Mathematics

The Researching Order of Teaching project provides structured scaffolds for teachers to implement two sets of research-based teaching strategies hypothesized to positively impact mathematics achievement in mathematical modeling and problem solving. The poster summarizes the teaching strategies and associated research.

The aim of this project is to develop and test the efficacy of a play-based numeracy intervention for preschool classrooms. Classrooms were randomly assigned to two experimental conditions (representing different pedagogical guidance approaches) and a business-as-usual control condition. Teachers in experimental classrooms were trained to incorporate a set of numeracy games. The intervention was assessed by pre- and post-test measures of teachers and children, 11 structured observations, and focus group data.

This project explores how children in grades K-2 understand visual representations of algebraic concepts. For instance, children create tables or graphs to organize information about the relationship between two quantities. They might use graphs and diagrams to explain their mathematical thinking and develop their understanding of relationships in numbers and operations. The project uses data gathered in K-2 classrooms and via interviews with children to describe their use of the visual representations.

This project explores the potential of lesson-centered collaboration on lessons for supporting teachers’ professional growth. Specifically, the project examines how the exchange between both domestic and international teams of teachers centered on teacher-generated lesson artifacts—in the form of storyboarded lessons and annotations of those lessons—can serve as a powerful tool for supporting teachers’ ongoing professional learning and growth through collaboration.

The project is extending a digital collaborative platform for networks of teachers to create, use, and share resources for planning, teaching, and reflecting. The resources online include problem-based curriculum, classroom artifacts from students, and resources created by teachers. We report on how teachers use the resources, collaborate with each other, and make instructional decisions. With more classroom resources being created online, the project will help understand how mathematics teaching can be best supported.

In this session, we share our conceptualization of an Equitable and Interactive Mathematical Modeling (EIM2) program that positions students as decision-makers in their own learning. Students engage in equitable mathematical modeling, a process of using mathematics to analyze and quantify scenarios through a lens of equity. The program involves collaborations with middle school students, a professional learning community series with their mathematics teachers, and the creation of a free online platform that hosts EIM2 modules.

Working in two high-needs urban school districts, Doing the Math refines and researches a mathematics professional development model for paraeducators in grades PK-3 through ongoing PD designed to enhance pedagogical content knowledge and mathematics teaching self-efficacy. This work also provides opportunities to support pathways to teaching, address the critical teacher shortage and diversify the teaching pool. Program sustainability is supported through integration in PD of classroom teachers, mathematics coaches, and use of PD graduated paraeducators.

Our project has two main components. First, we are creating instructional videos that feature the unscripted dialogue of pairs of students as they engage with mathematically rich problems over time, thereby providing a model of how authentic student voices and conceptions can be included in videos. Second, we are conducting studies that investigate students’ learning processes as they engage with our videos and explore how our videos might be used in classroom instruction.

This collaboration between Gulf of Maine Research Institute, Bowdoin College, and Vanderbilt University engages middle-school students in building and revising models of variability and change in ecosystems and studies the learning and instruction in these classroom contexts. Students construct and critique models that they and peers invent and develop foundational knowledge about the roles of variability and change in ecosystem functioning, as well as the roles of models and argumentation in scientific practice.

This project uses over 2000 integrated STEM classroom videos to design and validate the STEM Observation Protocol (STEM-OP) for use in classrooms where integrated STEM is taking place. The STEM-OP is a valid and reliable instrument for use in a variety of educational contexts and research. The STEM-OP and associated training materials are available for use by stakeholders such as K-12 teachers, district administrators, teacher educators, and educational researchers through an online platform.