Math Readiness

ST Math is a web-delivered integrated instructional system that supplements a more traditional math curriculum, using animated images instead of words, to help students visualize problem structure and identify paths to problem solving. The system’s creator, MIND Research Institute, has incorporated a distinctive visual approach to learning math skills, using spatial temporal reasoning in its software design and based on neuroscience, or the current understanding of the ways in which the brain learns. The non-verbal approach of ST math means that Napa Valley’s large English Learner population can progress much more rapidly in accruing math concepts than with a traditional curriculum.

Specifically, the program is a series of graphically rich images/activities that enable individualized and automated instruction, with immediate, non-threatening feedback, regardless of English language levels. It tracks a student’s progress in a single lesson as well as over time, and reinforces content as it builds self-esteem and motivation. The program is meant to augment classroom instruction for 45 minutes, twice a week in a computer lab setting.

WHAT NAPALEARNS IS DOING WITH ST MATH

NapaLearns has coordinated matching grants from Auction Napa Valley and other sources to provide the Napa Valley School District with: ST Math software and teacher manuals, MIND’s strategic training and intensive support for teachers and administrators to implement the program, as well as service and technical support for approximately 1763 students in grades K-5 at 14 county schools – including English Learner (ELs) and Students with Disabilities (SDs) in these grade levels.

For School Year 1, 2010-11, these numbers include:

• Howell Mountain Elementary (gr. 2/3)
• Pope Valley Elementary (gr. 2/3)
• And 12 out of 20 non-charter elementary schools in NVUSD.

Second and third grade classes will be the entry point for most schools because these are the earliest grade levels tested on the California Standards Test (CST). These figures cover over 500 ELs and about 170 (or 10%) SDs.