1. GUIDED GROUP WORK IN MATHEMATICS
Guided group work is about providing opportunity for extended talk, with groups of children selected for a particular purpose
Allow about an hour and a half for this staff meeting.

2. Guided group work Is integral to quality-first teaching
Is informed by detailed assessment of particular children’s learning with opportunities for further assessment
Involves grouping children with a shared and current learning need.
Has a very clear teacher role in scaffolding and supporting learning
Involves the giving of clear feedback to children on the focus of learning and the progress made

3. Guided Group Work
‘Working with a group can provide assessment information that is more difficult to capture in the whole-class context; it provides an opportunity to discuss the mathematics in more detail with individuals in the group. The focused attention given to a group helps to inform future planning and teaching. It also gives children who are not active contributors in the whole class the opportunity to participate more directly, share their ideas and extend their learning within a small group of peers.’ (P67)
Williams Review – June 2008
Time to read quote from Williams Review
Key words –
Assessment – listening and observing are easier;
Discuss – linked to mental strategies
Focused – meeting specific needs (intervention; m/a)
Participate – quieter children; thinking time; all-girls group
Guided groups may happen during a maths lesson (in the main part of the lesson) or in addition to the maths lesson e.g. alternate weeks with guided reading. Flexible in terms of length.

4. Why have guided sessions?
Focus on a concept, skill or strategy that assessment shows a group have not learnt
Pre-teaching
Acceleration of slow moving children
Challenge more able
Assessment (APP)
Discussion with ‘hidden’ children
Develop reasoning skills and mathematical language
Following discussion, give out guided group work handout and give teachers time to read (purpose/identification/strategies)
The following 3 slides are the key points from this handout. Reinforce any points that have not come out in discussion so far.

5. How do I identify these children?
Day to day assessment for learning e.g. plenary discussions, marking, self and peer assessment etc.
Following a planned assessment activity
Periodic assessment shows underperforming groups
Feedback from TA
Following up previous guided group sessions
Ability groups (flexible)
Children need to be carefully identified – not just blue group on Monday, red group on Tuesday….
Following a planned assessment activity e.g. maybe more able have done really well, and you have them as a guided group to see just how far they can go.
May well be an ability group
ALL children should have guided group work including Wave 3 and more able

6. What strategies should I use?
This depends on the purpose of the session,
but will probably include:
Share LO, and ensure children know what they have learnt, linking to whole class work
Scaffold (provide support) if necessary and guide discussions, but reduce as children’s confidence grows
Observe and challenge using probing questions
Focus on language and reasoning – aim for a high percentage of children talk
Involve all children – paired, individual and group work
Encourage risk taking

7. Pyramids Explain grid – ask them to complete it.
Agree top number is 20.
If I added one to each of the numbers on the bottom, what would the number on the top be?
Agree top number is 28
Ask staff to identify any patterns or properties they can see between the numbers within the grid.
•In the second row all the numbers are odd; in the third and fourth rows, all the numbers are even.
•The total at the top of the grid is twice the total of the numbers on the bottom row.
•The difference between adjacent numbers on the bottom row is 1, between adjacent numbers on the second row is 2 and between numbers on the third row is 4.
•The middle number in the second row is scaled up by 4 to give the total at the top.
•The total of the first and fourth numbers on the bottom row is equal to the total of the middle numbers on the bottom row.
•The top total is equal to the total of the two outer numbers on the bottom row multiplied by 4
Build up pyramid using the calculations rather then numbers in different colours.
Ask staff to summarise what they see in the pyramid. Feedback may include:
•The first and last numbers (from the bottom row) appear once in the final calculation.
•The second and third (middle) numbers appear three times each in the final calculation.
Invite staff to say what they think the top number will be if they add 5 to each of the four numbers in the bottom row.
Suppose we add 5 to each number in the first row, what will happen to the top number?
•The total will change from 20, the original top number, to 60
because we have added 40: 5 + (5  3) + (5  3) + 5.

8. Pyramids excel spreadsheet
Tools – options formula bar
The numbers on the bottom row are consecutive.
Excel spreadsheet ‘addition and subtraction pyramids’ 1st tab (+ and – consec.) make top number 84
If we know the top number what are the other numbers? The numbers at the bottom are CONSECUTIVE.
84 ÷ 4 = 21, then 21 ÷ 2 = 10.5 so numbers on bottom row are (other ways also)
84 ÷ 2 = 22 = sum of numbers on bottom row so 22 ÷ 4 = 10.5 so bottom row numbers are
e.g. algebraically
8a+12
4a a+8
2a a a+5
a a a a+3
What skillls will children be using?
Children will be using mental calculation skills, reasoning skills and using and applying those to the maths.

9. Guided Maths Video Handout the Y5 and Y3 examples.
Hand out Y3 pyramid example… Ts read through notes –
Explain context of video
6 children,
levels 1 x 2c, 1 x 2a, 4 x 3c, all Y3s,
December 2007 (week before Christmas!)
Hollywall 1-form entry,
….show Y3 guided maths video.

10. What should we see in a Guided Group session?
Exploring the Mathematics
Collaborative work
Effective Listening
Scaffolding
Building Confidence
Inclusion

11. Guided group work in mathematics provides focused opportunities to:
Develop children’s use of mathematical language
Engage selected children in sustained dialogue and mental mathematics
Use models and images
Introduce and apply new notation and symbols to support recording
Promote a ‘can do’ approach
Review the presentation, accuracy and efficiency of methods avoiding any sense a method is right or wrong
Language to explain and reason
Models and images that support aspects of learning and thinking these children find difficult
A can do approach to to problem solving and enquiry within a self-supporting group

12. Potential Obstacles Work produced could be of a low standard
Pupils mis-understand what is required of them
Some pupils struggle to work independently
Certain pupils display off-task behaviour
Small number of pupils do not complete the task set
‘Stuck’ pupils unsure what to do next…..

13. Practical ways to deal with potential obstacles
High expectations of standards of learning and behaviour
Making learning intentions clear
The learning environment ( how can it be used to support independent learning?)
Strategies to develop and support pupils working independently
Give out sheets of flipchart paper… what would you see happening in the classroom / teacher doing / pupils doing
Before guided maths happens (as routing or as part of the lesson before guided maths part of the lesson).
Sam to exemplify for learning wall.
Take feedback … prompt for explicit strategies.
Summary
Link invisible pupils / guided maths … what do the invisible pupils need during the guided maths session… consider the things which were obstacles to learning … your challenge is to consider how best to use the guided part of the lesson to address their learning needs.

14. Developing independence
Stop Think Use Clues Kids
Model ‘stuckness’
Talk partners, special thinker
Differentiation
Resilience
We only learn when we make mistakes
Trial and improvement
Use the good practise from guided reading and writing for guided maths. This slide is about how to manage the rest of the class whilst you are working with the guided group.

15. Guided Maths Booklet

16. Recording guided maths

17. Key Actions Teach a guided group daily
Use your day to day assessment to inform your guided sessions
Don’t forget to show on your planning your guided groups
Use the guided sessions to inform your assessments of your pupils
Have a range of activities for guided – knowledge, skills and problem solving!!!