The state’s math standards recently changed, and your district purchases new instructional materials for all math teachers. Teachers use the materials for a few months, but when students struggle to master the content, they grow skeptical about the material’s quality and suitability for their students. Increasingly, teachers turn to lesson resources they have developed themselves, borrowed from colleagues, or downloaded from the internet . The district’s materials gather dust, and district leaders are left with curriculum chaos. Sound familiar?
In a 2022 study by the RAND Corporation, one out of five teachers surveyed reported not using their district- or school-purchased materials. The most common reasons teachers gave for not using their district materials were (1) the material did not meet their studen ts’ needs , and (2) they did not have time to learn how to use or incorporate the material into
their lessons. Additionally, between one-third and one-half of the teachers surveyed indicated that they need more or better curriculum materials. (Prado Tuma et al. 2022, 9) The study recommends that school systems could improve the alignment between teachers’ and students’ needs and the instructional materials they purchase by involving teachers in the selection of new instructional materials and by clearly communicating how teacher input will be used in the selection process. Moreover, the report suggests that state education departments, districts and professional development providers could provide guidance to help teachers become better evaluators of instructional materials. (Prado Tuma et al. 2022, 13) Over the last decade, Learning List has reviewed more than 3,300 PreK-12 core and supplemental instructional materials by approximately 200 different publishers, as well as teacher-created resources. We have also assisted
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