Instructional Minute

For years, many students have memorized steps or procedures without truly understanding the why behind them. This kind of learning may help students complete a worksheet, but it doesn’t build flexible, lasting mathematical understanding. Research consistently shows that deep conceptual understanding—making sense of ideas, relationships, and structures—is what enables students to later develop strong procedural skills and apply mathematics in new situations with confidence.

To bring Belief #3—Sense-Making Is a Key Skill in Mathematics—to life in classrooms, here are a few key practices:

• Build Conceptual Understanding First – Focus on the meaning behind mathematical ideas before introducing formal procedures.

• Use Visual Models and Representations – Help students make connections by grounding abstract ideas in concrete and pictorial models.

• Encourage Reasoning and Justification – Invite students to explain their thinking, compare strategies, and defend their conclusions.

• Connect Concepts to Procedures – Show how efficient methods grow naturally from conceptual understanding, not in place of it.

• Promote Mathematical Discussions – Use conversation to deepen understanding and help students make sense of ideas together.

Both of our new math curricular tools are designed to support this approach by emphasizing sense-making, conceptual development, and student reasoning at every grade level. When students understand the why behind the math, they become confident, flexible thinkers who can apply their knowledge in powerful ways.

Over the past four weeks, we’ve moved from understanding inquiry to doing inquiry. Bringing the C3 Framework to life means embedding curiosity, evidence, and reflection into our everyday teaching. Even small changes—like revising a question or trying a new type of student product—can create powerful shifts in engagement and learning.

💡 Reflection Prompt:
Which inquiry practice will you commit to trying (or refining) in your next unit, and how will you measure its impact on student learning?

As the first half of the year comes to a close, you're probably thinking about ways to keep your students engaged. The Amplify Core Knowledge Language Arts (CKLA) Knowledge Domains present unique opportunities to build your students’ background knowledge in tangible, exciting ways.

Amplify educators around the country have devised creative projects to engage their students, based on these immersive units. Take a look at what they’ve come up with, then plan something to captivate your students before winter break—and after!

As you wrap up the first half of the school year, are you looking for detailed information on student performance? The Amplify ELA Reporting app has you covered! Using this tool, you can easily track students’ results in their formative and summative assessments.

Here’s a snapshot of some of the reports you can access today:

• The Writing Prompts report pulls the AWE scores from Formative Writing Prompts across an entire unit.

• The Solos report shows raw scores for all selected-response questions (multiple choice, drag and drop, etc.) for Solo reading assignments.

• The Exit Tickets report provides the raw scores on selected-response questions in all Exit Tickets in a unit.

• The Reading Assessments report pulls submissions data from the selected-response questions in the Unit Reading Assessment.

Essential Standards: the critical learning outcomes that teacher teams agree all students must master. They represent the most important knowledge and skills within a curriculum — not everything that could be taught, but the content every student must know and be able to do. They help PLCs answer the key question: “What do we want all students to learn?”

Where to Find Them: The high school staff has identified essential standards for all graduation-required classes. They are housed in a Google Classroom that can be accessed HERE.

Priority Standards: Once the district has identified essential standards, individual buildings identify those essential standards that need the most focused attention instructionally, based on student data (for example, NWEA or interim assessments). These standards are then a priority of the school.

Effective instruction begins with materials that truly align to what students are expected to learn. Priority standards require intentional selection of resources that support depth, rigor, and coherence.

A. Check for Alignment to the Exact Skills and Concepts

Ensure materials:

• Address all components of the priority standard
  

• Match the verbs of the standard (e.g., analyze, compare, justify, solve)
  

• Include tasks that reflect the rigor level (DOK)
  

For example, if a standard asks students to evaluate, materials should include evaluation tasks—not just recall or basic practice.

B. Confirm Rigor and Cognitive Demand

Materials should include:

• Opportunities for deeper thinking (analysis, reasoning, application)
  

• Multi-step or real-world tasks
  

• Writing or discussion that requires students to explain their reasoning
  

Well-aligned materials push students to demonstrate understanding, not just complete isolated practice.

C. Prioritize Quality Over Quantity

A high volume of worksheets or activities does not indicate alignment. Instead, choose:

• Fewer, high-quality tasks
  

• Tasks that approach mastery from multiple angles
  

• Activities that build both skill and conceptual understanding
  
  

D. Incorporate Scaffolds and Supports

Materials should help all students access the standard by including:

• Graphic organizers
  

• Sentence starters or stems
  

• Guided examples and models
  

• Gradual release structures (“I do → We do → You do”)
  

These supports help students move toward independent mastery without lowering the standard.

E. Use Materials as Tools, Not Scripts

Teachers should adapt materials to:

• Clarify misconceptions
  

• Extend learning when students are ready
  

• Modify tasks to meet student needs while keeping the priority standard intact
  

Strong instruction leverages materials flexibly but purposefully.

Keeping students engaged before winter break can feel like an impossible task, but it doesn’t have to! Download our free Science Winter Games bundle and gain instant access to easy-to-use, hands-on activities for K–8 science students.

Each activity explores a different science concept and contains simple directions to assist in your implementation, no matter where you are in your yearly science instruction. So, whether you’re looking for a week’s worth of activities or one short activity to do right before break, we’ve got you covered.

The Science Winter Games activity bundle includes:

• Five grade-banded K–5 and 6–8 activities.
• Easy-to-follow directions and suggestions for gamifying each activity.
• Supplementary materials, including downloadable bulletin board decorations.

Thank you to all of those who joined the K-8 Math Steering Committee last month!

K-8 Math Steering Committee meets on the last Tuesday of every month!

The K-8 Science Steering Committee is working on rebuilding. More information to come!

For more information on Classroom Management, check out our brand new Lansing School District educator's Guide located here on the district's staff forms page!

“To meet the needs of today’s learners, the tradition of artisan teaching in solo-practice classrooms will have to give way to a school culture in which teachers continuously develop their content knowledge and pedagogical skills through collaborative practice that is embedded in the daily fabric of their work. Teacher collaboration supports student learning, and the good news is that teachers who work in strong learning communities are more satisfied with their careers.”

—Fulton & Britton, STEM Teachers in Professional Learning Communities:

From Good Teachers to Great Teaching (2011), p. 5

These guidelines are in place to ensure that all students have access to a guaranteed and viable curriculum—one where every learner receives the essential content and skills needed for success.

Intention to daily instructional minutes supports learning retention, builds routines, and ensures equity across classrooms and schools.

By adhering to the daily instructional minutes, we create:

• Consistency – Students know what to expect and can build stronger learning habits.

• Equity – Every child has access to the same high-quality learning opportunities.

• Progression – Skills and content build in a logical, intentional sequence.

Your commitment to this practice ensures that our students benefit fully from the curriculum we’ve adopted and are better prepared for future success. Thank you for your dedication to maintaining this consistency for all learners.

The documents attached outline K-8 curricular resources, standards and pacing. This can also be found by clicking here on the LSD website. *Please note that pacing for Illustrative Math powered by Kiddom and Reveal Math will become available as the year progresses.

The document attached outlines 9-12 curricular resources, standards and pacing. This can also be found by clicking here on the LSD website.

A resource to use as you see fit.

The newsletter is created each week by the Instructional Division: