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An analysis earlier this year of more than 100 studies of math interventions finds that students who study already-worked example problems improved in mathematics nearly a half of a standard deviation more than those who didn’t use that approach. That improvement is like a student who would normally score at the 50th percentile performing above the 69th percentile instead.

For students who have gaps in prior math knowledge, the study review suggests that analyzing both correctly and incorrectly answered examples might improve their understanding. But the study found that students tend to make less progress with problems that lack detail, don’t clarify the goal of the problem, or don’t try to highlight the upcoming steps needed to solve the problem.

Julie Booth, an education professor at Temple University, and Allie Huyghe, an assistant director at the Strategic Education Research Partnership Institute, a nonprofit group that develops research-based education practices, have created free example-based lessons in elementary math and algebra. They are now working with California and Maryland teachers in schools serving high percentages of low-income students and students of color to do the same in geometry.

In their “MathByExample” project, students read and analyze one correct and and one incorrect solution for each problem; explain the reasoning behind the solutions and identify misconceptions that led to incorrect solutions; then apply that understanding to similar problems.