If your student struggles with solving single digit problems, you'll want to teach him one class of facts at a time. Due to working memory limitations, the IES Practice Guide recommends focusing on only one or two new facts at a time (Forbringer and Fuchs, 2014). However, students can focus on a whole class of facts, as long as they are related.
Forbringer and Fuchs (2014) write:
When information is clustered meaningfully, multiple facts may be grouped together and still count as just one item in working memory. Consider the analogy of a small change purse that is only large enough to hold two coins at a time. If we put two pennies into the purse, the purse is totally filled with just two cents. But if we instead place two dimes in the purse, that same purse can hold twenty cents. When information is grouped into meaningful clusters, the brain can hold more content than if each fact is considered in isolation. We can apply this principle to help students master basic facts. For example, "one" is the identity element in multiplication because multiplying a number times one yields a product that is the same as the original factor, as illustrated by the fact 7x1=7. Students who understand this concept can practice all the x1 facts simultaneously without overloading working memory.
O'Connell and SanGiovanni (2011) recommend the following sequences for teaching addition and subtraction facts and multiplication and division facts. Each sequence begins with simpler facts that, once mastered, students can then use to solve trickier facts.
O'Connell and SanGiovanni (2011) recommend four steps in order to teach a class of facts to mastery. They define mastery as a student's ability to be complete the facts with automaticity (the ability to effortlessly recall a fact), and understanding (not simply remembering). These steps include:
As you prepare to intervene to support your student's ability to solve facts with automaticity and understanding, it is important to follow these four steps in order, and move onto the next stage as your student shows mastery of the previous one.
Connell, S. & SanGiovanni, J. (2011). Mastering the basic math facts in addition and subtraction: Strategies, activities, & interventions to move students beyond memorization. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
When you build a lesson plan that supports computational fluency, you'll want to chunk your time and designate each chunk strategically in order to support mastery of the skill or concept you are teaching. The sample computational fluency lesson plan below provides an example of one way that you might structure your time. As you read, consider the following:
Computational Fluency Lesson Plan
Wilson, A. (2017). Fluency lesson plan. New York, NY: Relay Graduate School of Education.