How ditching your use of ability groups can increase students’ motivation and learning

Screen Shot 2015-04-08 at 1.46.17 pmI’ve been teaching for a long time –long enough to see fads and fancies come and go in the world of education- but one thing that I’ve always stuck with is ability grouping in my classroom. I guess that’s because when I trained at Cambridge University it was held up as the epitome of good child-centred teaching, rendering it possible to target teach to specific needs and differentiate to take children’s capabilities into account.

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So for more than twenty years that’s what I’ve done, firmly believing that it was the right thing to do. However, I am a reflective practitioner, and in 2013 I began training to be a Maths Support Teacher, which involved taking a post-graduate paper through Massey University. One of the readings that I did for an assignment really struck a chord with me.

It was an article by Rachel Marks discussing the way that ability grouping affected children, regardless of whether they were in the top group or one of the struggling learners who we label Green Group or something else designed to disguise their position in the academic pecking order. And this article made me think long and hard about what I was doing.

There were lots of things in my classroom that took my time away from teaching: controlling the behaviour of children who were supposed to be working independently, keeping the children in my teaching group focused on their task, motivating the children to push themselves academically, trying to make them take responsibility for being independent workers and thinkers, getting them to set academic goals and strive for them, and enabling the children to reliably self-assess their learning and progress.

I wondered if there was a way to make all these things happen, and it occurred to me that forcing the issue of grouping actually created many of these situations. I did a bit more reading, and came to the conclusion that the groups had to go.

So I came up with Maths Café.

Welcome to Room 3’s Maths Café. Take a seat and relax. The menu today features seasonal dishes of addition and subtraction strategies and everything is served with a side order of fun and humour. Today’s Dish of the Day is “adding up in our heads by using a tidy number and compensation”. If you have ordered that dish, then please remain seated. If that dish is not to your liking then please feel free to choose from our smorgasbord.

This is how maths is taught in my classroom. The whole class will have enjoyed an Appetiser together (usually a game or quick thinking challenge) and then the Dish of the Day is announced. Some children will have already ordered it at the beginning of the fortnightly cycle, and some will decide just today that they would like to take part in the teaching session. At the end of the lesson we will come back together and share Dessert – often a game or a chance for children to feedback to others what they have learnt during the lesson.

It has taken a year to refine this system and to teach the children the skills they need to make it work, but we have got there. The children love the fact that they are in charge of their learning – behaviour management is no longer an issue in my maths classrooms except for asking some of the games groups to maintain an appropriate volume when they get carried away – and it is having a positive impact both on our results and on our children’s perception of themselves as mathematicians.

How does it work?

This runs on learning cycles of 2 – 3 weeks.

At the beginning of a learning cycle I post the various strategies and lessons that I will be teaching.

The children check their maths profiles in their portfolios, and order the lessons that they think they would benefit from (the Dish of the Day). They order by writing their name onto a waiter’s pad next to each “Dish of the Day”. The Dish of the Day and the waiter’s pad are displayed together on the relevant day so the children can check if they ordered it or not.

I decide the order in which I am going to teach the lessons. The objectives are taken from several levels of the curriculum to address the varied needs of my class, and I try to move between levels each day so that different children will spend time with me.

We begin with an Appetiser – something to get the children’s mathematical brains warmed up.

Any children who didn’t order today’s Dish of the Day lesson move off to choose from the Smorgasbord – a whole range of activities linked with the focus in the room, and include

number knowledge activities,

basic facts’ practice,

some group problem solving activities,

games and computer programmes.

Some of the children will be finishing off a Doggy Bag from a previous Dish of the Day.

Some will put in an order for a Second Helping of something they previously ordered.

The Dish of the Day group might be just 1 or 2 children, or it might contain 15 depending on the lesson being offered. If there is time, I may offer 2 Dishes of the Day.

Once children have had their Dish of the Day, they take a Doggy Bag activity to do independent practise of what they’ve just learnt.

When we have had a substantial helping of mathematics, we come back together and celebrate with a Dessert (feedback time, plenary session or maybe a number game on the board).

How do you make sure the children learn enough?
Children are accountable for their choices. If I think they’ve chosen things that are too easy I make them sit through the session anyway. The same goes if they choose from the hardest sessions which I think are beyond them. They do the session anyway (I might have underestimated them). They get bored and it usually only takes one time to convince them to make appropriate choices.

How you make sure they are doing all the independent work?
Children are accountable for their choices here too. They have to sign off each piece of work as they finish it, and I check halfway through the second week to see if they have done each piece well. They are expected to do each activity on offer during the fortnight time-frame. If they are not doing the work to the required standard, if they aren’t completing enough work or if they are spending too much time on the computer or playing maths games then they lose the right to choose for a specified period of time.

Do they all get the same independent activities?
No – each type of Smorgasbord activity is offered in a range of levels. Children pick their own level. They become adept at choosing one that is appropriate for them. Basically they don’t want to be bored because it’s too easy, and they don’t want to get frustrated because they can’t do something.

How do you work with a group that contains many different abilities?
I actually reverse the usual order of working. Normally we introduce a new strategy or concept using materials, we move into imaging the materials and then we use abstract symbols. In a mixed ability group I start by going through the strategy using abstract representations (numbers, symbols and equations) and then I pause to offer those who feel confident with the strategy the chance to take their Doggy Bag and get started on it. Anyone who is not feeling confident stays with me, and we go back through the strategy using materials. At any point when they feel confident, children can opt to take their Doggy Bag and move on.

Are there any downsides to Maths Café?
It does take a lot of setting up initially, but once you’ve got the routines and activities sorted out it is fine. Also, you do that planning once every two or three weeks, and then work from it.

It also takes a little while for the children to get used to working in this way. They will need coaching in how to make those decisions – what lessons they need to order, which levels of activities are right for them, and why they should not just order every Dish of the Day (they do need some time to do their Doggy Bags and independent activities).

What are the benefits of Maths Café?

The benefits I have seen so far have been:

A dramatic increase in student engagement and motivation

A similar decrease in time spent dealing with behaviour management

Students are much more aware of their learning paths – where they are, where they need to go and how they will get there

Good or accelerated rates of progress for the majority of students

A marked improvement in students’ ability to self-direct their learning – this became obvious in many areas of the curriculum once Maths Café was embedded

And finally…
Having seen Maths Café in action in my classroom for 3 terms last year, my school Principal decided that we should implement it through the whole school this year. Every student, from our 5 year olds through to our 13 year olds is using it, with similarly positive results throughout the school.

I have recently extended the idea into my Literacy lessons as well – and the children love it!

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Jo Lewis


Jo’s enthusiasm for teaching and learning is highly infectious. Since graduating from Cambridge University, she has worked with students from a diverse range of backgrounds, both in the UK and in NZ. Jo is passionate about enhancing people’s thinking and planning skills through the use of Thinking Map.