Do you use EngageNY math in your classroom? Are you struggling to complete all the necessary lesson components during your instructional time? We’ve enlisted the help of IXL Training Specialist Lauri Susi to break down the intended philosophy behind EngageNY and to show how using IXL with this curriculum can actually save you time! And, we even have two EngageNY/IXL lesson alignments available for download.
To start off, let’s take a brief look at what EngageNY is actually meant to be. Many teachers are unaware that EngageNY is designed to be “adopted and adapted” rather than used as a prescriptive curriculum and that the curriculum is designed around a “time frame,” not a “task frame.” What this means is that you shouldn’t expect every student working on the problem set within a lesson to complete all of the problems. In fact, teachers are encouraged to customize the lesson by selecting the “must do” and “can do” problems of a problem set.
The curriculum contains a three-step process for planning each lesson (which you can find here), with the expectation that teachers will study the teaching sequences of the curriculum and, when necessary, customize lessons to meet their students’ needs. For example, creating “zero problems” for student who are not ready for the first problem in the problem set or creating “Extra D’s” by developing a set of problems that create a bridge between two problem types. But don’t panic at the thought of this extra work! IXL can support you in both achieving the lesson objectives and in customization.
IXL grade level skills are aligned to the Common Core, as well as other standards, so don’t be afraid to look in a different grade level for skills that support your lesson customization. Sometimes a skill in a previous grade may match the models or strategies in the practice set, and often, skills in lower grade levels can help students who need remediation.
To help you get started, we have two lesson alignments, available for download below, that will give you some ideas on how IXL can help you customize and deliver your EngageNY lessons! Be sure to also check out our EngageNY alignment documents located on our Community page.
EngageNY and IXL Gr 1 Module 4
EngageNY and IXL Gr 2 Module 5 Topic B
Do you have any other tips for using the EngageNY curriculum? Are there other IXL lesson plans you’d like to see?
