Content-Focused
Professional Learning:
Math & Literacy Suites

Develop the content area knowledge and pedagogical practices needed to master the fundamentals of literacy and math instruction.

Content-Focused Professional Learning from NWEA is designed to enhance educators’ content knowledge and strengthen their pedagogical practice across mathematics and literacy.

Sustained, content-driven learning to evolve your professional practice

With Content-Focused Professional Learning, you can:

Improve instructional decision-making with a focus on responsive teaching and learning
Explore evidence-based methods and practices derived from a strong body of internal and external research
Foster ambitious and equitable instructional practices
Learn skills and methods that work with any high-quality curriculum or assessment data

Content-Focused Professional Learning workshops

The math and literacy suites provide teachers with a deep understanding of content- and research-based instructional practices, along with ways to apply that understanding to their unique grade-level instructional needs and content standards.

Responsive Literacy Practices suite

Grades K–2: Foundations—Guided by the Shifts: Literacy

Beginning with a solid understanding of what is at the heart of today’s college- and career-ready standards will provide educators with essential knowledge for instructional practice. In these foundational sessions, participants will gain a deep understanding of the key shifts in literacy, how they progress, and the development of a classroom culture that supports discourse and builds a culturally responsive environment. This provides both teachers and administrators with a foundation for the upcoming content within the workshop series if a school or district deems it appropriate.

Grades K–2: Understanding How Students Learn to Read, Parts 1 and 2

Our brains are wired to learn spoken language, but learning to read does not happen the same way! By teaching reading in ways that align with how the brain acquires, processes, and retains letters, sounds, and language, we support all students’ reading success. In this offering, participants will learn how students learn to read, the multiple components that make up reading, and how to structure their reading instruction to align to the science of reading research.

Grades K-2: Early Word Recognition, Parts 1 and 2

Deepen pedagogical content knowledge for early literacy instruction grounded in the converging evidence from science of reading research. This 6-hour offering helps K–2 educators implement effective literacy instruction through accessible, classroom- and evidence-based practices for a sounds-first approach.

Grades K–2: Building Fluent Readers, Parts 1 and 2

Fluency plays an integral role in bridging students’ decoding to automatic reading of connected text to determine meaning. In this offering, participants will discover strategies to help students increase fluency, advance their pedagogical content knowledge by analyzing reading fluency components, and examine the variables impacting reading fluency.

Grades K–8: Foundations of Writing*

Developing young writers is an essential component of providing equitable and excellent literacy instruction. This offering lays the groundwork for understanding how writing happens, what writers need to grow, and why writing is essential for every content area.

Responsive Math Practices suite

Grades K–8: Foundations—Guided by the Shifts: Mathematics

Beginning with a solid understanding of what is at the heart of today’s college- and career-ready standards will provide you with essential knowledge for your instructional practice. In these foundational sessions, you will gain a deep understanding of the key shifts in mathematics, how they progress, and the development of a classroom culture that supports mathematical discourse and builds a culturally responsive environment. This provides both teachers and administration with a foundation for the upcoming content within the offering series if a school or district deems it appropriate.

Grades K-8: Engaging students: Eliciting Evidence of Students’ Math Understanding, Parts 1 and 2

Strengthening teachers’ math identities and cultivating questioning skills can help you uncover student understanding and make instructional decisions that lead all learners to success. Customizable to grade bands K–2, 3–5, or 6–8, this offering helps participants discover and practice strategies to increase the value of classroom discussions and enable making timely instructional adjustments based on student responses.

Developing Deep Conceptual Understanding of Fractions, Parts 1 and 2

As students progress and build their mathematical understanding, flexibility and accuracy with fractions are key elements for determining student success. Grades 3–5 teachers need to support all children in building their understanding of a fraction as a single number and conceptualizing fractions as part of the number system. In this offering, participants will discover the mathematical concepts underlying fractions, how to tackle common misconceptions, and how to make timely instructional adjustments based on student understanding.

Grades 6–8: Cultivating Integer Fluency, Parts 1 and 2*

This 6-hour offering addresses supporting students in building fluency with integer operations. The session cultivates habits of thinking about integer concepts for middle-grades teachers and provides space to collaborate with colleagues to consider the underlying concepts that foreground student fluency with integer operations.

Utilizing the Aspects of Rigor in your Classroom, eLearning module*

Designed as an optional accompaniment to the Guided by the Shifts workshop, this self-paced eLearning module teaches how to determine the rigor expectations of your standards, how to select tasks and plan lessons that support the appropriate balance of rigor, and how to build scaffolds to ensure all students have access to the same level of rigor.