Collaborative Planning

Collaboration with colleagues to plan and reflect on instruction is an essential part of successful implementation of a high quality math program.

teacher collaboration

Effective mathematics teachers not only collaborate but also focus their collaborative efforts on improving instruction and student learning through the co-planning of lessons. Focusing teachers’ work within professional learning communities on detailed lesson planning has been demonstrated to be a highly productive strategy to support more in depth interactions within collaborative communities and effect change in teachers’ practice
- NCTM Principles to Actions

Teachers and schools that engage in better quality collaboration have better achievement gains in math and reading. Moreover, teachers improve at greater rates when they work in schools with better collaboration quality. 
 - Ronfeldt, M., Farmer, S., McQueen, K., & Grissom, J. (2015). Teacher collaboration in instructional teams and student achievement. American Educational Research Journal, 52(3), 475-514.

Collaborative Planning Includes

  • Doing math together to deepen content knowledge and anticipate student work
  • Looking at student work to notice what students know and are able to do
  • Looking at grade level standards and curriculum

Tools for Collaborative Planning

Unit and Lesson planning tools

The Unit and Lesson Planning Tools include templates specific to planning with the SFUSD Math Core Curriculum.

Other Professional Learning Resources available from the SFUSD Math Department ​include modules for professional learning and protocols for looking at student work.

More Resources

5 Practices for Orchestrating Productive Math Discussions discusses doing math together to anticipate possible student work.

Doing Math Together to Build Community discusses how learning together in a PLC changed teacher and student outcomes in grades 2 and 5. (NCTM membership required to access.)

Video Podcasts

​These 5-minute video podcasts introduce every unit in grades K–5 as well as some of the high school units. You can watch the podcast for an upcoming unit with colleagues as part of your collaborative planning.

Elementary

​High School

This page was last updated on June 20, 2023