Washington schools to update math curriculum

After statewide screening tests showed Washington students falling below state norms in math areas, district officials say they’re changing curriculum to better equip kids.

“There are areas like math, our kindergarten through (first) grade went down ... and then sixth, seventh and eighth grade went down,” Superintendent Willie Stone said at a school board meeting last week. “Stewart is implementing illustrative math and the middle school is implementing illustrative math, which is a curriculum aligning to the state standards which this test is aligned to.”

Curriculum changes will partner with evolving methods of instruction, informed by professional development programs and teacher leadership data.

“The curriculum what you need to teach them, the ability to teach it counts on your strategies that your teachers use,” Stone said. “This curriculum change for us is really important because we’ve done a good job with what our power standards need to be, and this curriculum action is what we think will be best for our students.”

School board member Troy Suchan said he was skeptical about state demands on local education.

“What I want to know is, is this curriculum change better than what we had?” he said. “A curriculum change just because the state wants to see something different always seems to be a catch-22 ... if we change curriculum every time the state wants, we’ll be doing this every year.”

District Curriculum Director Veta Thode said she had confidence in the state’s requirements.

“It is better,” she said. “It’s more up to date, different approaches, it’s more problem-solving, it addresses needs as students think differently ... they did a lot of research, investigated a lot of different resources, talked with math specialists at the AEA and worked with them, they were vetted through a lot of different things.”

Thode said the change was a familiar process, similar to steps the district has taken in the past to boost reading scores for the same screening tests.

“If you remember, all of the buildings were really focused on reading for a long time because that was a state mandate,” she said. “Now we’re trying to get caught up to where we are with reading with the math.”

Comments: Kalen.McCain@southeastiowaunion.com