How to Successfully Teach Eureka Math (Engage NY)

When teachers begin using Eureka Math (also known as EngageNY), they quickly learn that it has a major learning curve, and the curriculum itself can be, quite frankly, bland.
 
Eureka is a math curriculum that many schools and teachers across the country have implemented within the last few years. It is known for its research-based, rigorous approach to teaching math conceptually.
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The method helps students develop a deep understanding of mathematics, along with an ingrained number sense and has a proven success rate. Teachers tend to love it or hate it. That said, in my opinion, it truly is one of the best math curriculums out there.

Over the next few weeks, I will go over everything you need to know about teaching this curriculum successfully. Hopefully, this will help eliminate some of that learning curve for you and you will become one of the teachers who loves the curriculum, like me!

Overview of Eureka Curriculum

First, let’s break down the components of the Eureka curriculum so you know exactly what’s included in the curriculum and how you can best utilize it.

The curriculum is broken down into several different modules each covering a different math topic for your grade level. It is important to note that the progression of the topics covered is research-based and build upon one another. Therefore, Eureka Math works best when the modules are completed in order. 

Each module comes with a teacher manual, a student workbook, and student fluency practice. If you are using the physical workbooks, these will each be found in separate books that may include several modules in one. If you are using the online PDF version, these are each found in separate files for each module. Here’s what you can expect to find in each of these:

Teacher Edition
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The Teacher Edition of each module is what you as the teacher will primarily use to teach your lessons. Here is what you can expect to find in the TE for each module:

• A module overview at the beginning of each module. This will walk you through the progression of concepts covered in the module and how they tie in to prior knowledge or future modules. The module overview also includes pacing notes (including which lessons can be omitted if timing is an issue), the focus and foundational standards addressed, important vocabulary, suggested tools and manipulatives, and any important notes on delivery of instruction. It is HIGHLY recommended to read the overview before beginning each module.
• A topic summary at the beginning of each topic. Each module is divided into a few different topics, and a summary is found at the beginning of the topic. These summaries are short and give a quick preview of what will be covered in the lessons to follow. They are not as extensive as the module overviews.
• Scripted lessons. Several lessons are included in each topic. These lessons are completely scripted and typically include 6 main components - fluency practice, application problem, concept development, problem set, debrief, and exit ticket. While each component is scripted, the lessons are designed to be customized to meet the needs of your class. Each component also includes a suggested amount of time to spend on each component. We will go more in-depth into what a typical lesson looks like in a future post.
• Student assessments and grading rubrics. For most modules, your teacher manual will also include a mid-module test and end-of-module test. These tests are graded with a rubric, which is also included. We will go into more detail about Eureka testing in a future blog post.​

Student Workbooks and Fluency

Where you will find the various student pages depends on whether you have physical books or not, but the same components are available to you either way. We will go into more detail about each of these components in a later blog post, but for now, here is a quick overview of the student resources included with each module:

• Sprints. Sprints are part of the fluency practice section of a lesson. Not every lesson has a sprint. Sprints are not your typical timed fact test, but rather help to further deepen a conceptual understanding of the concepts being taught.
• Problem sets. Each module includes a problem set with each lesson for independent practice. This is typically done as part of the concept development.
• Exit Tickets. Each module also includes exit tickets to be completed at the end of each lesson. The problems are similar to those on the problem set, however each exit ticket typically only has 1-3 questions on it. It is typically used as a quick assessment to gauge student understanding of the lesson.
• Student Templates. Occasionally, a template is included with a lesson for students to use the concept development. 

If you have physical workbooks, a student page for working the application problem is also included. However, this page is not necessary for completing the application problem.

Teaching Eureka Curriculum Successfully

Remember when I said that there’s a major learning curve to successfully teaching Eureka? Now that we’ve taken a quick look at the general layout of the Eureka curriculum, it’s time to dive into learning how to properly teach this curriculum. Fair warning - it’s A LOT to take in, so I’m going to break it down for you into bite-sized pieces to make it a lot more manageable and avoid information overload! In the coming weeks, I will walk you through:

• The steps you need to take before teaching the lesson
• How to best prepare your supplies for each lesson
• Each individual component of the lessons and how to customize them for your students including: fluency, concept development, application problem,  problem set, student debrief and the exit ticket
• ​How to grade Eureka Math
• What whole group instruction might look like and how to incorporate small groups/centers into your instruction
• And more!

Stay tuned for the next post in this series, where I’ll walk you step by step through preparing each lesson. ​​