Basic math facts might seem elementary, but in Concho, Arizona, District Administrator Billie Bell and special education teacher Maria Lopez-Haffke know that addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division facts can transform an entire math program.
Grade 3-7 students at Concho Elementary School District No. 6 used ExploreLearning Reflex, an adaptive and game-based math fact fluency program, to host a school-wide math competition.
During the free Reflex trial, teachers and students documented school-wide math fact fluency growth in less than three weeks.
Committed to changing math scores
Concho Elementary School serves grades Pre-K through 8th grade in eastern Arizona. “We are a single-site school district covering over 300 square miles in very rural Arizona,” said Billie Bell, the District Administrator and school principal.
“When I took over the school two years ago, we were a D school and had gone into school improvement. We really focused on our English Language Arts. In one year, we were able to bring our grade up to a B,” said Bell. “But our math was still abysmal. We need to find out how to fix that.”
“We decided that we wanted to, as part of our school improvement, look at our math program, because our math scores were very low. Ms. Lopez-Haffke was tasked with seeing if she could find a program that would work for us,” said Bell.
Maria Lopez-Haffke, a special education teacher, has been at Concho Elementary School for over 13 years, spending most of her time teaching 4th grade. “Our scores in math are low. We didn’t know exactly what we were missing, if it was a new curriculum or what else could be done to help the kids raise their scores,” said Lopez-Haffke.
Determined to find a solution, the special education teacher surveyed every educator at the school and hosted interviews to learn more about what teachers actually wanted in their classrooms to help with math. “One of the things we found out is that nobody wanted to have another curriculum.”
Pinpointing the problem: math fact fluency
Lopez-Haffke began partnering with her school’s instructional coach to go deeper into the problem. “I asked, ‘How come our scores are so low?’ As a SPED teacher, I go into the different grade levels and see the kids working. I see they are grasping the concepts, they know how to use formulas, and they know how to calculate different things, but they were still low.”
“Our instructional coach explained to me that the problem was the facts. The students didn’t know their facts that well. The fluency was lost. As much as they can solve an equation or you solve whatever math problem they have in front of you, if students incorrectly say that 7 X 5 = 25 because they are miscounting, that’s the problem. They’ll get the answers wrong, lose points, and that’s why the scores were low.”
Searching for trusted math solutions
“I was really concerned when she told me it was just the facts,” said Lopez-Haffke. With so many educational technology options and textbooks on the market, she expressed how confusing it can be to analyze and evaluate classroom products. “I told Billie, ‘We are not going to go just with what vendors tell us, because vendors just want to sell something.’”
As with most things, word of mouth is often the most trustworthy form of recommendation. Lopez-Haffke turned to neighboring school districts in that state with strong math scores to learn more about the math programs they were using with students.
“We decided to call schools in the area and find out what they were doing for the fact matter. Schools with very good reputations and solid scores. Three schools recommended Reflex,” said Lopez-Haffke. “These schools said they didn’t use any additional curriculum, but Reflex and Frax. We started searching the website to see what it was about because we didn’t know Reflex at all. It looked very interesting to us. We decided to give it a try. We got a very generous free trial.”
Reflex helps students develop crucial math fact fluency skills with adaptive and individualized practice, making it an ideal solution for all levels of learners.
Boosting student engagement with math fact fluency competitions
After beginning Reflex classroom trials in grades 3 – 7, Lopez-Haffke and Bell strategized the best way to get teachers and students on board with the game-based math program quickly.
Bell had previously brainstormed a school-wide math competition, and the Reflex trial period was the perfect opportunity to put things into action. Lopez-Haffke organized a three-week math fact fluency challenge between the 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th grade classrooms. This Ready, Set, Reflex competition sparked friendly rivalry between the classes to earn prizes like ice cream with the principal and Concho Bucks, the school’s motivational currency system that students can use to purchase prizes.
Concho teachers implemented Reflex into their daily classroom routines for roughly 30 minutes per day, ensuring students achieved the Green Light in each session. Reflex uses the Green Light as a key motivator for students, signifying the completion of a successful day of math fact practice. Lopez-Haffke reported Green Light and classroom fluency progress to the school using numbers from the built-in Reflex data reports.
“The kids were always coming to me every day. How did we do? Which place is my class in today?” She found that most of the teachers got excited and even competitive during the school-wide challenge. “We realized, Wow. People are into these competitions. Teachers and students. That was pretty exciting.”
Students at Concho Elementary School
“I think part of it is because it’s fun. Students learn more and they learn quicker. It’s more meaningful when something is fun. Especially with this competition.” -Maria Lopez-Haffke
Measuring student growth before and after the free Reflex trial
But student engagement wasn’t the only thing increasing around the halls of Concho Elementary School. Bell and Lopez-Haffke observed noticeable student growth during and after the short Reflex competition.
To accurately measure growth, teachers administered a 5-minute paper-and-pencil multiplication and division pre-test to students. After the three-week competition ended, teachers gave students the same questions on a post-test. Teachers measured the average number of problems (out of 100) that students answered correctly on the pre- and post-tests. All classrooms began to experience growth after implementing Reflex during the free trial period.
“The growth was incredible,” said Lopez-Haffke. “The ones that were playing Reflex 30 minutes a day, they grew. Even if it was a minimum of five points.”
“I was overjoyed [by the growth]. Reflex is going to be something that will really, really help our students. I was in a classroom watching the students go through the Reflex games. They were so excited about it. When kids are excited about learning, they learn.” -Billie Bell
Improved student confidence and math fact fluency
As students began to grow stronger with their math facts, teachers began to notice changes in students’ everyday math work.
“The little ones got so confused with the zeroes. They might think 5 x 0 = 5 and not 0. In the beginning, I saw a lot of problems with zeroes, tens, and ones. Even though they are easy, they are easily confused by the SPED students. For example, you have a student saying that 5 x 1 = 6 because they automatically add. I’m seeing changes that they aren’t doing that anymore. There’s no adding, and they know pretty much when an answer is zero, even if it’s a high number, it’s zero,” said Lopez-Haffke.
District Administrator Bell also noticed positive changes. “My nephew happens to be in third grade, and my husband quizzes him all the time. He couldn’t hardly do his facts at all. After about the second week [of Reflex], my husband would ask him questions, and boom, boom, boom, he knew his facts. We were really impressed on a personal level, not just in the school, so I’ve seen it from both angles.”
Continuing the math momentum
After the free trial ended, students at Concho Elementary School have continued to use Reflex with a pilot. While Reflex is still new on campus, Bell is confident it will continue to help students develop math fact fluency over the coming months.
“To jump that much higher in just three weeks—I think it’s got to be able to help us out. Every little bit helps, especially this year, as low as we were. I’m sure that it will help. It has to. Because we’ve seen what it’s done already. The 3rd-grade class was just leaps and bounds, and everyone did a lot better,” said Bell. “We did try it, we liked it, and the students liked it. We’re really looking forward to it next year. We’re looking forward to Frax. We haven’t tried that yet, but I’m sure if it’s anything like Reflex we will be very happy with it.”
“I would say try it, especially since it didn’t cost us anything. That in itself is really nice that you’re able to do that. It’s like going when you test-drive a car. We test drove it, and our kids loved it, and it worked.” -Billie Bell
Listen to Concho Elementary School’s full story!
Experience the impact of a Reflex trial
Student and teacher engagement is crucial, and nothing drives motivation like some healthy competition. Available with any full Reflex subscription, the new Reflex Competitions feature allows teachers to host competitions among different classrooms in the same school building. The class with the greatest average number of Green Light Days wins!
Arizona students began to experience math fact fluency in just three weeks. Are you ready to see what Reflex can do for your students? Start seeing fluency gains today with a classroom trial.