Illinois is one of many states recently upping the ante for supporting high-quality math instruction. The Illinois Comprehensive Numeracy Plan is undergoing a public development process, with educators and advocates weighing in to shape the state’s vision for quality math instruction. 

One group that’s jumped in is New Classrooms, a national nonprofit that designs and supports math learning solutions to help schools meet students where they are and move them to mastery. Their response to the Illinois plan includes lots of smart recommendations, with an emphasis on coherence in math instruction. I recently had the chance to connect with Joel Rose, Co-Founder and CEO of New Classrooms, to hear more about their important work. Here’s what he had to say:

Can you tell us a bit about the work you do at New Classrooms?

Joel: At New Classrooms, we work directly with educators to make instruction more responsive to individual student needs, while also supporting policies that enable that kind of teaching at scale. Since our founding in 2011, we’ve worked with tens of thousands of students across the country. One of the core lessons from that work is that improving math outcomes requires a much clearer understanding of how learning builds over time. That’s what led us to focus on skill maps.

So what exactly is a skill map, and what does it take to build one?

Joel:  Standards tell you what students are expected to be able to know and do at each grade level. A skill map breaks those expectations down into discrete, teachable skills—specific pieces of learning, whether procedural, conceptual, or applied, that can typically be taught and assessed within a single lesson—and shows how those skills connect to one another across grades. 

When educators have access to a math skill map, it gives them a much more concrete picture of how students move from foundational concepts to more advanced math. In that sense, a skill map doesn’t replace standards—it makes them actionable.  The goal is to end up with something that’s not just aligned, but actually usable in classrooms.

Why do states like Illinois need skill maps, when they already provide information on how the standards progress?

Joel:  Many states, including Illinois, have developed rigorous standards that set clear expectations for what students need to learn. This is an essential building block for instructional coherence. But standards and standards progression documents don’t always give teachers a clear picture of how learning builds from one concept to the next, or where foundational gaps are most likely to show up.

A skill map addresses two limitations of state standards: First, standards are written for grade-level expectations and don’t spell out prerequisite knowledge. So when students are struggling—or ready to accelerate—it’s not always clear which underlying skills matter most.

Second, many standards bundle multiple skills together. That can make it hard to tell whether a student has partial understanding, where they’re getting stuck, or whether they’ve already mastered key components and are ready for deeper work.

By making the progression of learning explicit and showing how skills connect across grades, a skill map gives teachers a much clearer understanding of which foundational concepts underpin upcoming content, and where gaps are most likely to accumulate.

Give us an example of how a skill map can help with math instruction.

Joel:  If a student is struggling with the Pythagorean theorem, the issue might not be that concept itself. It could be something earlier—like exponents or solving equations. A skill map makes those connections visible, so support can actually address the root cause. 

On the other hand, if a student demonstrates strong mastery of the Pythagorean theorem, a skill map can help teachers see what concepts that unlocks next—whether that’s distance on the coordinate plane, geometric proofs, or more advanced work with irrational numbers. That makes acceleration more purposeful and connected, rather than just moving faster through content. And that’s where skill maps can unlock something deeper: when students have genuine mastery of foundational concepts, they’re better positioned to engage with more complex ideas, make connections across domains, and develop real mathematical understanding—not just procedural fluency. 

The goal of a skill map isn’t to reduce math to a checklist of isolated procedures or promote rote learning. Done well, it includes conceptual and applied skills alongside procedural ones—and it explicitly maps the relationships between them. Understanding why the Pythagorean theorem works is itself a skill. So is applying it in an unfamiliar context.

The problem we’re actually trying to solve is the opposite of rote learning: students sitting through lessons on concepts they can’t yet access because they’re missing foundational knowledge. When that happens, the result is often surface-level mimicry—going through the motions without genuine understanding—precisely because the conceptual scaffolding isn’t there.

A well-designed skill map helps ensure students have that scaffolding in place before they move on. That’s not a recipe for shallow learning. It’s a prerequisite for deeper learning.

Why should more states be thinking about skill maps?

Joel:  Because it’s the connective tissue across a lot of things states are already investing in—not an “extra” initiative. States have put real effort into strengthening standards, improving curriculum, and building better assessments. But those pieces don’t always line up well in practice, and teachers are often left to stitch them together for their students.

A skill map aligned to state standards helps bring a lot of coherence to that system. It creates a shared understanding of how learning builds, which can support everything from core instruction and intervention to assessment design and professional learning.

If you want standards, curriculum, and assessment to work together—and if you want educators to be able to respond to student needs in a targeted way—you need a clear picture of how learning builds.

In math, a skill map provides that foundation.