Spark Math

Spark Math is organized as four flexible replacement units—Community Building & Executive Function Skills, Making Sense of Ratios, Expressions & Equations, and Statistics—that can be implemented independently or as a complete sequence. The program provides comprehensive materials, including print and digital workbooks, teacher guides, slide decks, dashboards, and both analog and digital EF skill building games. This modular design allows educators to adapt resources to their specific classroom contexts while supporting deep mathematical understanding across key sixth grade topics.

Spark Math’s Skye Adaptive Practice Virtual World reimagines math practice as an immersive learning experience. Students navigate themed islands within each unit, completing math and EF skill challenges to earn coins and planks that build bridges to new content. The environment blends adaptive asset-based EF skill activities, PhET simulations, and “Cinema” videos showcasing diverse mathematicians, creating a structure for independent and collaborative learning that motivates students, supports transfer of EFs to math problem solving, and provides a responsive environment for students to receive feedback.

Spark Math opens with a Community Building unit designed to create a strong classroom culture before diving into math content. Students and teachers explore identity, interests, and belonging while developing a shared understanding of growth mindset and mathematical mindset. Through games and activities, students are explicitly introduced to EFs—working memory, inhibition, and cognitive flexibility—and learn how these skills support both learning and collaboration. By connecting EFs to math, games, and students’ own worlds from the start, the unit positions all students as capable math learners.

Spark Math explicitly teaches students about working memory, inhibition, and cognitive flexibility through accessible lessons, then provides ongoing practice through games like Equivacards (a unique take on the Uno card game), Set, and Rat-a-Tat Cat that integrate multiple EF skill demands with math content. This explicit-then-embedded approach intentionally weaves game play throughout the curriculum to help students practice EFs and strategic thinking while building relationships with peers. By framing game play as both skill-building and collaborative fun, Spark Math creates opportunities for students to strengthen the cognitive abilities they need for complex math while fostering classroom community.