Necessary Conditions: Teaching Secondary Math with Academic Safety, Quality Tasks, and Effective Facilitation

Students do not experience math in a vacuum. The curriculum, the students’ social and emotional well-being, and the teacher’s expertise as a facilitator must all be attended to, and each interacts with the others.
–Geoff Krall
Math instruction in high school is often something of a grab bag, with schools jumping from curriculum to curriculum, lacking a guiding vision or continuity between years.  No wonder so many students conclude, “I’m not a math person.”
Geoff Krall thinks that’s a problem.  And he’s devoted his career to fixing it.
Necessary Conditions posits for the first time a coherent approach to secondary math pedagogy. Krall identifies three essential elements that will open the door to math for all your students: academic safety, quality tasks, and effective facilitation.
 
Krall takes readers into real middle- and high-school classrooms to see how teachers cultivate these three "necessary conditions." With extensive examples, practical techniques and resources, and insightful analysis, this guide equips teachers to do the following:

• Design classroom experiences that increase engagement and build all students’ identities as mathematicians.
• Create dynamic, high-quality lessons that include meaningful, efficient assessment.
• Facilitate routines and discussions that increase all students' access to conceptual mathematics.

 
The biggest drivers of students’ math experiences are their teachers. With Krall’s guidance, you can help every student come to recognize that they are indeed a “math person.”