LEaDME: Leading Educators and Development in Mathematics Education

Mathematics Leadership Activity Plan (MLAP)

Here is a plan for mathematics leaders in primary schools to support goal setting for mathematics leadership activity. The designing of this plan is not a linear process.

There are guiding questions for each section to support planning and decision-making.

The sections of the plan are:

• Practice Development Focus: This statement addresses the impact of your leadership activity on teachers’ knowledge, practices, and/or well-being, ultimately influencing their effectiveness in mathematics teaching. I tend to encourage maths leaders to write these in the form of “Teachers will…” For example, “Teachers will use open-ended tasks with enabling and extending prompts and record these in mathematics planning documents”
• Focus questions: On what, do you direct your leadership work? What do the teachers do because of your leadership influence? What aspect of practice do you want to develop with teachers?
• Evidence: These are the sources of information that could be collected that prove that your leadership activity is influencing your teachers’ knowledge, practices, and/or dispositions for effective mathematics teaching
• Focus questions: What will be collected by you as evidence of your leadership influence? How do you know teachers are enacting this focus on practice development?
• Evidence analysis: These could be questions that you use to analyse the evidence source, and thus be able to measure the practice development focus and change in teachers’ practice. 
• Focus questions: What questions might you ask to analyse the evidence? What will you look for?
• Status: This refers to the current situation associated with the practice development focus at a particular time. This could be “beginning”, “consolidating”, or “extending’.
• Focus question: At what stage is this indicator at in terms of the teachers’ practice:Beginning? Consolidating? Extending? 
• Priority: This is the time of the school year when you will initiate your leadership activity, focusing on practice development. It is also an indication of where teachers stand with the embedding of the practice development aspect. 
• Focus question: At what stage is this indicator at in terms of the teachers’ practice: Beginning? Consolidating?Extending?
  
• Leadership actions: These are the key actions that you will take to make the practice development focus a reality in the work of your teachers. These will be the specific actions you take and how you will influence teacher learning and development practice. These leadership actions may include opportunities for professional reading, mathematics planning meetings, staff meetings, and other relevant activities.
• Focus questions: What are the important leadership actions that you need to influence the teachers’ work with this practice development focus? What is the “sequence of action” that builds on teacher dispositions, practices, and knowledge in relation to this practice development focus?
• Resources: These are the tools, resources, and artefacts that you will need to help you in your leadership activity. Examples of resources might include teacher texts, professional reading materials, and concrete materials.
• Focus question: What resources/tools do you need to facilitate your work with this aspect of practice development?

Download the Mathematics Leadership Activity Plan below. This MLAP template was updated in 2024 based on feedback from mathematics leaders.