Enhanced Ability Groups in 15 Arab Society Middle Schools

In June 2020, the foundation approved a grant to the Branco Weiss Institute for a program to implement applied mathematics assignments in 240 middle school excellence classes and high ability groups in the Central District. When implementation of the program began, there was a huge demand for it from Hebrew-speaking schools. This year, 500 teachers in 20 learning communities are receiving in-service training and 300 of these teachers already implement the assignments in their classes.

The Central District operates 23 middle schools in Arab cities as well, which serve 10,700 students. The intention was to include them in the program, however, it immediately became clear that there are large gaps in the level of mathematics knowledge between the Hebrew-speaking and the Arabic-speaking schools. Only 27% of Arabic-speaking students attend excellence classes and high-ability tracks, compared with 68% in Hebrew-speaking schools. Furthermore, 7.9% of the Arabic-speaking students graduate the five-unit mathematics track in 12^th grade in comparison to 25% of Hebrew-speaking students.

According to Branco Weiss and the Central District, these gaps are caused by several factors; the Arab society schools have very few ability groups and no regular mathematics staff meetings. The mathematics teaching staff does not always have the suitable training to teach high order mathematics. In addition, teachers tend to use old textbooks and do not apply digital learning materials that include high order thinking in contexts of applied mathematics in their classrooms. Arabic-speaking students often have unique literacy challenges, which complicates solving literacy-rich problems.

The Central District has been working with the Arabic-speaking teachers to reduce these gaps and to strengthen their knowledge and technique. Now, they declare the teachers are ready for a next step, to open excellence classes and start implementing applied mathematics assignments. They approached the Branco Weiss Institute, which is proposing a three-year program, in which they will work with 15 schools in Arab society cities that include 2,400 students in 9^th grade, and no existing excellence classes. They will open 40 enhanced ability groups for both 8^th and 9^th grades, for which the District will provide two supplementary weekly teaching hours per group.

In these groups, 40 eighth and ninth grade teachers will be trained to teach a series of tasks based on advanced mathematics in real-world contexts. They will become familiar with this material in two professional learning communities. The communities will be led by Branco Weiss together with district instructors and professionals from an academic institution who will assist the teachers in becoming familiar with teaching practices that promote high-level mathematical thinking skills aligned with the 5-6 levels of PISA.

In addition, Branco Weiss will involve the 15 school principals in organizational restructuring in their schools so that students will be divided into ability groups in mathematics. In addition, the principals will be expected to allocate two weekly hours for staff meetings for the mathematics team. Branco Weiss will organize bi-weekly instructional coaching workshops with the department heads and district instructors, who will help the teachers to implement the tasks in their classrooms. They will also organize conferences and study days for the teachers, principals and department heads.

The goal of the program is that by 2025, 70% of the graduates of the excellence classes and high ability groups will succeed on a diagnostic tool, developed by CET, and aligned with the top 5-6 proficiency levels of the PISA tests, and that 35% (836) of the 9^th grade students will graduate from an excellence track.