Inspiring math confidence in education: 3 strategies for success

In the 1970s, the audio recording company Memorex created one of the most famous advertisements in history. Ella Fitzgerald, known as the First Lady of Song, stepped up to the microphone and delivered a masterclass in sound. She ended with a note of such power, skill, and confidence that it shattered glass.

This performance was recorded on a Memorex cassette and, when played back, had the same glass-shattering impact. The advertiser’s tagline famously asked, “Is it live or is it Memorex?”

Neither. It was Ella.

Of course, Fitzgerald didn’t become a world-class singer through sheer luck. Instead, her success required:

1. Mentors, teachers, and peers.
2. Many hours of practice.
3. The willingness to do the work to develop her abilities.

As educators, we seek to help our students master essential skills and develop their abilities in a similar way. They often struggle, however, with mathematics. In fact:

• The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) shows that 61 percent of fourth-graders and 72 percent of eighth-graders are not proficient in math; and
• A recent RAND study finds that more than half of students in grades 5–12 do not consider themselves to be a “math person”—and that this self-perception is often formed by the end of elementary school (Schwartz et al., 2025).

In our Math Masterclass video series, we explore recent trends in math pedagogy and share research-based strategies to improve student engagement and learning outcomes. In this blog, we’ll continue the conversation by focusing on three areas that have significant potential to deliver learning gains by building students’ math confidence.

Build confidence through deliberate math practice

Mathematics is made up of many interdependent skills, and we all understand that mastering skills requires practice. Too often, however, practice is treated as an afterthought in schools—something “seen as mundane and humdrum” and “considered unworthy of deep, sustained reflection and precise engineering” (Lemov, Woolway, & Yezzi, 2012).

According to a significant body of research, nothing could be further from the truth.

In their book Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise, Ericsson and Pool (2016) bring together knowledge from both cognitive science and their direct work with world-class performers from multiple fields. They discuss how these performers became great and stress the role not of mere practice but rather deliberate practice, which they describe as “the most powerful approach to learning that has yet been discovered.”

What does deliberate practice involve?

3 features of deliberate math practice for students

Ericsson, Krampe, and Tesch-Römer (1993) define deliberate practice as “activities that have been specially designed to improve the current level of performance” and are crafted with three points in mind:

1. The task’s design must take into account the learner’s preexisting knowledge, so the task can be correctly understood after a brief period of instruction.
2. The learner should receive immediate, informative feedback and knowledge of the results of their performance.
3. The learner should repeatedly perform the same or similar tasks.

To apply these points to K–2 math classrooms, ask yourself the following questions:

What percentage of time are students engaged in activities where everyone is doing essentially the same thing?

What percentage of time are students engaged in activities that:

• Consider their prior knowledge;
• Instruct them on the edge of their current ability level;
• Provide immediate feedback to both them and their teachers; and
• Provide a sufficient number of rounds of practice until a skill that was, until just recently, on the edge of the student’s ability instead becomes fluid and automatic?

We recently polled an audience of educators, and they felt their students’ math practice might meet the definition of deliberate practice—at most—25 percent of the time. If deliberate practice is “the most powerful approach to learning” that has been discovered, why do students engage in so little of it?

There’s an easy answer: Because it’s difficult to manage.

Providing deliberate math practice in every classroom

We’ve written previously about the wide range of ability levels in the average math class. This can span eight years or more, with some students working on early grades’ skills while their peers are ready for algebra.

Even if this range were smaller, managing the dynamics of deliberate practice for each student would still be a daunting task. The area of differentiated, deliberate math practice, however, is one where technology shines.

Consider, for example, the Freckle for math program from Renaissance. Freckle offers:

• Targeted practice, allowing teachers to assign the same grade-level skills to all students; and
• Adaptive practice, which meets students where they are by adapting to their current ability level. Adaptive practice is especially useful for addressing missing prerequisite skills, helping to close gaps that prevent students from accessing grade-level content.

Empowering students to practice at the right level—and providing enough repetitions to build fluency and automaticity—are key to making practice more deliberate. They’re also essential for building both math confidence and proficiency. Students with a good understanding of prerequisites can tackle new topics with confidence. Conversely, students lacking necessary prerequisite abilities are at risk of losing confidence and placing themselves in the “doom loop” of deciding they’re “just not a math person.”

Still, in practical terms, how do teachers engineer deliberate math practice?

Increase math confidence by following the 80/20 rule

Educators wishing to further explore the concept of deliberate practice would do well to consult the book Practice Perfect: 42 Rules for Getting Better at Getting Better by Lemov, Woolway, and Yezzi. These authors present a variety of ways teachers might consider both what they help students to practice and how they might optimally design this practice.

One suggestion they make is to take guidance from the 80/20 rule, also known as the law of the vital few. This holds that 80 percent of the results come from 20 percent of “the knowledge acquired or skills developed within a domain.” In essence, each subject area contains an essential 20 percent of content that ultimately accounts for 80 percent of our success.

Once these essential skills are identified, instruction should focus on them for extended periods. While they comprise 20 percent of the domain, they should be our focus for far more than 20 percent of the time. Lemov, Woolway, and Yezzi remind us that “if you’re practicing one of those important skills—one of the [skills that most drive] performance—don’t stop when your participants ‘know how to do it.’ Your goal with these skills is excellence, not mere proficiency.”

When students’ abilities around the essential core of a content area are fully developed, then confidence follows as well.

But how do teachers identify—and focus on—the “essential 20”?

Focusing math practice on the most important skills

In building math learning progressions for each US state, Renaissance’s content teams identified a subcategory of skills that are fundamental to students’ development at each grade level, which we named Focus Skills™. The concept of Focus Skills directly parallels the law of the vital few.

Kirkup et al. (2014) note that Focus Skills are “essential in underpinning future learning.” For example, mastering all of the math Focus Skills for grade 6 will adequately prepare students for the major math topics of grade 7.

Renaissance makes lists of Focus Skills for both math and ELA freely available to all educators through our Focus Skill Resource Center. You can browse skills by state and grade level, and you can easily look back to prior grades to see essential prerequisites.

To be clear, Focus Skills are not meant to replace your curriculum. Each skill in your curriculum is important and should be addressed. Instead, Focus Skills help you to identify the highest priority skills for whole- and small-group activities and student practice—the skills that have the greatest impact on students’ success.

Focusing your efforts on these skills—and providing students with multiple ways to practice and deepen their understanding—supports rigor and builds students’ confidence in their ability to tackle increasingly challenging math content.

Strengthen math confidence by making progress visible

Even with technological support, keeping students engaged in deliberate practice can be challenging. Ericsson, Krampe, and Tesch-Römer (1993) note “that deliberate practice requires effort and is not inherently enjoyable.” Fogarty, Kerns, and Pete (2018) add that “very few [students] are willing to push themselves to do the massive amounts of deliberate practice that expertise requires” without specific support.

What form should this support take? Both sets of authors point to the power of continual feedback that highlights progress and growth. This, in turn, motivates students to continue to strive and further builds their confidence.

This process is described by Stiggins (2014) in his discussion of why “the most important users of assessment results” are the students themselves. “Right from the time students arrive at school, they look at their teachers for evidence of success,” he writes. “If that early evidence suggests they are succeeding, what begins to grow in them is a sense of hopefulness and an expectation of more success in the future.”

Multiple studies validate this statement, including Marzano’s (2009) finding that having students track their progress is associated with a 32 percentile point gain in their achievement.

In short, when students monitor their grades, assignment completion, and progress toward goals, they become more aware of their strengths and areas needing improvement. This self-awareness encourages reflection and helps students make informed decisions about how to adjust their study habits or seek help when necessary.

A digital math practice program such as Freckle is especially helpful here, providing students with:

• The ability to set math practice goals and monitor progress toward achieving them
• Built-in scaffolds—including audio support and helpful hints—to help them engage with challenging math content, without giving up
• Focus Skills practice, so they can concentrate on the skills that have the greatest impact on future learning and success

Math Masterclass: Inspiring greater student confidence

Like Ella Fitzgerald’s success in music, K–12 students’ success in math requires years of practice, a willingness to persevere, and the confidence to deliver.

The good news is that we know from research how students learn best and how to structure instruction and practice to build greater math confidence. Our Math Masterclass series shares key insights from this research. We invite you to watch the videos and reflect on how you might use these insights to strengthen students’ confidence this school year:

Session 1: Where We Are & What’s Next, which reviews key trends in math pedagogy and explores the COVID-19 pandemic’s true impact on achievement.

Session 2: Ending the Math Wars, which explains how to strike the right balance between direct instruction and more open-ended, inquiry-based learning activities.

Session 3: Why Math Is Ruthlessly Cumulative, which examines key milestones in math development—and explains why missing even a single skill can impede students’ progress.

Session 4: Comprehensive Math Systems, which provides an in-depth look at targeted and adaptive math practice, and explains how much practice students need for success.

References

Ericsson, K.A., Krampe, R., & Tesch-Römer, C. (1993) The role of deliberate practice in the acquisition of expert performance. Psychological Review 100(3): 363–406.

Ericsson, K.A., and Pool, R. (2016). Peak: Secrets from the new science of expertise. New York: Harper.

Fogarty, R., Kerns, G., & Pete, B. (2018). Unlocking student talent: The new science of developing expertise. New York: Teachers College Press.

Kirkup, C., Jones, E., Everett, H., Stacey, O., & Pope, E. Developing National Curriculum-based learning progressions: Mathematics. National Foundation for Educational Research. Retrieved from: https://uk.renaissance.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/developing-national-curriculum-based-learning-progressions-in-mathematics.pdf

Lemov, D., Woolway, E., & Yezzi, K. (2012). Practice perfect: 42 rules for getting better at getting better. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Marzano, R. (2009.) When students track their progress. Educational Leadership 67(4): 86–87.

Schwartz, H., Bozick, R., Diliberti, M.K., & Ohls, S. (2025). Students lose interest in math: Findings from the American Youth Panel. RAND. Retrieved from: https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA3988-1.html

Stiggins, R. (2014.) 7 principles of student centered classroom assessment. Blog post. Retrieved from: https://rickstiggins.com/2014/03/04/7-principles-of-student-centered-classroom-assessment/