What is Fact Fluency?
Fact Fluency is a separate mode that sits alongside Magma's core drawboard experience. It focuses specifically on atomic facts like 3+4 or 7×8 — the building blocks that underlie all higher-order math work.
When students have to count fingers or skip-count to retrieve a basic fact, they're using working memory that should be free for the harder thinking: fractions, word problems, algebra. Fluency practice clears that cognitive load so deeper reasoning can happen.
This mode does not replace Magma's show-your-work approach. The canvas captures how a student reasons. Fluency captures whether they've automatized the facts that reasoning depends on. Same student, two different views.
How a session works
Each session is about 20 questions, presented one at a time with instant feedback. Sessions take roughly 5 minutes.
Students can either:
Tap Just Start to let the system choose facts (recommended), or
Select an operator (+, −, ×, ÷) to focus on a specific type
The mastery ladder
Every fact is tracked individually on a four-level ladder:
Level | Label |
🌱 | Learning |
🌿 | Growing |
⭐ | Strong |
🏆 | Mastered |
What moves a fact up or down:
Outcome | Effect |
Correct and fast (recalled) | Moves up one level |
Correct but slow (derived) | Stays at current level |
Incorrect | Drops down one level |
The silent timer
Students do not see a timer. There's a silent threshold running in the background, calibrated by grade:
K–1: 6 seconds
Grades 2–3: 5 seconds
Grade 4+: 4 seconds
This lets the system distinguish automatic recall from finger-counting or skip-counting. A student who derives the answer correctly isn't penalized — the fact simply stays at its current level until recall becomes automatic.
Spaced repetition
Facts return on a schedule that grows as students get stronger:
🌱 Learning — comes back within a few hours
🌿 Growing — returns in a couple of days
⭐ Strong — returns in about a week
🏆 Mastered — returns after several months
If a student got a fact right by luck, they won't remember it two weeks later — so the fact drops back down. This is how the system separates real mastery from one-off correct answers.
Common questions you might have or receive:
My student got it right — why didn't they move up
They answered correctly but were slow, so the system treated it as a derived answer rather than a recalled one. This is working as intended. Once retrieval becomes automatic, the fact will move up.
There's no timer, but it says they need to be faster?
The timer is invisible on purpose — no pressure, no anxiety. The fact stays at its current level; the student isn't penalized.
Why is the same fact showing up again in the same session?
The student got it wrong, it dropped a level, and it resurfaced for a second attempt while it's still fresh.
How much should students practice?
One session per day — about 20 questions. It's not meant to be a long drill, just a consistent 5-minute habit.