For Families
Team Support Guidebook
Study team interaction is an integral part of the learning process in the CPM curriculum. The daily activities in a CPM course depend on students working and having discussions in teams to make sense of concepts. The teacher has an active a
Support at Home
Get math tips in your inbox
A short email for anyone helping a student at home, whether you are a parent, caregiver, grandparent, or tutor. Practical ways to support their math, plus new resources as we add them. No classroom jargon.
Purpose of the Study Team Structure
In short: collaborative learning is one of the best-supported findings in math education research, so CPM builds every lesson around study teams.
CPM builds every course on three pillars
Collaborative Learning
Problem-Based Learning
Mixed, Spaced PracticeSharing ideas or dividing up a task.
Jointly building understanding: students make their thinking public, respond to each other’s ideas, and reach shared understanding. This is what CPM is designed to produce.
Why study teams help your child
Always someone to think with
Teams of 2 to 4 mean your child can discuss, share ideas, and explain their thinking all lesson long.
Easier to ask questions
It is easier to question and challenge ideas with a few classmates than in front of the whole class.
New ways of seeing
Teammates see things differently, so your child discovers new connections and learns to justify their ideas.
Why Collaborative Learning
In short: when math ability is treated as something that grows, every child gets more chances to contribute and succeed.
What the research shows
Research cited in CPM’s 2024 Collaborative Learning report shows children in genuinely collaborative settings demonstrate:
Higher achievement
and stronger long-term retention
More motivation
and more positive attitudes toward math
Better transfer
of learning to new, unfamiliar problems
Stronger identity
seeing themselves as capable math doers
How lessons are built for this
- Challenging on purpose. Classwork assumes peer and teacher support. Lessons are not designed for your child to work alone.
- Many ways to solve. Lessons often ask for more than one method, so students see the value of other strategies.
- Students investigate and justify. Discoveries stick longer when your child finds them by examining teammates’ work than when simply told.
The Teacher’s Role in a Collaborative Classroom
In short: it is not less teaching, it is teaching redirected.
The teacher demonstrates a procedure. Students copy it.
Students meet the problem first and reason it out together. The teacher sets up the conditions for understanding to develop.
While teams work, the teacher is…
Listening
to follow which ideas are forming, where confusion starts, and who needs a nudge or a bigger challenge.
Asking
carefully chosen questions that deepen thinking without giving the answer away.
Watching
who is participating, and stepping in so every student gets a real chance to engage.
Choosing
which student ideas to share with the class, and in what order, to build toward the big idea.
Wrapping up
every lesson with a closing activity that pulls the learning together and clears up confusion.
Teacher-led discussion still matters
At the end of each lesson the teacher brings students’ ideas into a class conversation, sums up what was discovered, and connects it to the big mathematical idea.
Give it time
The first weeks can feel bumpy for students and families. Once teams find their footing, your child starts asking better questions, working through confusion, and helping others learn.
How teachers give team feedback
- End-of-day discussions that highlight the behaviors that helped teams move forward.
- Public notes the teacher takes on team conversations, shown by team on a projector, focusing on quality, content, or particular role behaviors.
- Regular reminders about roles and expectations all year, which keep teams working well.
Where Teamwork Happens
In short: in a single class period, your child’s team may work in three different places.
At desks or a team table
For most collaborative problem solving and for recording work in math notebooks.
At a whiteboard or wall paper
Research shows standing at a visible, erasable surface makes students more willing to take risks, share thinking, and stay engaged.
On a shared device
One per pair, for the online textbook, math tools, and technology-based lessons.
Wherever they are, your child should keep their math notebook or Toolkit nearby to record thinking, conclusions, and new vocabulary.
Student Roles in Study Teams
In short: every child gets a specific job, so no one carries everything and no one gets left out.
Roles are not just about staying on task. They make sure every child has a real way to contribute, including those who might hold back, check out, or get talked over. Roles are an equity tool as much as a management tool.
Visibly Random Teams
Teams may change every day. Students can see the groupings are genuinely random, not chosen by ability, grades, or behavior.
How roles keep things fair
- 1Assigned randomly. Your child does not pick a role, so no one sorts by bias, and every student is seen as capable of every role.
- 2Made visible. Role descriptions are posted so students know exactly what their job is.
- 3Rotated regularly. Your child experiences every role many times, so a pecking order never takes hold.
- 4Modeled by the teacher. Before an activity, the teacher walks through what each role does and says.
- 5Reinforced all year. Especially after teams change or after a school break.
Expectations for Student Interaction
In short: teams follow five shared guidelines, easy to remember as TEAMS.
Your child’s teacher revisits these through the year, especially when teams change or collaboration starts to break down.
Together, work to answer questions
Teammates are resources for each other. Teams move together, so no one is left behind or races ahead.
Explain and give reasons
There are many valid ways to solve a problem. Students share reasoning, not just answers.
Ask questions and share ideas
The classroom is a community of support. Unfinished thinking is welcome, through routines like Rough Draft Talk.
Members of your team are your first resource
Teams try to answer their own questions before calling the teacher, building independent learning habits.
Smarter together than apart
Understanding others’ approaches deepens your own. The goal is for everyone to understand, not for the fastest to finish.
Using the Text and Resource Materials
In short: CPM’s materials are built for teamwork, not solo worksheets.
The textbook is a team resource
Problems are meant to be worked through out loud, with everyone contributing, not completed silently and separately.
The Toolkit records the why
After working a problem together, each student writes their own understanding, vocabulary, and worked examples to study from later.
Digital tools support teamwork
Print or digital, the tools are there to support team discussion, not to let students work in isolation.
Additional Help
In short: every team has an adjustment period, and that is normal.
If your child mentions their team is not working well, here is what is worth knowing.
A slow start is normal
New teams often need several sessions before collaboration clicks. Teachers expect this.
Teachers step in
If a team struggles, the teacher uses a specific strategy to move the conversation forward.
Teams change often
Your child gets to learn new roles and practice working with different classmates.
Ask the teacher
For how your child’s class handles team challenges, their teacher is the best source.
Resources for families
Quick Reference
Words in This Guidebook
Study team
The 2 to 4 classmates your child works with in class. Each has an assigned role, and teams change often.
Three Pillars
The three things CPM builds every course on: Collaborative Learning, Problem-Based Learning, and Mixed, Spaced Practice.
Collaborative Learning
Students jointly building understanding, not just sitting together or splitting up a task. See the note on collaboration in Section 01.
Problem-Based Learning
Students meet a problem first and work out the mathematics from it, rather than being shown a procedure and repeating it.
Mixed, Spaced Practice
Practice that mixes in topics from earlier chapters instead of drilling only today’s lesson. It is why your child remembers it longer.
Team roles
Each student in a team is given a specific job so everyone has a clear way to contribute and no one is left out.
Visibly Random Teams
Teams formed by a random process students can see, so no one believes they were sorted by ability, grades, or behavior.
Rough Draft Talk
Saying an idea out loud before you are sure it is right. It is meant to be unfinished, and it is encouraged.
Toolkit
The notebook your child builds through the course, holding their own notes, key vocabulary, and worked examples in their own words.
Methods and Meanings
The boxes in the book with definitions and formulas. They appear after students have worked with an idea. Called Math Notes in 2nd Edition.
Reflection and Practice
The take-home practice in Inspiring Connections. Called Review and Preview in Core Connections.
Closure
The short activity at the end of a lesson where the teacher pulls the day’s learning together and clears up confusion.
Mathematical identity
Whether a student sees themself as someone who can do mathematics. CPM treats this as something the classroom shapes, not something fixed.
Justification
Explaining why an answer works, not just what the answer is. CPM expects students to share reasoning, not only results.
CPM Research Base
CPM’s published research on how its curriculum works, updated in 2024 and written to be readable by families.
No match. Try another word, or ask your child’s teacher.
Tell Us What You Think
Was this page helpful?
Your feedback shapes what goes on these pages. For questions about your child’s specific team or class, their teacher is still the best person to ask.