High School - Gateway 3

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Education Integrated series meet the expectation that the visual design (whether in print or digital) is not distracting or chaotic, but supports students in engaging thoughtfully with the subject.

The layout of the materials is identical for every course, Unit, and Concept. Teachers can easily toggle between the “teacher view” and the “student view.” A Glossary tab and Math Tools tab are also easily accessible. Pictures and models used throughout the series support student learning as they are connected directly to an Investigation or problems being solved. The figures and models used are not distracting from the mathematical content.

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series provide a list of lessons in the teacher’s edition, cross-referencing the standards addressed and providing an estimated instructional time for each Unit, Concept, and Session.

The Table of Contents page and the Course Overview PDF both provide a list of the Units for each course in the series. The Units are divided into Concepts, and these are also listed on both of these resources. Each Concept is then broken into Investigations. These are not provided as a list. In order to identify the Investigations, the user must navigate to the specific Concept page and view the Investigations individually.

Standard alignment is available for each Unit in the Unit Overview and in a variety of places for the Concepts. The standards aligned to each Concept can be found in the Progression and Standards Tab of the Model Lesson section, the Course Overview PDF, a drop down menu for each concept on the Table of Contents page, and the Standards section on the homepage of each course. Alignment is not provided at the Investigation level. Therefore, it cannot be determined which standard, specified for the Concept, students are developing in each Investigation without reading or working the Investigation.

The instructional materials reviewed did not include a pacing document. The publisher provides suggested pacing for each Investigation in the Model Lesson section of the techbook. To determine how many instructional days should be planned to complete a Concept, teachers must find the timing for each Investigation and determine how these times would align to their instructional time. For example, Math I Concept 1.2 includes four Investigations. To determine the pacing for this Concept, a teacher would take note of the times suggested by clicking five different session tabs within the Model Lesson tab. The following times are suggested per the session tabs: Session 1 (Introduction) 20 min, Session 2 (Investigation 1) 40 min, Session 3 (Investigation 2) 40 min, Session 4 (Investigation 3) 75 min, Session 5 (Investigation 4) 50 min. A teacher would then need to compile this information in order to determine suggested pacing of their instruction.

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series contain strategies for informing students, and parents or caregivers about the mathematics program. Each unit has a parent letter, available in both English and Spanish. These letters have three sections that 1) identify the learning goals for the unit, 2) explain how the teaching may differ from how the parents learned the concepts, and 3) provide specific suggestions for supporting students in the unit. Specific examples of suggested support include discussing the interactive glossary terms together, having the student share how they used a specified interactive in the investigations to discover the mathematics, and having the student explain their understanding or connections they have made from specific examples from the Investigations.

The Discovery Education Teacher portal includes professional development academies, white papers, case studies, and virtual tours to build understanding of the instructional approaches and provide a research-based framework for the design of the program.

The teacher edition provides a white paper entitled Meeting the Mathematics Needs of 21st-Century Students with Math Techbook which “Relates the guiding principles of Discovery Education philosophy about learning in math, explains each principle using supporting research and reports on accepted best practices, and demonstrates how Math Techbook is specifically designed to help students meet the expectations of the CCSS and its vision for increased mathematics proficiency.”

Teachers can also select the picture of the home next to “My DE Services,” and on the left side of the page is a “Try a Strategy” tab which states “Discovery Education’s Spotlight on Strategies are creative, research-based instructional strategies, presented by teachers for teachers. These simple instructional strategies incorporate digital media in meaningful, effective, and practical ways.”

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series offer opportunities for students to monitor their own progress.

Each concept has a Summary section that includes examples of mathematical concepts that were examined during the Investigations. Directly connected to the Summary is an Additional Assistance section that includes videos and math explanations related to the current learning, which students are able to review on their own as needed. The Coach section allows students to monitor their own progress by giving direct feedback after a question which a student can use to gather further understanding on a skill they have not yet mastered. Scoring rubrics provided for Apply and constructed response questions can also be given to students to reference as they complete those tasks.

The students have a dashboard on their Math Techbook home screen to keep track of their answers to questions and points given to responses throughout the Discover, Practice, and Apply cycle. A student would have to be directed by the teacher to look in the dashboard or self direct. Students get immediate feedback during the Coaching cycle that allows them to determine their progress as they navigate through the concept.

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series provide a balanced portrayal of various demographic and personal characteristics. The activities are diverse, meeting the interests of a demographically diverse student population. Images presented display a balanced portrayal of various demographic and personal characteristics.

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series provide opportunities for teachers to use a variety of grouping strategies.

Instructional notes in the Session tabs provide teachers with suggestions on grouping for each activity; suggestions are made whether work should be done individually, in pairs, or in small groups. For example, the Math III Concept 6.2 Instructional Notes for Session 1 direct the teacher to “Prompt individual students to consider ways to remember the coordinates of the ordered pairs, and then have them discuss their strategies with their partner. Then, ask pairs to jointly make a list of similarities and differences between the values for the special right triangles they already knew and the values on the unit circle. Reconvene the class and ask pairs to share their lists. Finally, ask pairs to share their strategies for remembering the numbers.”

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series do not consistently encourage teachers to draw upon home language and culture to facilitate learning. Parent letters are evidence of the materials drawing upon home language and culture to facilitate learning. Parent letters are provided as Word documents, so they can edited to meet a teacher’s needs. Letters are provided in English and Spanish. The letter informs a parent of the content their student will be learning and ways in which they may help their student.

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series are compatible with multiple internet browsers and devices. The Discovery Integrated Series is compatible with the following most recently updated browsers: Chrome, Safari (version 9.0 and above), Firefox (version 44 and above), Explorer (version 11 and above), and Edge (version 24 and above) as well as tablets and mobile devices with ChromeOS, Android, or iOS operating systems.

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series include opportunities to assess student mathematical understandings and knowledge of procedural skills using technology.

Each unit contains an online Unit Assessment that can be assigned for students to complete electronically. Materials also provide teachers with technology-enhanced assessment items to build their own Standards Based Assessments. Additionally, materials include electronic Check for Understandings, as do the Coach and Play tabs within each concept.

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series include opportunities for teachers to personalize learning for all students. The online platform allows for teachers to create additional assignments and assessments for students under the tab labeled Builder Tools at the top of the Techbook home screen. The Assignment Builder gives teachers the opportunity to upload materials and add media from Discovery Education and then assign the new item to the entire class. The Assessment Builder lets the teacher create additional assessments by standard. These assessments can be assigned to individual students. The assessments are not adaptive but are taken online.

Innovative tools are embedded throughout the instructional materials. These innovations include Highlight, Speak Text, and Take Notes. Materials also provide a “My Notebook” tab which enables printing of notes for every Concept in each Unit.

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series are not customizable for local use. The digital materials include Builder Tools that provide for some customization. However, the structure of the materials, Discover, Practice, Apply within Concepts, does not provide teachers the opportunity to teach Concepts and/or Investigations out of order without missing important information.

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series incorporate technology that provides opportunities for teachers and/or students to collaborate with each other. The teachers are given an opportunity to share files under the My Content tab on the Math Techbook homepage. There are spaces for teachers to share files within their school site or within the district. Students can collaborate in the Bulletin Board. They can post small notes after the teacher creates a Bulletin in the Bulletin Builder under Builder Tools.

The instructional materials reviewed for the High School Discovery Integrated series integrate technology such as interactive tools, virtual manipulatives/objects, and/or dynamic mathematics software in ways that engage students in the MPs. The math tools and virtual manipulatives/objects are available to students within the Investigations, when appropriate, as well as in the home screen under math tools. In addition to the online and interactive format of the Techbook, Graphing Calculator and Dynamic Geometry Tool are incorporated directly into Investigations in order to engage students in the MPs.