The MFJS Reporter — Winter 2020 T-R

To understand this type of a curriculum, one must know what a learning trajectory is. A learning trajectory consists of three pieces: the goal or where you want the kid to go, the developmental progression or the necessary steps to get there, and the instructional activities or how to move from step to step.

This is the backbone of “Building Blocks” itself, a curriculum individualized to every student so that the one’s in need of help don’t get left behind, but the children who are ahead don’t get bored and wander off.

“Early literacy predicted better reading,” Sarama said. “But early math predicted better math and reading, just as well as early learning. Math is more predictive than other things.”

With the adjustment and individualization of learning trajectories as well as the newfound focus on early mathematics, “Building Blocks” was born. Sarama and her team started implementing the practice in schools to see how it would work in actual classrooms, but the kids were the easy part.

Sarama, for most of this lecture, focused the most on the teachers, as they are the catalysts for a child’s education, one of the many vessels from which a child can learn.

“[The teachers] had to change from a detrimental mindset to a developmental mindset,” Sarama said, her microphone-enhanced voice reverberating off of the walls of the atrium. “They had to move on from moving from page one to page two and so on.”

“Building Blocks” isn’t linear like a textbook, but rather progressive in the way that nobody skips steps, because each step requires use of the previous steps while also teaching new skills that will be used in future steps. Some children may move faster than others, and that’s okay, but it’s the teacher’s job to realize this and adjust based on the child.

As the audience slowly nibbled on the complementary pizza, Sarama continued to elaborate on why this curriculum is so effective, and that is the emphasis on elaboration.

“The key is asking the kids ‘Why?’ or ‘How do you know that?’” Sarama said.

Asking for the kids to explain their thought processes not only helps with them better understanding math, but it helps with their literacy as well. Kids are not only learning how to solve problems, but also learning how to articulate their thoughts into words.

“Kids’ literacy results were not affected by the focus on early math, if anything they were increased,” Sarama said.

Furthermore, asking “Why?” helps the teachers better understand their students’ way of thinking. The trouble implementing “Building Blocks” was the teachers, some unable to grasp the new ways, but when they did, positive results were seen.

“It all comes down to the teachers’ understanding,” said Sarama.

The “Building Blocks” curriculum’s emphasis on math is not unwarranted, according to the data, and if focused on at an early age, helps kids develop an extremely wide variety of skills outside of math, such as literacy, reading, and analysis.

Just as the crowd was getting up to reload their plates with pizza and salad, Sarama concluded with a phrase that tied a perfect bow onto her lecture.

“Math matters, even though you think it doesn’t.”