planTeaching

(0) Introduction and links to the other teacher training topics

The ideas covered in plan teaching includes traditional lesson planning: who to teach what parts of the topic to, how to source the required teach-learn and practise-learn resources and to how make best use of the available time in the lesson.
However Plan Teaching with timely practice enables more than traditional lesson planning: assessment for learning data is robust and up to date, so small-bite and mastery learning is easy to achieve, (see assessment and feedback). This increases the likelihood of the teaching of the lesson being retained by the learner until the next lesson.
More than this however, the retrieval practice automatically scheduled by the app starting the next lesson, will gradually stretch the durability of the recall-ability of new learning until it becomes firm learning foundations. The app is able to work in concert with the teacher when feedback is required - see retrievalPracticeTheory(3).
Finally this page describes how the scheme of learning should follow a more tightly spiralled curriculum: the teaching on most topics is teaching a small bite more several times a year and how for learners who find maths learning (and more crucially retaining maths learning) difficult, can learn (and by learn we mean deeply embed new learning for the long term) far more content than with a traditional teach each-topic-once-a-year scheme of learning.

1 (0) Introduction and links to the other teacher training topics
2 (1) Key Changes: teach a small bite on firm foundations + embed that learning + then repeat
3 (2) Teach 1 layer per learner per topic per curriculum spiral
4 (3) Plan Teaching with timely practice
5 (4) Finding teaching and learning resources for timely practice teaching
6 (5) Moving from simple to more sophisticated lesson planning
7 (6) Schedule a cooldown before each holiday
8 (7) Consider firm foundations between topics

(1) Key Changes: teach a small bite on firm foundations + embed that learning + then repeat

We call this memory friendly teaching and it involves these 3 steps:

Teach a small bite on firm learning foundations so learners are more likely to retain the learning of the lesson until the next lesson.
Use increasing interval retrieval practice to extend the durability of the recall-ability of the small bite from the next lesson to a couple of months so
… the small bite is very likely to form firm foundations for future learning.

We can now repeat the process on another, small bite of learning from the same topic.

Teaching too large a bite or several small but similar bites or teaching on insecure learning foundations - means that although we are likely to see success of our teaching within the lesson - we are more likely to see the learner can’t independently recall and accurately apply the learning of the lesson the next lesson. i.e. not all teaching has become learning during the night after the lesson.
If the learner can independently recall and accurately apply the learning of the lesson the next lesson, they will forget that learning - or not be able to recall that learning - if they do not use the learning within a suitable time frame.
If we can successfully embedded a small bite of learning, but if we don’t repeat this process sufficiently frequently - by teaching a little more on the the topic several times a year - learners will still fall behind their peers who can learn larger bites at one time.

The steps in the summary guide us to the most efficient process:

Teach an appropriate grain size - for low attaining learners this is a small bite - but which bite? The timely practice app can help the teacher identify suitable next bites to teach and provide suitable teaching and learning resources and teacher training to give a very high chance of success.
Embed the learning using increasing interval retrieval practice and respond to the need for feedback. The timely practice app schedules the retrieval practice, the teacher provides the feedback within a time in the lesson allocated for this, whilst all the other learners in the class are productively engaged in embedding learning.
Spiral through the curriculum at a faster pace, whilst ensuring steps 1. and 2. are applied.

(2) Teach 1 layer per learner per topic per curriculum spiral

Summary: Learners are more likely to be able to build an accurate chunk in long term memory, during the night after the lesson, if we teach them one small bite - one timely practice layer - rather than if we teach them a “too-large-for-the-learner” bite i.e. several layers. Since the teaching and subsequent practice of a layer usually takes between 10 and 25 minutes, there will often be time to teach more than one topic per lesson, so the class can more quickly spiral through the curriculum if we use spare time to teach 1 small bite from 2 topics rather than 2 small bites from the same topic. In each spiral the teacher teaches less on a topic at one time but teaches many topics several times a year. In each curriculum spiral most learners learn and embed 1 small bite on to their existing firm learning foundations.

Adding 1 small bite more of firm learning foundations is far better then adding 2 or 3 small bites of muddled or incorrect learning.

Additionally if we return several times a year to add another small bite, each becoming firm learning foundations, we are teaching almost all our class, the same or more new learning as the most able in the class might otherwise learn.

In our development of timely practice and our training of teachers we have found that changing from an annual (depth-first) to a more tightly spiralled (breadth-first) scheme of learning is the hardest of the changes for teachers to take on. We accept that some schools would prefer to use timely practice without doing this - however our experience is that this significantly dilutes learning gain. For these schools we offer trials where they can measure and compare gains in embedded learning.

An effective revision program uses these key behaviours

pre assess: the learner decides what they need to learn,
a more tightly spiralled curriculum: the learner splits up what they will revise into smaller blocks and space these out over their revision program,
use of retrieval practice, self-assessment and feedback-when-necessary: to ensure that the learner fully retains all their learning, the learner reviews frequently what they have learned and gets help if necessary.

If we think about teaching following an annual scheme of learning it is much more like cramming than a good revision program since

pre assess: may not be done at all or may not be done in sufficient detail or may be difficult for the teacher to use,
all the teaching on a topic: is done within a short period of time and only once a year,
practice questions: are done within a short period of time.

However it is not surprising we teach like "cramming" - as it is easier for the teacher - and it works for most learners.

With timely practice the teacher can teach learners with a wide spread of attainment like an effective revision program rather than like cramming.

Suppose the "big" bite of teaching on a topic with blocked teaching could be split into 3 small "bites" and let's suppose the learners might judge them as: "OK", "hard" and "very hard". With blocked teaching a teacher might find that a few "more able" learners in the class learn and retain all of the "big" bite, but most learners will not. Instead with a more tightly spiralled scheme of learning, the teacher can teach

the "OK" bite in term 1,

the "hard" bite in term 2 and

the "very hard" bite in term 3.

However, since the learners master the "OK" bite during term 1, through their timely practice, when the teacher returns to teach the "hard" bite in term 2, the learners will find the "hard" bite much easier to learn. So now the learners will judge that bite as "OK" and by term 3 the "very hard" bite will also be "OK" for the learners to learn - as through retrieval practice with timely practice - they will have mastered both the "OK" and "hard" bites.

So by spacing out the teaching of a topic most of the class can learn and retain what the teacher was previously expecting only the more able in the class to learn.

The following sections describe in more detail

how the teacher can apply increasing interval retrieval practice, adjusted by feedback to help the learner to build chunks in long-term memory through regular timely practice during most maths lessons,
the most effective ways to teach new learning in the rest of the lesson.

(3) Plan Teaching with timely practice

Using timely practice to plan lessons increases the likelihood of teaching becoming deeply embedded learning because

the teacher can teach on firm learning foundations - see also assess and feedback (1)
the timely practice app can follow up the teaching of a layer in one lesson, by beginning retrieval practice on the layer in the next lesson - see also retrieval practice theory (4)

This mp4 0:00 to 1:22 shows how to use the progress on the topic fractionINTRO array, found in the Plan Teaching section of the tpTeach P&P session (planning and preparation), to decide which layer each learner will focus on.

Key to colour coding used in the progress on topic array found in Plan Teaching

unknown	in pre assess	in pre assess	doesn’t know	teach next	fragile	improving	mastered	covered

unknown	in pre assess	in pre assess	doesn’t know	teach next	fragile	improving	mastered	covered

It is quite common for the teacher to be able to use the progress on topic array to plan the teaching for most learners in a class, but find a few learners in the class who haven’t completed enough pre-assess. The timely practice app is designed to work around this. What the teacher will do is use the progress on topic array in Plan Teaching, for those learners that have sufficient data and make a best guess of which layer to teach, for those learners that don’t have enough data.

Everybody can be taught their layer, everybody can do the matching practise-learn worksheet, but only those learners with the yellow squares, the layers selected within Plan Teaching in the timely practice app, will get follow up retrieval practice.

Why? The teacher, learners and the timely practice app go to a deal of trouble to find learners' firm learning foundations and to make sure all the layers the learners already know are added into the learners' retrieval practice pool - to make sure they keep all of their learning fresh. We don’t want to undo all this hard work by adding new layers which may not be built on firm learning foundations.

The carefully curated retrieval practice pool ensures that learners can “get on with their timely practice assignment” whilst the teacher has time to give feedback. If we allow “barely better than a guess” layers to be added to the retrieval practice pool, the learners who arguably will benefit from timely practice the most

perhaps the learners are absent often,
perhaps they take longer to answer their questions because they struggle to read with meaning,
perhaps they take longer to answer their questions because of very inefficient 4 operation strategies,

will need too much feedback and will therefore get the least from timely practice.

(4) Finding teaching and learning resources for timely practice teaching

This mp4 1:22 to 2:25 shows how to find, download and print the right number of each print-learn and teach-learn resources, found in Learning Resources in the customer knowledge base, so they match the learners needs.

(5) Moving from simple to more sophisticated lesson planning

Planning the order and manner of teaching the layers of a topic is more of an art than a science.

As the teacher gets to know how the learners in the class learn, the teacher will become more skilled at this.

A simple lesson plan will usually be

a timely practice session (retrieval practice and feedback),
teach-learn (T-L) activities on the chosen topic layers, taught as a whole class in ascending order**
each learner completing their practise-learn (P-L) worksheet and self assessing it,
a lesson ender where the teacher reviews either the topic taught or key errors found in feedback-dialogue, a homework pep talk or a whole class numeracy game etc ….

The simple lesson plan could be described as

a timely practice assignment episode + T-L on topic A + P-L on topic A

(6) Schedule a cooldown before each holiday

A cooldown with timely practice involves some maths lessons where timely practice assignments are done, but no new layers are taught, just prior to a school holiday.

The purposes of a cooldown are

to avoid wasting teaching time: e.g. a newly taught layer will need more than a week of retrieval practice scheduled by timely practice before it is likely to be remembered for 2 weeks. Hence continue with timely practice assignments until the last lesson before a holiday, but without teaching any new content during the cooldown period. This will make better use of lesson time (use the rest of lesson time to do activities which aren’t learning new maths content - see suggestions below).
to embed learning prior learning so that it can be recalled, without recourse to feedback, after the holiday. If layers become overdue during a holiday, and can’t be asked, then the learner is less likely to be able to recall this learning after the holiday. By allocating some cooldown lessons before the holiday (for which the teacher creates assignments with e.g. 30% more questions), fewer layers are likely to become overdue during the holiday. Increasing the number of retrieval practice questions, means layers are more likely to be asked closer to when they are “ready” - rather than closer to when they become “overdue”.

(7) Consider firm foundations between topics

Usually the teacher will only need to consider the progress on topic of the topic they plan to teach, to decide which layer to teach each learner. However sometimes the teacher may need to look at the progress of topic of another topic.

e.g. for the topic expandLinear the teacher may need to look at the learners skills in simplifyPQ

The layers in timely practice are designed, such that teachers of nurture groups will rarely encounter these problems, but for avoid GCSE retake classes and GCSE retake classes, it may be useful to think about what skills from other topics are required

e.g. some stemLeaf layers require some MMMRQseparate layers