Assessment 2: Designing a research-informed Sequence of Learning (Critical Task)

Search for literature. 

Individually, select at least ten mathematics education literature sources that are about your focus area. The literature must have a research focus and be focused on the primary years (don't use literature focused on secondary students or pre-service teachers). You can support your literature review by using mathematics education professional journal articles, but the expected level is at least ten mathematics education research texts.  

Evaluate your chosen sources. 

Use the following questions to help you evaluate each piece of literature: 

What are important concepts/ideas that students are required to learn? 

What are the important key strategies, skills, ways of working mathematically, or proficiencies/processes that students must learn?

What are common misconceptions about your topic? 

What are important teaching strategies/pedagogical actions that teachers need to use?

What tasks are important that help students learn the content and proficiencies/processes? 

What specific representations and concrete materials are important to use? 

Organise your research by looking for common themes and patterns. 

You should interpret, analyse, and synthesise (bring together) different research perspectives – don't just retell information. Instead, you need to bring together similar themes and patterns across the texts that you have read. You can use the following questions to support your synthesis of multiple sources: 

What are the authors saying about your focus area? 

What are the most similar / different research findings? 

What themes are common within the literature in terms of what students need to learn and in terms of effective practice in teaching your focus area? 

What are the most influential theories/approaches? 

Organise your research into subtopics of similar themes or subtopics. 

Develop an overall thesis. 

Write a one or two sentence summary of what you have learned about your focus area. This is essentially what you see as the main trends and developments in the research on your focus area.

Write the paper. 

Your literature review should use the following structure:  

Introduction:

 Start your thesis by establishing your focus area and the purpose of the literature review, as well as your overall thesis that you wrote in Step 4. 

Body: 

Structure your body sections by themes or subtopics, not by individual theorists or researchers. 

Conclusion:

 Summarise your key findings (the common themes) and remind the reader why they are significant to your focus area. 

Reference list:

 In APA7 style.

We want to see clear evidence that you have engaged in the literature and that you have, at least, engaged in a genuine attempt to present the most important aspects of your topic: 

Mathematical knowledge, concepts, and ideas that students should learn.  

Mathematical skills, strategies, ways of working mathematically, or proficiencies/processes that students need to learn.   

Misconceptions that students might form.   

Teaching strategies / pedagogical actions, tasks, representations and concrete materials an effective teacher uses. 

Step 2: Design a unit of work (1000 words)

This unit of work will consist of a unit overview and a series of learning lessons (three lessons), please use the template given along with this document. You must design the unit of work for a Year 3, Year 4, Year 5, or Year 6 classroom.  

This planning document / unit of work should be designed with a focus on building students’ conceptual understanding and procedural fluency of your chosen topic. This means that the teaching and learning strategies articulated in the planner will be guided by practices and principles of effective mathematics teaching, as highlighted in EDMA602. Seeing that the Gradual Release of Responsibility (GRR) and the 'I do, we do, you do' approach are models for teaching in literacy education, you will not include references to them in your mathematics planning document/unit of work. 

Ensure that each learning lesson/lesson in the unit of work builds on the previous lesson. You should plan with the intention of supporting the students to connect learning from one lesson to the next. You need to provide evidence of your pedagogical reasoning, demonstrating that you can plan for a sequence of learning lessons appropriately. 

Working with your partner, use the following steps to help you complete your unit of work. 

Write a short rationale.

 The rationale explains the purpose of the unit of work and its intended impact on students’ learning (i.e., what will students know, understand, and do mathematically by the end of the unit of work). You will include references to literature to defend your pedagogical reasoning.  

Write a unit overview

. The overview elaborates more on the rationale for your unit of work that will include planning considerations, including curriculum links (content and proficiencies / processes). This short unit overview should highlight important aspects of the unit of work, including: 

Your chosen focus area. 

Unit title (give a name to your unit of work). 

Year level. 

Specific learning objectives / learning intentions. 

Curriculum links (content and proficiency / process strands). Discuss recommendations for effective pedagogical approaches to develop the chosen concept, including reference to appropriate curriculum documentation (e.g. ACARA F-6 Mathematics curriculum or equivalent state-based documentation, Early Years Learning Framework) in view of the ideas presented in your literature review. 

A description of the way in which cross-curriculum links.  

Possible misconceptions. 

Assessment strategies overview. 

Plan the

three

lessons. 

Draw on information about the practices and principles of effective mathematics teaching. Make sure the

3

lessons align with your rationale and unit overview and are ready to teach (i.e. the lessons could be used without further modification by in-service teachers). The planning considerations (key elements) that are expected in each lesson are: 

Learning intentions / maths

focus

for each lesson – these must align to your focus area. 

Use of lesson structures (e.g. Launch, Explore, Summarise). 

Explicit teaching for concepts and use of other appropriate high-impact teaching strategies for mathematics teaching and learning (as advocated for by the mathematics education field and made available to teachers at 

this website)

 

Tasks that elicit higher-order thinking, including games, investigations, and/or open-ended tasks (as appropriate). We’re looking for purposeful mathematics learning, not ‘art and craft’ activities or low-order drilling. Be sure to include at least one open-ended task. 

Concrete materials and representations to support learning, including manipulatives, diagrams, and visual representations (as appropriate). 

Appropriate and ethical use of ICT (at least one lesson should have the purposeful use of ICT). 

Ways to cater for diversity. For example, purposeful and authentic extensions and modifications for activities 

Teacher questioning. 

Assessment strategies and matching assessment criteria for analysing assessment data for each lesson (formative assessment and summative assessment). 

An appropriate amount of activity for each lesson/lesson phase and within the whole unit of work. 

Alignment within each lesson and between lessons (ensure lessons build on each other and are aligned to the focus area).