Instructional Model
A-B-C Instructional Framework
Lessons within the A-B-C Instructional framework are structured as follows:
ACCESS (5-10 minutes)
Provides opportunities for:
• Engaging learners, leveraging prior knowledge, sparking
interest
• Facilitating mathematical conversations to build connections
• Supporting various ways learners make their understandings
visible
Focus: Developing and expressing mathematical language
BUILD (35-40 minutes)
Provides opportunities for:
• Developing luencies with graduated levels of support
• Questioning, responding, and giving suggestions to support learning
• Reflecting on mistakes and misconceptions to improve understanding
Focus: Communicating about understanding, reasoning, evidence,
strategies, and lingering questions
CONNECT (5-7 minutes)
Provides opportunities for:
• Connecting learner-generated strategies to procedures
• Engaging in challenging tasks that allow learners to transfer knowledge to new situations
• Identifying, expressing, and applying critical connections between and among mathematical skills and concepts
Focus: Building ability to communicate deep conceptual understanding and to ask meaningful questions to challenge misconceptions
WRAP-UP (3-5 minutes)
• Students express verbally or in writing what they “connected”
and learned.
PRACTICE
• Helps teachers make decisions about instructional grouping
and differentiation
• Up to 5 varied practice problems that allow students to
demonstrate learning
Flexible use:
• Could be done with whole group, in small groups with or
without the teacher, or independently (at the teacher’s discretion)
• Could be part of remediation
• Could be an extension of the Wrap-Up discussion
• Lives in the Student Edition (print and digital)
Check Your Understanding
• All lessons include a Check Your Understanding (CYU) section
that consists of 2–5 practice problems. These problems allow
teachers to collect information quickly and effectively about
students’ learning.
• The section can be assigned for independent practice during small group instruction (while the teacher works with other students) or homework.
• The section can include a little spiral review, but that should not be the focus of the CYU.
• These can be used for a grade.
• The Check Your Understanding problems are available in the digital Student Edition, and provided to the teacher for copying and distribution in the Teacher Edition. Answers to these problems appear within the Teacher Edition at point of use.
Assessment
Each Concept closes with a Concept Check-In and Remediation lesson. The Concept Check-In is a formative assessment that helps the teacher make instructional decisions. The Concept Check-In is accompanied by suggested strategies for addressing students’ lingering misconceptions and errors. Concept Check-In and
Remediation lessons are available in the digital Teacher Edition. A Unit Assessment is provided at the end of each unit of instruction. This assessment is summative and can be used for a grade.