not really
sure, I'm not really sure howPresley is thinking about this
particular thing, so let me goover and ask her."
Dan Meyer (19:36):
I would love to just back up a second and just
replay for myself, see if I gotthis, and what parts I'm
missing, if I could. First,there was a rationale for this:
Our fluency scores, ourindicators, are not where we
want them to be, let's say. Andthere's vertical integration.
Where the upper school or themiddle school said, "Hey, we
would love to see studentscoming to us with some
(19:56):
different kinds of skills andfluency developed already." So
you established that, and thenif I'm hearing you right,
there's just a fairly lengthyperiod, that my sense is,
should not be shortened. Even alittle bit of establishing
shared goals, shared languagearound what we mean by fluency,
what it looks like in theclassroom, ideas about
(20:20):
assessment. And you folksdevised collectively other
kinds of assessments thatweren't the kinds that often
turn kids off of fluency andgive meager kinds of
information but kind ofenvironmental fluency
indicators? And it sounds likethat was to both predict what
might be the final boss-stageindicator of the end-of-course
(20:43):
exam, but also to give theopportunity to celebrate some
wins along the way. Am am Igetting that right? Those feel
like some very interestingsteps that other leaders could
follow all the way through.
What did I miss there?
Dr. Jody Guarino (20:57):
For sure. I think that's pretty much how it
was. If I go back to themeaning of the word "assess,"
like, "to sit alongside andlisten," I think that's what we
did. So, kids would be playinggames and we would just be sort
of leaning in and maybe notsaying anything but just
listening to what they weredoing and then internally, "Oh
my gosh, that's so great, lookwhat just happened." And sort
(21:19):
of keeping track of that andcelebrating with kids, too.
Like, "Oh, I noticed that whenyou had three, you asked him
for a five. Like, wow." But Idon't ever feel like they were
being evaluated or judged,which I think assessment
sometimes does. It feels likeit turns more into evaluation
and sort of sorting kids. Andthis was the total opposite of
that. It was just likelistening in. And then, if
(21:43):
there was evidence that wedidn't have — like, "I'm not
really sure" — then we wouldinformally just ask, like, "Hey
Bethany, how did you solve thatone when you got to, I don't
know, nine plus six? What didyou do? What did you think
about?" So I think from thestudent perspective it was more
about, "Wow, my teacher'scurious about my thinking!" or
"My teacher wants to listen tome, or values my ideas!" I
(22:04):
mean, to me, that's whatassessment is anyway, but it's
often not the studentexperience. I didn't feel like
there was ever pressure on kidsor any sort of negative
connotations around assessment.
It was all like, "OK, what dothey know?" And Dan, you sort
of brought up that idea oflike, "What can we celebrate?"
Like, we've made this greatprogress and we're noticing
(22:26):
this stuff, and then what'snext? What do we, as teachers,
do? I think every teacher wouldtell you one resource we don't
have enough of is time. So howdo we make sure we know where
kids are, to think about, "OK,we need to spend a little more
time on this," or, "We're readyto move on."
Dan Meyer (22:41):
What you said there seems so true to me. That that
students really like and learnfrom teachers who like and
learn from them. It feels to melike teachers who present
themselves as students of theirstudents and their thinking,
that seems really powerful.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (22:54):
Yeah, I'd love to talk a little bit
more about assessment. Becausewhat I remember as a teacher in
my classroom, we definitely didone-on-one interviews with
students where we'd show theman expression and we'd ask
them, like, "What's two andthree more? What's two and
three? or what's two plusthree?" And we would make
(23:17):
detailed notes about how theysolved. Did they solve like
with counting? Did they justknow it? Or did they use a
strategy? Maybe they said ,"Five." And I'd say, "Well, how
did you get that?" And they'dsay, "Well I knew three and
three is six, so I just tookone away." Now I'm not saying
that's what happened. But I'msaying, "Did they use a known
fact, a derived fact, to helpthem answer an assessment
(23:39):
question?" So we did that andthat really helped us to
understand where our studentswere. And we would do that a
couple times throughout theyear with the students, like,
as they progressed through thedifferent goals. But then, like
you were saying, Jody , it wasso powerful to take formative
(24:00):
assessment notes while theywere playing games, while we
were having class discussions.
We really learned the power ofeveryday listening to students'
thinking. And you know, thoseon-the-spot, in-the-moment
questions as well. We learnedso much from that, too. There
were definitely no timed tests, definitely no timed tests .
So their assessments were veryrelaxed, just a goal of like,
(24:23):
"Hey, show what you know" kindof thing. And it was an
important part of theassessment, but it a hundred
percent wasn't the wholepicture that we were building
of where our class was.
Dan Meyer (24:34):
I'm sort of curious about the student experience at
a little more depth. It soundslike you folks adopted a
particular program ... andthere's lots of programs out
there. Without getting into anykind of product
recommendations, let's say,what are the features of the
student experience, as comparedto, perhaps, what they were
experiencing before thiswholesale shift in approach at
(24:57):
the school level?
Dr. Jody Guarino (24:59):
Absolutely.
So, this work was grounded insome research principles, one
of which was we spent 10 to 15minutes a day on fluency. We
used Dr. Valerie Henry's work.
And in her research findings,it didn't matter if you spent
10 minutes or 30 minutes — youwould get the same results. So
we were really just spendingfive to 10 minutes a day. And
(25:21):
it was a lot of games. Andthere was sort of a progression
from concrete torepresentational to abstract.
So an example of a concretegame: You might picture those
two color counters, thoseyellow and red counters. And
kids might have five countersand they would just sort of
shake them or toss them andcount. Like, "Oh, I got four
and one," and do it again and"I got three and two." How many
(25:45):
times can they do that in fiveto 10 minutes? And every time,
it's just repeated practice offour and one, three and two,
five and zero. They were allred. So that was an example of
a concrete activity. And anexample of an abstract
activity, as I mentionedbefore, the game Go Fish. So if
we're working on facts of 10,then maybe we're looking for
(26:07):
pairs of 10. So the studentexperience was very much like
games. The other thing that Ishould mention — and this sort
of going back to even myPilates experience — was this
idea of immediate feedback. Somost of the activities kids did
in pairs. So they wereconstantly getting feedback
from their partner. If they hada six and were asking for a
(26:29):
four, you know, and theirpartner gave 'em a four, and
they realized , "Wait a minute,that wasn't the right number,"
they would get instantfeedback, rather than
practicing somethingincorrectly. And then it also
didn't take the role of theteacher, because it wasn't the
teacher walking around givingfeedback; it was sort of built
into the structure of all ofthe activities. So I think for
kids, fluency was fun. And, youknow, they might come in from
(26:53):
recess like, "Oh, now we get toplay with the counters!" or
"...play cards!" or whatever. Idon't think they ever looked at
it as, "Ohhh, fluency."
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (27:01):
I remember we did, after the five
to 10 minutes or whatever — Ithink it ended up being about
15, because we'd pull studentsback to the carpet to have a
quick conversation about whatthey had just done, like, "What
did you notice?" or "What didyou know?" Maybe questions we'd
come up with ahead of time. Andthen sometimes it was just
(27:22):
things we'd seen based onstrategies: "When I was walking
around, I saw Jody and Dandoing this really interesting
thing. They had these countersand they were using it to..."
and we we'd pull outexperiences. And I felt that
coming back together cementedthe learning, in a way. Yes, it
(27:42):
was games, but it also gave theopportunity for reflection on
the experience that thestudents had just had.
Dr. Jody Guarino (27:49):
For sure.
That feels like, Bethany, oneof the most critical pieces.
Because I think prior to that... I mean, everybody does a
lot of games in theirclassroom. And sometimes I
think kids are just takingaway, "Oh, it's game time,"
versus actually, as you'retalking about, those debriefs.
Like, "OK, what did you noticeabout different ways to make
10?" or "Were there particularways that were easy for you to
think about and other ones thatyou're still working on?" We
(28:12):
also spent a lot of time thatyear, as I mentioned, in the
monthly staff meetings, reallythinking about, "How would we
even make public records fromthose debriefs?" So I can still
picture, Bethany , one of thecharts in your room was Ways to
Make Five. And so, whether kidswere working with connecting
Unifix cubes, or a common taskwith little kids was "show me
(28:33):
five," where they would justhold up their hand, or "show me
four," and then they might showfive in two ways and talk about
... a lot of times kids didsomething like this, where they
were putting a stick or apencil between their fingers:
Like, five is two and three.
And I think about all of thosesort of charts, because that
really also led to S & P Seven.
Like, seeing and usingstructure as they're thinking
(28:56):
about math fluency and factsand relationships between
things. So that was a reallyimportant piece, the debrief
and then the public records orthe charting that came from
that as well.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (29:07):
So before we talk about how you
saw this evolving over theyear, I wanna just help frame
it a little bit. Because Ithink something that was so
interesting is you did such agood job of basically getting
us invested. You and theprincipal did a very good job
of getting us invested in, "I'mteaching kindergarten, but all
(29:32):
of these students are ourstudents. We care about what
they're gonna be encounteringnext. And what if you're a
student in this school —whatwill your experience of fluency
be, K–5?" And initially, therereally weren't these
touchstones that we could speakto. We may have all had similar
training, but it was thatnorming — getting on the same
(29:55):
page about what fluency soundslike, what it looks like, how
do we talk about it, what areexperiences and activities that
students can do in this grade —that could carry over to the
next grade. And so, I think iffolks are listening and they're
thinking, "Well what could thislook like?" I think it's really
important to emphasize thatnorming that you talked about.
(30:16):
And then, also, thosestructures that you mentioned
were in place. Weekly, we weremeeting as a staff in your
team, your grade-level team.
So, every week, you mettogether with your other direct
peers in your grade level, andyou're working on this for a
part of the staff meeting, butthen at one of our staff
meetings that month, we'd cometogether K–5 and do those
(30:40):
check-ins where we are craftingthat story, K–5, and really
using those protocols that youhelped to build. So I am
inserting that because I feellike as you're talking, I'm
reflecting on, "Oh, I feel likethat's some of the reasons why
it worked." I don't know , Iwas really excited to be a part
of that. And I feel like asyou're talking about it, I'm
(31:02):
remembering how intentional youwere about those pieces to help
build this project.
Dr. Jody Guarino (31:08):
I think that's huge, and comes back to
that idea, even, of our visionof learning in community. What
do we think it means to learnand even to collaborate? The
entire school was workingtoward the same goal, with the
same vision. So I think it alsooffered ... the goal was not
around team-building andcommunity-building, but I think
(31:28):
it actually did that at thesame time. Because we all
wanted the same thing. And asyou mentioned, it was like we
were all here for all kids. Sohow do we navigate this
together? I think the otherthing was that before we had
these systems in place, everyteacher had two days of
professional learning. And Ithink that's another important
thing. Because I feel it'spretty easy to go to
(31:51):
professional learning and belike, "OK, yeah, I wanna do
that. I totally buy in. I didthose activities and I'm
excited." And I go back to myspace and I try some things and
then I'm like, "Now what? I'mnot really sure what to do
next." And so I think the valuein that was having people in
community to try things with.
Far beyond ... it's one thingto go to professional learning
(32:13):
and even, "YES! That is what Iwant!" But then to go back and
you're sort of on your own,isolated, to "What was that
thing again?" Or you know, onceyou jump in, you have questions
that you didn't have, for thetwo days that you were sitting
there, right?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (32:26):
What do you do with those conference
notes, right? You went to thisgreat session, you're fired up,
or you're listening to thispodcast, and you're like, "Ooh,
I wanna try this," but whatcould you put into place that
allows that to be possible?
Dr. Jody Guarino (32:39):
Yeah. And how do you do that with other
people? Right ? So that you'resort of comparing conference
notes, or "What did you do withthat?" or "How did you take up
that idea?" or "How are youmaking sense of it?" So that,
to me, was the beauty in thiswhole thing. It was building
upon a shared experienceeveryone had, but navigating it
together.
Dan Meyer (32:57):
I'd love to think about — just briefly, here —
how teachers developed.
Obviously the studentsdeveloped in some fantastic
ways. I am always just dazzledand kind of scared to think
about how secondary teachersknow a lot about one thing and
primary teachers need to know alot about a lot of things. And
that seems like a realchallenge. So, when you talk
(33:17):
about debriefs and creatingtakeaways with students,
there's a lot of math knowledgeand pedagogical content
knowledge going on there. Howdid teachers develop that? Was
that through the two PD days,primarily? Through Val Henry's
work? Or were there elementsthroughout the PLCs or
throughout the year that resultin teachers feeling more
(33:38):
confident to do more than justsay, "OK it is time for these
intentionally designed games,"but to make more out of it?
Dr. Jody Guarino (33:45):
I would say all of the above! I think
certainly there was a lot togain from the professional
learning. I mean, for a lot ofus it was like, "Oh, that's
what fluency looks like andsounds like!" I know before I
started working with Val , tome it was like, "Memorize
facts," and just, automaticity,where I hadn't really thought
about strategies and studentflexibility. So, I think there
(34:06):
was a lot of learning aboutthat content knowledge. And
even, like, why does thatmatter? So that was a huge
thing. Because I thinkmemorizing your facts is
different than, you know, "If Iknow nine plus six is 15, how
does that help me when I'mworking with 39 plus 26?" Like,
these ways of thinking. So Ithink it supported, actually,
teacher flexibility andthinking, too. I know it did
(34:28):
for me. Like, I would say Ihave a different level of
fluency from doing this workmyself. I think, also, as
you're mentioning vision andbeliefs, that was huge. So
seeing that kids actually cando this was so powerful.
Bethany, I think aboutkindergarten — the goal at the
time was fluency to five. Andat some point, we were like,
(34:51):
"Whoa, we're not even halfwaythrough the year, and kids have
got it. They've got the end ofthe grade-level standard,
halfway through the year. Oh mygosh, what do we do now?" And I
think there was a lot of energyand excitement around that,
because maybe we hadn't beensuccessful before, or actually
had this vision of like what itcould look like. So, I think it
definitely impacted teachers'vision of what could be, and
(35:12):
also beliefs, because we saw itwith our own kids. We saw it
with the kids that, you know,prior, we had thought, "They're
not fluent." And now, it'slike, "Wait a minute! They
are!" And it was these thingsthat we did that led them to
this! So I think there was — Idon't know — celebration, in
that I can remember aparticular note-taking sort of
(35:32):
protocol that we had, whereteachers would set, like, smart
goals (35:37):
"By whatever date this percentage of kids would be
fluent!" And then we wouldreflect on, like, "Did we get
there?" And it was always thisreally positive celebration of,
"Wow, it can be done!" And atthe beginning, we were sort of
setting arbitrary goals, like,"What does it look like to work
toward 10 over a year?" andjust kind of pacing it. Versus
now (35:55):
Like, "Oh my gosh, that actually worked, and we made it
work." And also, pedagogically,as we had mentioned, or Bethany
mentioned, the charting. Therewas a lot of conversations
about that. Like, "I wanna havea debrief after we do this
activity, but I don't reallyknow the question I might ask."
Or, "I asked this question andkids just stared at me and it
(36:17):
fell flat." So then somebodymight suggest, "Well, try
this." Or "What do you thinkabout this other idea?" So I
think every single thing led tolearning. Whether it was the
professional learning, thecollaboration in practice,
watching kids do things that wewere like, "Whoa, that was
really effective" or "I'm notsure they're really taking away
what I was hoping for in thisparticular activity." So I'd
(36:40):
say a lot of learning to learn,from teaching. I dunno.
Bethany, does that resonatewith your experience?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (36:46):
Yeah, absolutely. It's really nice to
hear you reflect on it. 'Causeit's making me think about,
there was so much power infocusing on that, and having
such investment from theprincipal, with your expertise,
with Dr. Henry's research. ButI wanna make sure that as we
(37:09):
are sharing this, I want folkswho are listening to be able to
take away like, "Yeah, if yourschool can can focus on this,
imagine the power," right? Butrealistically, how do we as
educators ... I mean, maybe weare able to head in that
direction, but what are somethings that would be your
(37:31):
biggest takeaways from thewhole experience? For
educators, what advice wouldyou want to leave them with
that maybe you learned fromthis experience? And I feel
like you've already shared alot of those keys throughout,
but maybe if there's anythingelse in particular...?
Dr. Jody Guarino (37:46):
I guess one of the things — or this is two
things together — I think ittakes time and it takes
friends. So what we'redescribing, that was over an
entire year-long process. So, Ithink one of the things is not
to give up, but just keeptrying different things and
reflecting on progress. What'sworking, what's not working.
(38:07):
And when I say it takes timeand friends, at least in that
situation, I think there was alot of leaning into each other.
So I think, if people areinterested in working on
fluency, finding a friend —even if that friend isn't at
your school or at your gradelevel — who can be that
accountability partner orthought partner, that you can
lean on each other as you'redoing this. I think another
(38:30):
really important thing is tosort of have a shared vision
and shared goals that you'reworking on together. So, what
does fluency look like andsound like? For me, another big
thing when I started this wasjust learning.I wasn't up to
speed on fluency research, andI didn't really have any ideas
of anything beyond myflashcards and timed tests. So
(38:53):
that could be a big thing too —just looking at some research,
or what's out there that's alsoaligned with your philosophy
and beliefs . So, as Imentioned, the assessment
things that we use ... like,how do you make sure whatever
you're doing is aligned withthe experiences that you want
for kids? And what you want tobe remembered by as
(39:14):
contributing? Like, I certainlydon't wanna be remembered as,
you know, the time that Istarted hating math in third
grade because I didn't know mymath facts, and I was that
teacher, or whatever. So whatdo we really want for our kids?
That feels like a reallyimportant thing. The other
thing I would say in our workthat I didn't talk about at all
is the role of theadministrator. And the
(39:34):
understanding. And I think thatis so pivotal. Because in that
situation, the principal wasreally supportive in creating
structures and time, and notmoving onto the next thing.
Like, "Oh yeah, we met aboutfluency next last week; we're
done now."
Bethany Lockhart J (39:50):
Absolutely, absolutely.
Dr. Jody Guarino (39:51):
Like, really understood that it was a
journey. But also, in terms ofprincipals, allocating the
resources, the people, thetime, the funding for the
professional learning. Andmaking decisions that were
aligned to that, versus what ifhe had gone out in the middle
of the year and just been like,"Yeah, I'm over that. I'm gonna
go get some computer game." Orsomething. Like, the level of
(40:14):
understanding and vision of theleader seemed really important
too. So, I would say, if peopleare starting this on their own,
bring in your leader with you.
And have them experience thesame sort of things you're
working on together. Feels likeit could be useful.
Bethany Lockhart Johnso (40:29):
That's also useful! And I want to
thank you for being a part ofcreating this opportunity, and
sharing your insights. I knowit's hard to sum up a year-long
project in the span ofa podcast. But I feel like some
of those really key touchstonesthat helped ground that story
of fluency K–5, you were ableto share that. Really, really
(40:53):
appreciate you joining us inthe Lounge, Dr. Guarino.
Dr. Jody Guarino (40:57):
Well, thank you for having me.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (40:58):
Come back any time.
Dan Meyer (41:00):
Thank you so much.
Take care.
Bethany Lockhart Johnso (41:02):
Thanks so much for listening to our
conversation with Dr. JodyGuarino, former classroom
teacher who is now part of theOrange County Department of
Education Teaching, Learningand Instructional Leadership
Collaborative team. Check outthe show notes for links to
more resources. And let us knowwhat you thought of this
episode. I am fired up. I'm allexcited thinking about this
(41:24):
project, and remembering beinga part of it, and I'm just
like, "Let's go! Let's go domore fluency things!" It was a
lot of fun. Visit us in ourFacebook discussion group, Math
Teacher Lounge (41:35):
The Community.
And to make sure that you don'tmiss any new episode in our
season-long deep dive into mathfluency, you can subscribe to
Math Teacher Lounge podcasts onany and all podcast platforms.
And let me tell you, the bestway to share the love is with a
review, or let your let yourfriends know. Let your teacher
(41:58):
friends know. Maybe there's anidea that that sparked for you,
and you can say, "Hey, givethis a listen . Hey, you wanna
try something? You wanna teamup and try this, and report
back?" And then message us andtell us what you did. See, it's
a community. You can find moreinformation on all of Amplify's
shows at our podcast hub. Go toAmplify.com/hub. And finally,
(42:21):
here's a little sneak previewof what's to come on our next
episode.
Myuriel von Aspen (42:24):
For some children, we — the teachers —
might be the only ones that cansupport them with the work of
fluency, of learning their mathfacts. Because maybe they have
parents at home that areworking two jobs, three jobs,
and may not have thoseopportunities that other
children have at home. And so,taking away those opportunities
(42:46):
from our students , we'retaking away the chance for them
to learn higher math later on.
Because we are what they haveto learn those foundational
skills.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (42:55):
We hope you'll join us next time
on Math Teacher Lounge. Thanksso much for listening.
I can remember a particular
note-taking protocol that wehad, where teachers would set
smart goals (00:06):
By whatever date this percentage of kids would
be fluent. And then we wouldreflect on like, Did we get
there?" And it was always thisreally positive celebration of
like, "Wow, it can be done."
Dan Meyer (00:17):
Welcome back, folks, to Math Teacher Lounge. I'm one
of your hosts, Dan Meyer.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:21):
And I'm Bethany Lockhart Johnson .
Hi, Dan.
Dan Meyer (00:24):
Hey, Bethany. We are currently motoring our way
through our season on fluency,but before we check in with a
new fantastic guest, just wannasee how you are doing in the
world of math and education andlife in general. Take it
however you want to.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (00:39):
I mean, any day that I get to
talk about math with you andwith our guests, especially in
our current season of fluency,is a good day. But I am fine. I
love counting with my toddler.
I love trying to build on thisidea that math is everywhere.
And you know, sometimes he'sinto it. But I, I gotta tell
(01:05):
you something my toddler lovesmore than counting is saying
"NO" to everything. Just "No,no." I'm like, wait ... but ...
this...! Dan, I don't know whatI'm doing! Just in general. I
don't know what I'm doing.
Dan Meyer (01:22):
Yeah, yeah. I mean that's the most honest thing a
parent's ever said.
trust the parents who say theydo know what they're doing. I
have a question for you aboutthis. Can I ask you — I've been
on a parallel track here, onthis fluency season, trying to
think about fluency with my ownschool-aged kids. And the other
day, yesterday, last night, asa matter of fact, I had this
(01:42):
kind of math-y game book —really thoughtful book; I love
it with the kids so far. Thefirst time we used it, this
thing happened where like itwas like, "OK, the problem said
there's 17 hippos and one ofthem doesn't have a block of
cheese, or something. How manyblocks of cheese are there?"
(02:03):
All right? You see what'shappening here, right? You see
where this is going? It'strying to like get the kid to
like say, "Oh, 17. I'll justlike think backwards, one on
the number line, or countbackwards one, or something.
There's a bunch of these. Andone of my kids — or both,
rather — would keep ondirect-counting from one every
time. And I'm trying toinsinuate myself a little bit
(02:26):
in the process, but definitelynot trying to say this is the
wrong way to do it.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (02:31):
Yeah.
Dan Meyer (02:31):
It's, you know, effectively got the answer. But
like how do you as anelementary math educator/expert
think about helping the kidmake their way up the ladder of
abstraction towards moreefficient methods? So, I just
let this play out. What's mymove here?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (02:47):
You know, it's interesting, you've
mentioned that before, aboutthe counting-up or the
counting-all. I think it getsyour goat a little bit, Dan.
'Cause you see where they'reheaded and you see the power in
like not counting-all. You seethat power. And for me, having
(03:08):
been a teacher of children yourkiddos' age, I think if they're
counting and they're countingaccurately and they're making
sense of the problem, Icelebrate that. Right? I would
then try to pose a problem of areally high number, where it
would make no sense to count,like, 89 hippos, right? There's
(03:31):
90 hippos! So they're probablypracticing decade numbers,
right? So maybe there's 90hippos and one of them doesn't
have a block of cheese . Wouldthey start at one or would they
start at 90? And then maybehave a hundred chart there.
Because counting backwards froma decade number, especially a
high one, is tricky, right? Sothen they could find 90, and
say, one of them does see whatthey do with that. I mean,
(03:55):
personally, I wouldn't worrytoo much. I would say the fact
that you are counting andcelebrating math with your
kiddos and doing it in a waythat builds connection through
fun stories is what reallymatters here. But in terms of
wanting t o support your kiddosin growing towards more
efficient methods, that wouldbe one suggestion. I know in my
(04:18):
classroom, I would choose sothat one of the share-outs
showed somebody counting-alland one of the share-outs
showed somebody who startedwith that number and
counted-on. But not in a waythat would say, "Look at this
kiddo who w orks so much moreefficiently!" Just, like, "Oh,
you solved it differently." Youknow? Does that make sense?
Dan Meyer (04:40):
Yeah. No, I basically do that except the
the share-out is me, and I'msharing out the right method.
Bethany Lockhart Johns (04:45):
Dan Meyer (04:46):
And I'm making sure that that my kid knows that
it's right. No, I hear you onthat, and I really appreciate
the craft , that cognitivelyguided instruction work does
this really well, and all kindsof other areas where it's like,
you gotta give the kid anexperience where this more
efficient method makes sense,and it feels really hard to
rush it. And I'll be totallyclear that this is not going
(05:08):
on, and I'm like, "Oh no, likewhat future will my kid have?"
Bethany Lockhart Johns (05:12):
Dan Meyer (05:13):
"If by age five and a half, they're not..."! It's
like, really, not even a littlebit. But I do think it's
interesting —
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (05:20):
It is interesting.
Dan Meyer (05:20):
— he's so excited to count-all! He's just like down
with it! And I'm just curiouswhat it takes to, you know,
make that seem a little lessappealing, or make other
methods seem a little moreappealing.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (05:31):
My dear friend is an amazing
teacher. She has three girlsand when she had her first
girl, she was so excited. She'sa teacher, has all these
resources, was so excited towork with her daughter and play
math games and do these phonicsgames. Her daughter wanted
nothing to do with any of it.
And she had made some fungames! So my kiddo, I
(05:55):
recognize, toddler, it is verymuch developmentally
appropriate that he is like,absolutely
especially if it's time toleave the park. But what if he
doesn't wanna play these coolmath games, Dan, what do I do
then?
Dan Meyer (06:09):
Yeah. I wish I could tell you that that fear is
unfounded, but it is foundedwith me, also. I share that
fear, to some degree. I havethe fear that my enthusiasm
will be the thing that turns mykids away from mathematics. Not
that my kid wouldcoincidentally be cold on math,
but uh ... I'm not worried foryou. You've got that verve,
that vibe.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (06:26):
Oh, thanks, buddy.
Dan Meyer (06:27):
I have every confidence. And that is as
sentimental a vibe you'll everget recorded on the pod with
me, anyway. And Bethany. Sohope you enjoyed that while it
lasted. I'm pumped that we haveour own areas of expertise and
experience and I just lovehaving the excuse on this pod
to bring people on who haveother kinds of expertise. And
(06:48):
we've had chats so far thisseason with people like Lauren
Carr, who have experience inindividual classrooms at
developing fluencies in waysthat are humanizing for
students. We've had people talkabout assessment and how to
assess fluency, with Val Henry,Dr. Val Henry. And of course
people like Jason Zimba, whocame on to talk about how to
define fluency itself.
(07:09):
Super-helpful. And today we'retalking with someone who has a
lot of experience with mathfluency at the school level.
What does that look like, whena school decides, "Hey, all of
us, not just one individualhero teacher, but all of us,
are gonna do something heroicand try to take on fluency as a
project and make it apriority"? What does that look
like? What kinds of moves areeffective?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (07:29):
So for all of those reasons, we're
very excited to have on Dr.
Jody Guarino, a formerclassroom teacher of 18 years
who most recently taught firstgrade. She also served as a
math coordinator through theOrange County Department of
Education and she's now part oftheir Teaching, Learning and
Instructional LeadershipCollaborative team. And I have
(07:52):
a personal connection to sharehere as well, because not only
was Dr. Guarino my professorfor many classes at UCI, but I
was a teacher at the schoolwhen she was spearheading this
project that we're gonna talkabout today, about fluency. And
so before Dr. Guarino joins usin the Lounge, let me just give
a little, brief summary of thisproject. So, K–8 public charter
(08:17):
school. And basically K–5, theprincipal had made a commitment
that we were gonna focus onfluency all year long. So as a
teacher, I was told, "Thisyear, we're gonna be focusing
on fluency, not only withinyour grade level, but we're
gonna be building verticalalignment and talking about it
(08:39):
with teachers K–5." So, frombefore school started: "Hey,
this is our big project for theyear, and we're gonna be
crafting the story of fluency."What did fluency look like at
this school for students? And Imean, that commitment is, I
think, incredibly powerful. Andto involve administration, but
(09:00):
then also someone from outside,Dr. Guarino, who brings that
like system-wide expertise andwill be able to come in with a
fresh vision and help guide ourprofessional development. I
just thought, "What a coolproject, and how e xciting to
be a part of it." And I'm soexcited to welcome Dr. Guarino
to the Lounge to tell us moreabout it. So let's welcome her.
Dr. Guarino, hi! We're soexcited to have you in the
(09:23):
Lounge. Welcome.
Dr. Jody Guarino (09:24):
Hi, thank you for having me.
Dan Meyer (09:27):
We're thrilled you're here and we're always
curious, for our guests whocome on, about your own journey
in fluency. Thinking about mathfluency conjures up lots of
prior images for people, thatcan get a little bit
challenging to untangle andmesh with research. So we love
to just say, "Hey, outside ofmath, in your own life, as
personally or professionally asyou want to get, where is an
(09:49):
area that you've been trying todevelop fluency? And what's
something you've done to try todevelop that?"
Dr. Jody Guarino (09:56):
Sure. So
When I listened to the firstepisode and heard Jason Zimba
talking about roasting chicken, he got me thinking. So for
me, I started doing Pilates afew years ago. And at the time,
I was like learning vocabulary,and I would listen to the
instructor cues and interpretthem and attempt to do them.
And often my attempts would befollowed up with some immediate
feedback from the instructor: "Make sure your knees are (10:18):
undefined
aligned with your ankles," ordifferent feedback. And now,
having practiced a few years, Iwouldn't say I'm fluent, but my
form has certainly improved,and I think it's just been
practice over time andcontinuing to engage in the
work.
Dan Meyer (10:34):
Super-helpful illustration here. Tell me
about the feedback a little bitmore. Have there been moments
where there's feedback thatworks and doesn't work? And all
the meta-analyses say, like, athird of attempts at feedback
do worse than no feedback atall. So can you say what's been
good and great feedback for youin Pilates?
Dr. Jody Guarino (10:56):
So I think there's a mix. There's
certainly verbal feedback.
Sometimes it's helpful toactually show people. Like,
actually come up and model themove. Or reposition. So I think
the feedback looks all sorts ofdifferent ways ... but it's
immediate. And I think that'sthe big thing. And that's
something that I love aboutPilates. There's an instructor
walking around giving everyonefeedback all the time, and it's
(11:17):
sort of an expectation to helpus all get better so we're not
injuring ourselves.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (11:23):
Well, iit sounds like some of those
moves that took up so much ofyour thought processes, so much
of your working memory, that Ihave to like, "What am I doing?
Wait , where are my knees?"Some of those things are now
incorporated into your work,right? Like the fluency we hope
for our kiddos.
Dr. Jody Guarino (11:41):
Totally.
Yeah.
Dan Meyer (11:41):
It's awesome. The stuff that used to be hard is
now your fluent edit. Whichallows you to do, I assume,
more complex ... Pilate moves?
I call them "Pilate moves"'cause I don't know what I'm
talking about.
Dr. Jody Guarino (11:53):
Dan Meyer (11:54):
And just to squeeze a little more juice out of this
orange, I love theseconversations about
extracurricular fluency. But Iwonder if, with Pilates,
there's ways that your own bodygives you feedback that's not
related to the instructor.
Like, "Ah, this doesn't feelquite right. This feels a
little bit awkward or evenpainful." And that's its own
form of feedback.
Dr. Jody Guarino (12:13):
Dan Meyer (12:14):
And if and when that's possible in math
education. Or when you can lookat a co-learner and see when a
co-learner is doing the samething a little differently, and
how that happens in matheducation with a group of
learners together. Anyway, allvery interesting. Thank you for
sharing.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (12:32):
I don't know, my sweat and tears
in my high school math classwas giving me a lot of
feedback.
Dan Meyer (12:39):
A lot of negative feedback?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (12:41):
In the thick of the deepest part
of my math anxiety. But I lovethat, and I'm picturing you —
you go to that first class,you're nervous, and of course,
next to you on the Reformer issomebody who you know is five
years ahead of you, 10 years,20, whatever, in their
practice. And how, if it's agreat instructor, they're
(13:02):
making space for everyone. Andmaybe they're physically
manipulating your body in a waythat you're like, "Oh, that's
what it feels like. OK. OK."I'm digging it. I love it.
Thank you for sharing that.
Thank you f or, I'm tellingyou, I wanna go to class with
you and I want to have someroast chicken with Jason Zimba.
Dan Meyer (13:19):
Reformer?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (13:22):
It is.That's the machine .
Dan Meyer (13:23):
OK, so you're manipulating your body in the
Reformer. This sounds like theSpanish Inquisition, that
torture device
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (13:30):
It actually kind of looks like
that.
Dan Meyer (13:31):
Cool. Good to know.
Bethany Lockhart Johns (13:32):
Anyway, as much as I have a lot more
questions about your classes,what I'm so excited to share
with listeners is I got to be aparticipant in this project,
but I don't know anything abouthow it came to be. I know that
as a teacher, our principalbasically had total buy-in and
(13:56):
was like, "Guess what we'refocusing on in our PD sessions,
K–5; it's fluency," and it wasjust such a unique experience.
So before we talk about thedetails of the project, I would
love to hear a little bit ofthe backstory. How did it come
to be that you were leadingwith the principal this
(14:16):
yearlong fluency study?
Dr. Jody Guarino (14:19):
Sure. So at the time I was a math
coordinator, contracted to workwith the school. And there were
some comments, actually, fromupper-grade teachers, like, "My
students aren't fluent; I'm notsure if they can do this other
thing, because kids are comingto me not knowing their math
facts." So there had been thisdiscussion, which I'm sure
we've all sort of heard indifferent spaces. And so the
(14:40):
principal identified this needto work on fluency. For me, it
was sort of the perfect storm,because at the time I had
already been working with ValHenry — who was on one of your
episodes — and doing work in myown first-grade classroom in
prior years based on her work.
So she had done some fluencyresearch and it had amazing
(15:01):
results. Like, the effect sizewas over 1.0, and even higher
for Spanish-speaking kids. So,super interesting that it had
strong results. So myfirst-grade team and I started
this work. And we had workedwith Val for probably a few
years. And once we got itgoing, we saw amazing results.
So this was before Common Core,and our kids would leave first
(15:24):
grade proficient up to what'snow the second-grade fluency
standard. And we had seenresults that we'd never seen
before. So prior to that wewere doing, I think, really
traditional practices — thingslike flashcards and timed
tests. So, working with Val asa teacher really shifted my
understanding of fluency. So,when my job was supporting
(15:47):
teachers, supporting schools ,supporting districts as a math
coordinator at Orange CountyDepartment of Ed, at that
point, the leadership of theschool I had a contract to work
with had identified the need towork on fluency. So when the
principal of the schoolmentioned that, I was like, "Oh
my gosh, this is great. We needto bring in Dr. Henry's work."
Because I'd had such positiveexperiences over the last few
years in my own classroom.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (16:09):
So, what I think is interesting
here is you had experiencedwhat it looked like when as a
grade level you worked onfluency, right? You experienced
that. So you mentioned thatsocial setting, you had
partners, accountabilitybuddies, to work with and say,
like, "OK, I'm having thisissue," or, "Whoa, this really
(16:30):
worked well." So how did youtake what you experienced in
that setting? How did you usethat to create something that
was gonna span K–5?
Dr. Jody Guarino (16:44):
Yeah. So, I think the social nature of it
was critical to me, thinkingabout how do we do this both as
grade-level teams and a wholeschool? And that was something
that I hadn't experiencedbefore. When we did, it was
just my first-grade team. So Iwas really thinking about, "How
is this relevant to every gradelevel at the school?" And
(17:05):
luckily enough, upper-gradeteachers saw this as a need.
Like, everybody wanted fluency,and fluency for kids. That sort
of made the perfect storm ofeverybody was in and had a
shared interest in doing thework together. The school also
was a very collaborative spacealready. And they had
structures like professionallearning communities; students
(17:26):
went to specials. So there wascollaboration time built into
the day. So all of thestructures were already there.
It was more a matter of, "OK,how do we do this together?" We
also ended up talking aboutwhat spaces were common. So ,
at this particular school, Ibelieve Wednesdays were
early-out days. So what wouldit look like for the whole
staff to engage in this, once amonth? It didn't feel like each
(17:50):
team working in isolation, buteveryone together. And in that,
we also came up with the needof, like, "How would we
communicate about this? Andwhat protocols would be
helpful, school-wide, so thatwe're all using shared
language? And using language inways that we also have shared
meaning? So how do weco-construct ways that we're
(18:12):
gonna talk about things, andeven develop a shared vision?
What does fluency look like andsound like? What do we want for
kids and what do we wanthappening in classrooms?" The
school was a project-basedlearning school, so everything
was very like hands-on, reallythinking about all of those
things as well. At thebeginning, there was a lot of
(18:33):
development. One of the thingswas about, "How are we gonna
know if students are makingprogress? What would assessment
look like?" And for that, I canremember, Bethany being in your
classroom, kids were playinggames and we were just
listening in, like, "Oh mygosh, did you notice what that
student just did?" They wereplaying the card game Go Fish.
And if they were playing Fishfor five, instead of asking for
(18:55):
pairs, if they had a three,they might ask for a two. So
things like, "How are we goingto watch kids doing the tests
they're doing, but how will wecollect and keep track of
information in ways that'sthat's humanizing?" So we
weren't gonna do any timedtests or any sort of written
things that you wouldtraditionally think about
measures. But how would we dothat? And how would we keep
(19:17):
track of that information? Andin terms of assessment, also
thinking about, we can gaininformation on kids from
engaging with them inactivities. And then there are
probably some kids that we werelike, "Ooh, I'm not really
sure, I'm not really sure howPresley is thinking about this
particular thing, so let me goover and ask her."
Dan Meyer (19:36):
I would love to just back up a second and just
replay for myself, see if I gotthis, and what parts I'm
missing, if I could. First,there was a rationale for this:
Our fluency scores, ourindicators, are not where we
want them to be, let's say. Andthere's vertical integration.
Where the upper school or themiddle school said, "Hey, we
would love to see studentscoming to us with some
(19:56):
different kinds of skills andfluency developed already." So
you established that, and thenif I'm hearing you right,
there's just a fairly lengthyperiod, that my sense is,
should not be shortened. Even alittle bit of establishing
shared goals, shared languagearound what we mean by fluency,
what it looks like in theclassroom, ideas about
(20:20):
assessment. And you folksdevised collectively other
kinds of assessments thatweren't the kinds that often
turn kids off of fluency andgive meager kinds of
information but kind ofenvironmental fluency
indicators? And it sounds likethat was to both predict what
might be the final boss-stageindicator of the end-of-course
(20:43):
exam, but also to give theopportunity to celebrate some
wins along the way. Am am Igetting that right? Those feel
like some very interestingsteps that other leaders could
follow all the way through.
What did I miss there?
Dr. Jody Guarino (20:57):
For sure. I think that's pretty much how it
was. If I go back to themeaning of the word "assess,"
like, "to sit alongside andlisten," I think that's what we
did. So, kids would be playinggames and we would just be sort
of leaning in and maybe notsaying anything but just
listening to what they weredoing and then internally, "Oh
my gosh, that's so great, lookwhat just happened." And sort
(21:19):
of keeping track of that andcelebrating with kids, too.
Like, "Oh, I noticed that whenyou had three, you asked him
for a five. Like, wow." But Idon't ever feel like they were
being evaluated or judged,which I think assessment
sometimes does. It feels likeit turns more into evaluation
and sort of sorting kids. Andthis was the total opposite of
that. It was just likelistening in. And then, if
(21:43):
there was evidence that wedidn't have — like, "I'm not
really sure" — then we wouldinformally just ask, like, "Hey
Bethany, how did you solve thatone when you got to, I don't
know, nine plus six? What didyou do? What did you think
about?" So I think from thestudent perspective it was more
about, "Wow, my teacher'scurious about my thinking!" or
"My teacher wants to listen tome, or values my ideas!" I
(22:04):
mean, to me, that's whatassessment is anyway, but it's
often not the studentexperience. I didn't feel like
there was ever pressure on kidsor any sort of negative
connotations around assessment.
It was all like, "OK, what dothey know?" And Dan, you sort
of brought up that idea oflike, "What can we celebrate?"
Like, we've made this greatprogress and we're noticing
(22:26):
this stuff, and then what'snext? What do we, as teachers,
do? I think every teacher wouldtell you one resource we don't
have enough of is time. So howdo we make sure we know where
kids are, to think about, "OK,we need to spend a little more
time on this," or, "We're readyto move on."
Dan Meyer (22:41):
What you said there seems so true to me. That that
students really like and learnfrom teachers who like and
learn from them. It feels to melike teachers who present
themselves as students of theirstudents and their thinking,
that seems really powerful.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (22:54):
Yeah, I'd love to talk a little bit
more about assessment. Becausewhat I remember as a teacher in
my classroom, we definitely didone-on-one interviews with
students where we'd show theman expression and we'd ask
them, like, "What's two andthree more? What's two and
three? or what's two plusthree?" And we would make
(23:17):
detailed notes about how theysolved. Did they solve like
with counting? Did they justknow it? Or did they use a
strategy? Maybe they said ,"Five." And I'd say, "Well, how
did you get that?" And they'dsay, "Well I knew three and
three is six, so I just tookone away." Now I'm not saying
that's what happened. But I'msaying, "Did they use a known
fact, a derived fact, to helpthem answer an assessment
(23:39):
question?" So we did that andthat really helped us to
understand where our studentswere. And we would do that a
couple times throughout theyear with the students, like,
as they progressed through thedifferent goals. But then, like
you were saying, Jody , it wasso powerful to take formative
(24:00):
assessment notes while theywere playing games, while we
were having class discussions.
We really learned the power ofeveryday listening to students'
thinking. And you know, thoseon-the-spot, in-the-moment
questions as well. We learnedso much from that, too. There
were definitely no timed tests, definitely no timed tests .
So their assessments were veryrelaxed, just a goal of like,
(24:23):
"Hey, show what you know" kindof thing. And it was an
important part of theassessment, but it a hundred
percent wasn't the wholepicture that we were building
of where our class was.
Dan Meyer (24:34):
I'm sort of curious about the student experience at
a little more depth. It soundslike you folks adopted a
particular program ... andthere's lots of programs out
there. Without getting into anykind of product
recommendations, let's say,what are the features of the
student experience, as comparedto, perhaps, what they were
experiencing before thiswholesale shift in approach at
(24:57):
the school level?
Dr. Jody Guarino (24:59):
Absolutely.
So, this work was grounded insome research principles, one
of which was we spent 10 to 15minutes a day on fluency. We
used Dr. Valerie Henry's work.
And in her research findings,it didn't matter if you spent
10 minutes or 30 minutes — youwould get the same results. So
we were really just spendingfive to 10 minutes a day. And
(25:21):
it was a lot of games. Andthere was sort of a progression
from concrete torepresentational to abstract.
So an example of a concretegame: You might picture those
two color counters, thoseyellow and red counters. And
kids might have five countersand they would just sort of
shake them or toss them andcount. Like, "Oh, I got four
and one," and do it again and"I got three and two." How many
(25:45):
times can they do that in fiveto 10 minutes? And every time,
it's just repeated practice offour and one, three and two,
five and zero. They were allred. So that was an example of
a concrete activity. And anexample of an abstract
activity, as I mentionedbefore, the game Go Fish. So if
we're working on facts of 10,then maybe we're looking for
(26:07):
pairs of 10. So the studentexperience was very much like
games. The other thing that Ishould mention — and this sort
of going back to even myPilates experience — was this
idea of immediate feedback. Somost of the activities kids did
in pairs. So they wereconstantly getting feedback
from their partner. If they hada six and were asking for a
(26:29):
four, you know, and theirpartner gave 'em a four, and
they realized , "Wait a minute,that wasn't the right number,"
they would get instantfeedback, rather than
practicing somethingincorrectly. And then it also
didn't take the role of theteacher, because it wasn't the
teacher walking around givingfeedback; it was sort of built
into the structure of all ofthe activities. So I think for
kids, fluency was fun. And, youknow, they might come in from
(26:53):
recess like, "Oh, now we get toplay with the counters!" or
"...play cards!" or whatever. Idon't think they ever looked at
it as, "Ohhh, fluency."
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (27:01):
I remember we did, after the five
to 10 minutes or whatever — Ithink it ended up being about
15, because we'd pull studentsback to the carpet to have a
quick conversation about whatthey had just done, like, "What
did you notice?" or "What didyou know?" Maybe questions we'd
come up with ahead of time. Andthen sometimes it was just
(27:22):
things we'd seen based onstrategies: "When I was walking
around, I saw Jody and Dandoing this really interesting
thing. They had these countersand they were using it to..."
and we we'd pull outexperiences. And I felt that
coming back together cementedthe learning, in a way. Yes, it
(27:42):
was games, but it also gave theopportunity for reflection on
the experience that thestudents had just had.
Dr. Jody Guarino (27:49):
For sure.
That feels like, Bethany, oneof the most critical pieces.
Because I think prior to that... I mean, everybody does a
lot of games in theirclassroom. And sometimes I
think kids are just takingaway, "Oh, it's game time,"
versus actually, as you'retalking about, those debriefs.
Like, "OK, what did you noticeabout different ways to make
10?" or "Were there particularways that were easy for you to
think about and other ones thatyou're still working on?" We
(28:12):
also spent a lot of time thatyear, as I mentioned, in the
monthly staff meetings, reallythinking about, "How would we
even make public records fromthose debriefs?" So I can still
picture, Bethany , one of thecharts in your room was Ways to
Make Five. And so, whether kidswere working with connecting
Unifix cubes, or a common taskwith little kids was "show me
(28:33):
five," where they would justhold up their hand, or "show me
four," and then they might showfive in two ways and talk about
... a lot of times kids didsomething like this, where they
were putting a stick or apencil between their fingers:
Like, five is two and three.
And I think about all of thosesort of charts, because that
really also led to S & P Seven.
Like, seeing and usingstructure as they're thinking
(28:56):
about math fluency and factsand relationships between
things. So that was a reallyimportant piece, the debrief
and then the public records orthe charting that came from
that as well.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (29:07):
So before we talk about how you
saw this evolving over theyear, I wanna just help frame
it a little bit. Because Ithink something that was so
interesting is you did such agood job of basically getting
us invested. You and theprincipal did a very good job
of getting us invested in, "I'mteaching kindergarten, but all
(29:32):
of these students are ourstudents. We care about what
they're gonna be encounteringnext. And what if you're a
student in this school —whatwill your experience of fluency
be, K–5?" And initially, therereally weren't these
touchstones that we could speakto. We may have all had similar
training, but it was thatnorming — getting on the same
(29:55):
page about what fluency soundslike, what it looks like, how
do we talk about it, what areexperiences and activities that
students can do in this grade —that could carry over to the
next grade. And so, I think iffolks are listening and they're
thinking, "Well what could thislook like?" I think it's really
important to emphasize thatnorming that you talked about.
(30:16):
And then, also, thosestructures that you mentioned
were in place. Weekly, we weremeeting as a staff in your
team, your grade-level team.
So, every week, you mettogether with your other direct
peers in your grade level, andyou're working on this for a
part of the staff meeting, butthen at one of our staff
meetings that month, we'd cometogether K–5 and do those
(30:40):
check-ins where we are craftingthat story, K–5, and really
using those protocols that youhelped to build. So I am
inserting that because I feellike as you're talking, I'm
reflecting on, "Oh, I feel likethat's some of the reasons why
it worked." I don't know , Iwas really excited to be a part
of that. And I feel like asyou're talking about it, I'm
(31:02):
remembering how intentional youwere about those pieces to help
build this project.
Dr. Jody Guarino (31:08):
I think that's huge, and comes back to
that idea, even, of our visionof learning in community. What
do we think it means to learnand even to collaborate? The
entire school was workingtoward the same goal, with the
same vision. So I think it alsooffered ... the goal was not
around team-building andcommunity-building, but I think
(31:28):
it actually did that at thesame time. Because we all
wanted the same thing. And asyou mentioned, it was like we
were all here for all kids. Sohow do we navigate this
together? I think the otherthing was that before we had
these systems in place, everyteacher had two days of
professional learning. And Ithink that's another important
thing. Because I feel it'spretty easy to go to
(31:51):
professional learning and belike, "OK, yeah, I wanna do
that. I totally buy in. I didthose activities and I'm
excited." And I go back to myspace and I try some things and
then I'm like, "Now what? I'mnot really sure what to do
next." And so I think the valuein that was having people in
community to try things with.
Far beyond ... it's one thingto go to professional learning
(32:13):
and even, "YES! That is what Iwant!" But then to go back and
you're sort of on your own,isolated, to "What was that
thing again?" Or you know, onceyou jump in, you have questions
that you didn't have, for thetwo days that you were sitting
there, right?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (32:26):
What do you do with those conference
notes, right? You went to thisgreat session, you're fired up,
or you're listening to thispodcast, and you're like, "Ooh,
I wanna try this," but whatcould you put into place that
allows that to be possible?
Dr. Jody Guarino (32:39):
Yeah. And how do you do that with other
people? Right ? So that you'resort of comparing conference
notes, or "What did you do withthat?" or "How did you take up
that idea?" or "How are youmaking sense of it?" So that,
to me, was the beauty in thiswhole thing. It was building
upon a shared experienceeveryone had, but navigating it
together.
Dan Meyer (32:57):
I'd love to think about — just briefly, here —
how teachers developed.
Obviously the studentsdeveloped in some fantastic
ways. I am always just dazzledand kind of scared to think
about how secondary teachersknow a lot about one thing and
primary teachers need to know alot about a lot of things. And
that seems like a realchallenge. So, when you talk
(33:17):
about debriefs and creatingtakeaways with students,
there's a lot of math knowledgeand pedagogical content
knowledge going on there. Howdid teachers develop that? Was
that through the two PD days,primarily? Through Val Henry's
work? Or were there elementsthroughout the PLCs or
throughout the year that resultin teachers feeling more
(33:38):
confident to do more than justsay, "OK it is time for these
intentionally designed games,"but to make more out of it?
Dr. Jody Guarino (33:45):
I would say all of the above! I think
certainly there was a lot togain from the professional
learning. I mean, for a lot ofus it was like, "Oh, that's
what fluency looks like andsounds like!" I know before I
started working with Val , tome it was like, "Memorize
facts," and just, automaticity,where I hadn't really thought
about strategies and studentflexibility. So, I think there
(34:06):
was a lot of learning aboutthat content knowledge. And
even, like, why does thatmatter? So that was a huge
thing. Because I thinkmemorizing your facts is
different than, you know, "If Iknow nine plus six is 15, how
does that help me when I'mworking with 39 plus 26?" Like,
these ways of thinking. So Ithink it supported, actually,
teacher flexibility andthinking, too. I know it did
(34:28):
for me. Like, I would say Ihave a different level of
fluency from doing this workmyself. I think, also, as
you're mentioning vision andbeliefs, that was huge. So
seeing that kids actually cando this was so powerful.
Bethany, I think aboutkindergarten — the goal at the
time was fluency to five. Andat some point, we were like,
(34:51):
"Whoa, we're not even halfwaythrough the year, and kids have
got it. They've got the end ofthe grade-level standard,
halfway through the year. Oh mygosh, what do we do now?" And I
think there was a lot of energyand excitement around that,
because maybe we hadn't beensuccessful before, or actually
had this vision of like what itcould look like. So, I think it
definitely impacted teachers'vision of what could be, and
(35:12):
also beliefs, because we saw itwith our own kids. We saw it
with the kids that, you know,prior, we had thought, "They're
not fluent." And now, it'slike, "Wait a minute! They
are!" And it was these thingsthat we did that led them to
this! So I think there was — Idon't know — celebration, in
that I can remember aparticular note-taking sort of
(35:32):
protocol that we had, whereteachers would set, like, smart
goals (35:37):
"By whatever date this percentage of kids would be
fluent!" And then we wouldreflect on, like, "Did we get
there?" And it was always thisreally positive celebration of,
"Wow, it can be done!" And atthe beginning, we were sort of
setting arbitrary goals, like,"What does it look like to work
toward 10 over a year?" andjust kind of pacing it. Versus
now (35:55):
Like, "Oh my gosh, that actually worked, and we made it
work." And also, pedagogically,as we had mentioned, or Bethany
mentioned, the charting. Therewas a lot of conversations
about that. Like, "I wanna havea debrief after we do this
activity, but I don't reallyknow the question I might ask."
Or, "I asked this question andkids just stared at me and it
(36:17):
fell flat." So then somebodymight suggest, "Well, try
this." Or "What do you thinkabout this other idea?" So I
think every single thing led tolearning. Whether it was the
professional learning, thecollaboration in practice,
watching kids do things that wewere like, "Whoa, that was
really effective" or "I'm notsure they're really taking away
what I was hoping for in thisparticular activity." So I'd
(36:40):
say a lot of learning to learn,from teaching. I dunno.
Bethany, does that resonatewith your experience?
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (36:46):
Yeah, absolutely. It's really nice to
hear you reflect on it. 'Causeit's making me think about,
there was so much power infocusing on that, and having
such investment from theprincipal, with your expertise,
with Dr. Henry's research. ButI wanna make sure that as we
(37:09):
are sharing this, I want folkswho are listening to be able to
take away like, "Yeah, if yourschool can can focus on this,
imagine the power," right? Butrealistically, how do we as
educators ... I mean, maybe weare able to head in that
direction, but what are somethings that would be your
(37:31):
biggest takeaways from thewhole experience? For
educators, what advice wouldyou want to leave them with
that maybe you learned fromthis experience? And I feel
like you've already shared alot of those keys throughout,
but maybe if there's anythingelse in particular...?
Dr. Jody Guarino (37:46):
I guess one of the things — or this is two
things together — I think ittakes time and it takes
friends. So what we'redescribing, that was over an
entire year-long process. So, Ithink one of the things is not
to give up, but just keeptrying different things and
reflecting on progress. What'sworking, what's not working.
(38:07):
And when I say it takes timeand friends, at least in that
situation, I think there was alot of leaning into each other.
So I think, if people areinterested in working on
fluency, finding a friend —even if that friend isn't at
your school or at your gradelevel — who can be that
accountability partner orthought partner, that you can
lean on each other as you'redoing this. I think another
(38:30):
really important thing is tosort of have a shared vision
and shared goals that you'reworking on together. So, what
does fluency look like andsound like? For me, another big
thing when I started this wasjust learning.I wasn't up to
speed on fluency research, andI didn't really have any ideas
of anything beyond myflashcards and timed tests. So
(38:53):
that could be a big thing too —just looking at some research,
or what's out there that's alsoaligned with your philosophy
and beliefs . So, as Imentioned, the assessment
things that we use ... like,how do you make sure whatever
you're doing is aligned withthe experiences that you want
for kids? And what you want tobe remembered by as
(39:14):
contributing? Like, I certainlydon't wanna be remembered as,
you know, the time that Istarted hating math in third
grade because I didn't know mymath facts, and I was that
teacher, or whatever. So whatdo we really want for our kids?
That feels like a reallyimportant thing. The other
thing I would say in our workthat I didn't talk about at all
is the role of theadministrator. And the
(39:34):
understanding. And I think thatis so pivotal. Because in that
situation, the principal wasreally supportive in creating
structures and time, and notmoving onto the next thing.
Like, "Oh yeah, we met aboutfluency next last week; we're
done now."
Bethany Lockhart J (39:50):
Absolutely, absolutely.
Dr. Jody Guarino (39:51):
Like, really understood that it was a
journey. But also, in terms ofprincipals, allocating the
resources, the people, thetime, the funding for the
professional learning. Andmaking decisions that were
aligned to that, versus what ifhe had gone out in the middle
of the year and just been like,"Yeah, I'm over that. I'm gonna
go get some computer game." Orsomething. Like, the level of
(40:14):
understanding and vision of theleader seemed really important
too. So, I would say, if peopleare starting this on their own,
bring in your leader with you.
And have them experience thesame sort of things you're
working on together. Feels likeit could be useful.
Bethany Lockhart Johnso (40:29):
That's also useful! And I want to
thank you for being a part ofcreating this opportunity, and
sharing your insights. I knowit's hard to sum up a year-long
project in
of those really key touchstonesthat helped ground that story
of fluency K–5, you were ableto share that. Really, really
(40:53):
appreciate you joining us inthe Lounge, Dr. Guarino.
Dr. Jody Guarino (40:57):
Well, thank you for having me.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (40:58):
Come back any time.
Dan Meyer (41:00):
Thank you so much.
Take care.
Bethany Lockhart Johnso (41:02):
Thanks so much for listening to our
conversation with Dr. JodyGuarino, former classroom
teacher who is now part of theOrange County Department of
Education Teaching, Learningand Instructional Leadership
Collaborative team. Check outthe show notes for links to
more resources. And let us knowwhat you thought of this
episode. I am fired up. I'm allexcited thinking about this
(41:24):
project, and remembering beinga part of it, and I'm just
like, "Let's go! Let's go domore fluency things!" It was a
lot of fun. Visit us in ourFacebook discussion group, Math
Teacher Lounge (41:35):
The Community.
And to make sure that you don'tmiss any new episode in our
season-long deep dive into mathfluency, you can subscribe to
Math Teacher Lounge podcasts onany and all podcast platforms.
And let me tell you, the bestway to share the love is with a
review, or let your let yourfriends know. Let your teacher
(41:58):
friends know. Maybe there's anidea that that sparked for you,
and you can say, "Hey, givethis a listen . Hey, you wanna
try something? You wanna teamup and try this, and report
back?" And then message us andtell us what you did. See, it's
a community. You can find moreinformation on all of Amplify's
shows at our podcast hub. Go toAmplify.com/hub. And finally,
(42:21):
here's a little sneak previewof what's to come on our next
episode.
Myuriel von Aspen (42:24):
For some children, we — the teachers —
might be the only ones that cansupport them with the work of
fluency, of learning their mathfacts. Because maybe they have
parents at home that areworking two jobs, three jobs,
and may not have thoseopportunities that other
children have at home. And so,taking away those opportunities
(42:46):
from our students , we'retaking away the chance for them
to learn higher math later on.
Because we are what they haveto learn those foundational
skills.
Bethany Lockhart Johnson (42:55):
We hope you'll join us next time
on Math Teacher Lounge. Thanksso much for listening.
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