Rural teacher leadership in science and mathematics

This study adds to our understanding of science and mathematics teacher leadership in rural schools. Through In Vivo and Concept coding of teacher interviews, we investigated 20 secondary science and mathematics teachers' perceptions of rural teacher leadership during their participation in a three-year professional development program. As the teachers developed as teacher leaders, they broadened their focus from improving their own students' learning to sharing new knowledge learned through the program with other teachers both informally and formally. We compared our program components to the Teacher Leader Model Standards and added an emphasis on the importance of disciplinary content knowledge. We also identified patterns in science and mathematics teacher leadership that are contextually connected to teachers' instruction in rural high poverty schools. Rural teacher leadership included the importance of building strong teacher–student relationships, providing new academic opportunities for students, encouraging students' success, and building community connections.     

Developing a reform mathematics curriculum program in Sweden: relating international research and the local context

This paper reports on a research-based mathematics curriculum program development project in Sweden, whose educational context is currently characterized by multiple reform initiatives. Current reforms include a repositioning of the teacher as central for students’ learning, but also a trend toward initiatives and teacher resources that are more directive than has been the case in the past 30 years. Collecting data from multiple sources, such as teacher log books, lesson observations and feedback meetings, we build on input from 11 elementary school teachers trying out our materials, including student texts and a teachers’ guide, during four trial rounds. We analyze how international research about curriculum programs and teachers’ use of these programs are interpreted and operationalized within the Swedish context. In particular, the two research questions guiding the study are: (1) “How do Swedish teachers interact with and reason about the reform-based classroom practices promoted by the curriculum program?” and (2) “How do Swedish teachers interact with and reason about their use of a teachers’ guide?” From our experiences in the Swedish educational context, we suggest the following contextual aspects to take into account when designing a curriculum program whose design is grounded in international research literature: characteristics of current classroom practices, teachers’ role in classrooms, the level of explicit/implicit support teachers are used to receiving, and teachers’ experiences using a teachers’ guide.     

Justification as a teaching and learning practice: Its (potential) multifacted role in middle grades mathematics classrooms

Justification is a core mathematics practice. Although the purposes of justification in the mathematician community have been studied extensively, we know relatively little about its role in K-12 classrooms. This paper documents the range of purposes identified by 12 middle grades teachers who were working actively to incorporate justification into their classrooms and compares this set of purposes with those documented in the research mathematician community. Results indicate that the teachers viewed justification as a powerful practice to accomplish a range of valued classroom teaching and learning functions. Some of these purposes overlapped with the purposes in the mathematician community; others were unique to the classroom community. Perhaps surprisingly, absent was the role of justification in verifying mathematical results. An analysis of the relationship between the purposes documented in the mathematics classroom community and the research mathematician community highlights how these differences may reflect the distinct goals and professional activities of the two communities. Implications for mathematics education and teacher development are discussed.     

Mathematics teacher educators’/researchers’ collaboration with teachers as a context for professional learning

This paper describes our joint activity as mathematics teacher educators and academic researchers in collaborating with both experienced and novice teachers in two contexts: an emergent community of inquiry into mathematics teaching and its development; and a research methods course, offered as part of a mathematics education Master’s program, aspiring to initiate participating teachers into research practice through inquiry. Adopting an Activity Theory (AT) perspective, we analyse our activity, identifying its nature and transformations that frame our professional learning. The results indicate that our professional learning is the outcome of a continuous process of becoming aware of our own activity and its transformation in relation to that of the teachers.     

Teachers and didacticians: key stakeholders in the processes of developing mathematics teaching

This paper sets the scene for a special issue of ZDM—The International Journal on Mathematics Education—by tracing key elements of the fields of teacher and didactician/teacher-educator learning related to the development of opportunities for learners of mathematics in classrooms. It starts from the perspective that joint activity of these two groups (teachers and didacticians), in creation of classroom mathematics, leads to learning for both. We trace development through key areas of research, looking at forms of knowledge of teachers and didacticians in mathematics; ways in which teachers or didacticians in mathematics develop their professional knowledge and skill; and the use of theoretical perspectives relating to studying these areas of development. Reflective practice emerges as a principal goal for effective development and is linked to teachers’ and didacticians’ engagement with inquiry and research. While neither reflection nor inquiry are developmental panaceas, we see collaborative critical inquiry between teachers and didacticians emerging as a significant force for teaching development. We include a summary of the papers of the special issue which offer a state of the art perspective on developmental practice.     

Learning with classroom videos: conception and first results of an online teacher-training program

Within the framework of a yearlong teacher education program we examined the conditions and effectiveness of learning with classroom videos. In online phases and face-to-face sessions (blended learning), 20 teachers from two different countries. (Germany and Switzerland) analyzed videos of their own mathlessons and math-lessons of other teachers. Using different instruments, the training program was evaluated from a scientific perspective. The evaluation aimed to obtain information about processes within the training, about the acceptance of the training by the teachers and the patterns of perception of teaching processes of the teachers.     

An ecological reading of mathematical language in a Grade 3 classroom: A case of learning and teaching measurement estimation

In our work in teacher education and professional development, we aim to help teachers to learn to participate in, and create, classroom ecologies that support students’ learning. In this article we focus on the challenges of developing a classroom ecology that provides mathematical sustenance for students. We pay particular attention to the ways in which classroom language can impede the development of a classroom ecology—one where all students are heard and where knowing is understood as participatory. We present recommendations for teaching practice drawn from an ecological reading of the classroom discourse during a series of lessons on measurement in a Grade 3 classroom.     

Elementary Teachers: Concerns About Implementing a Science Program

The purpose of this study was to examine elementary teachers’ science teaching concerns after participating in a two‐year extensive and sustained science professional development intervention. The intervention consisted of two types of teacher professional development across two years including: (a) summer institutes (60 hours across two years) which provided training on curriculum units, inquiry‐based instructional strategies, problem‐based learning, classroom management, and technology use in the classroom; and (b) coaching (60 hours across two years) which provided teachers support in establishing an investigative classroom and assistance in the implementation of inquiry/problem‐based science units. Teacher data were collected across four different time points: prior to the intervention, after one year of intervention, after two years of intervention, and one year after completion of the intervention. Results from quantitative data supported with qualitative interviews indicated concerns among teachers changed but they were not eliminated. The findings of this study provide evidence that teachers’ concerns may not be eliminated, but with extensive support––concerns become less focused on self and more focused on students.     

Using video representations of teaching in practice-based professional development programs

This article explores how video can be used in practice-based professional development (PD) programs to serve as a focal point for teachers’ collaborative exploration of the central activities of teaching. We argue that by choosing video clips, posing substantive questions, and facilitating productive conversations, professional developers can guide teachers to examine central aspects of learning and instruction. We draw primarily from our experiences developing and studying two mathematics PD programs, the Problem-Solving Cycle (PSC) and Learning and Teaching Geometry (LTG). While both programs feature classroom video in a central role, they illustrate different approaches to practice-based PD. The PSC, an adaptive model of PD, provides a framework within which facilitators tailor activities to suit their local context. By contrast, LTG is a highly specified model of PD, which details in advance particular learning goals, design characteristics, and extensive support materials for facilitators. We propose a continuum of video use in PD from highly adaptive to highly specified and consider the affordances and constraints of different approaches exemplified by the PSC and LTG programs.     

Changing Teacher Behavior Through Staff Development: Implementing the Teaching and Content Standards in Science

For the last five years, the Center for Precollege Programs of the New Jersey Institute of Technology has operated the Urban Elementary Outreach Program, a staff development program intended to bring improved math and science education to the elementary schools of Newark, New Jersey. Teachers in urban settings have been hampered in their efforts to provide enriching, student-centered and constructivist science and math teaching ( Huinker, 1996 ). The Outreach Program has attempted to provide teachers with sustained support through training and direct classroom assistance in an effort to develop a sense of self-efficacy ( Bandura, 1982 ) in relation to desired teaching and student behaviors that are part of a standards-based learning experience. Traditional training approaches for teachers are supplemented by weekly classroom visits by graduate assistants, who both model standards-based science teaching and assist the teacher in assuming effective instructional methods. The combination of workshops, orientations, newsletters, and weekly classroom visits make up a staff development program of two years in duration for teacher participants. Through this intensive program, we intend to change teaching behaviors in the many complex ways identified in the National Science Education Standards.     

Sociocultural perspectives in research on and with mathematics teachers: a zone theory approach

Sociocultural theories view teacher learning as changing participation in social practices that develop their professional identities rather than as acquisition of new knowledge or beliefs that are internal to the individual. Although sociocultural research on mathematics teacher education has tended to focus on understanding teachers’ learning, this article argues that sociocultural perspectives can also guide more interventionist research involving changing classroom practice. The approach illustrated here uses an adaptation of Valsiner’s zone theory to analyse teacher learning and development in two separate research studies. In one study the aim was to understand how teachers incorporated digital technologies into their practice, while the other study helped teachers implement an investigative approach to working mathematically consistent with a new syllabus. In both studies, productive tensions between teachers’ beliefs, contexts, and goals were a trigger for learning and development.     

A High‐Quality Professional Development for Teachers of Grades 3–6 for Implementing Engineering into Classrooms

With the increasing emphasis on integrating engineering into K‐12 classrooms to help meet the needs of our complex and multidisciplinary society, there is an urgent need to investigate teachers' engineering‐focused professional development experiences as they relate to teacher learning, implementation, and student achievement. This study addresses this need by examining the effects of a professional development program focused on engineering integration, and how teachers chose to implement engineering in their classrooms as a result of the professional development. 198 teachers in grades 3–6 from 43 schools in 17 districts participated in a yearlong professional development program designed to help integrate the new state science standards, with a focus on engineering, into their teaching. Posters including lesson plans and student artifacts were used to assess teachers' engineering practices and the implementation in their classrooms. Results indicated that the majority of the teachers who participated in the professional development were able to effectively implement engineering design lessons in their classrooms suggesting that the teachers' success in implementing engineering lessons in their classroom was closely related to the structure of the professional development program.     

Mathematics teacher education advanced methods: an example in dynamic geometry

We present a research work about an innovative national teacher training program in France: the Pairform@nce program, designed to sustain ICT integration. We study here training for secondary school teachers, whose objective is to foster the development of an inquiry-based approach in the teaching of mathematics, using investigative potentialities of dynamic geometry environments. We adopt the theoretical background of the documentational approach to didactics. We focus on the interactions between teachers and resources: teachers’ professional knowledge influences these interactions, which at the same time yield knowledge evolutions, a twofold process that we conceptualise as a documentational genesis. We followed in particular the work of a team of trainees; drawing on the data collected, we analyse their professional development, related with the training. We observe intertwined evolutions and stabilities, consistent with ongoing geneses.     

Teachers' funds of knowledge and the teaching and learning of mathematics in multi-ethnic primary schools: Two teachers' views of linking home and school

In this paper we explore two teachers' views on the role(s) of parents, the local community and children's home lives in the learning of mathematics in primary school. We use Moll and Greenberg's concept of ‘funds of knowledge’ and apply it to the case studies of two teachers working in the UK context. Issues of teachers' professional experience, ethnicity, class and gender emerge as significant in examining similarities and differences in the teachers' beliefs, understandings and practices in the area of linking home and school. We end with a discussion of some implications for teacher education and professional development.     

Authentic and Simulated Professional Development: Teachers Reflect What is Modeled

Science is a dynamic discipline, representative of the nature of science. Yet, young science students continue to think everything is already discovered. In this study, we examine why students are not actively doing science. From professional development to student engagement, how are classrooms and students changing as we increase teachers' content knowledge? Teaching practices modeled in professional development can change what occurs in the classroom. Our study was designed to probe differences in two different types of professional development programs both focused on content knowledge. We found that what is modeled by the professional developers has a profound effect on the direction of the classroom. This matched controlled study found that teachers reflect the teaching practice modeled by professional developers through their individual classroom teaching practices. A significant difference was found in cognitive activities and questioning skills between teachers in a professional development program modeling authentic inquiry versus the teachers in a professional development modeling simulated inquiry. While both groups increased the amount of overall inquiry used in the classroom, students whose teachers were in authentic inquiry professional development were engaged in higher cognitive activities and questioning skills. If students are engaged in dynamic classrooms, searching for answers to students' questions, perhaps they will understand that science is a dynamic discipline.     

Science Talk: Preservice Teachers Facilitating Science Learning in Diverse Afterschool Environments

The purpose of this study was to assess the impact a community‐based service learning program might have on preservice teachers' science instruction during student teaching. Designed to promote science inquiry, preservice teachers learned how to offer students more opportunities to develop their own ways of thinking through utilization of an afterschool science program that provided them extended opportunities to practice their science teaching skills. Three preservice teachers were followed to examine and evaluate the transfer of this experience to their student teaching classroom. Investigation methods included field observations and semi‐structured, individual interviews. Findings indicate that preservice teachers expanded their ideas of science inquiry instruction to include multiple modes of formative assessment, while also struggling with the desire to give students the correct answer. While the participants' experiences are few in number, the potential of afterschool teaching experience serving as an effective learning experience in preservice teacher preparation is significant. With the constraints of high‐stakes testing, community‐based service learning teaching opportunities for elementary and middle‐school preservice teachers can support both the development and refinement of inquiry instruction skills.     

Reviving Pólya's “Look Back” in a Singapore school

This study is based on the stance that Pólya's “Look Back,” though understudied, remains relevant to Mathematics curricula that place emphasis on problem solving. Although the Singapore Mathematics curriculum adopts the goal of teaching Look Back, research about how it is carried out in actual classroom practice is rare. In our project, we focus on a redesign of a teacher development programme that is targeted to help teachers realize Pólya's original vision of Look Back in the classroom. We report the cases of two teachers who have participated in the teacher development programme: their thinking about Look Back (through interview records) and their interpretation of Look Back in their classroom practice (through video records). By bringing these two spheres of data together, we discuss their degree of ‘buy-in’ to Look Back in the overall problem solving enterprise.     

A teacher education experiment to challenge conceptions and practices

This study describes a teacher education experience with grade 5–6 teachers, based on a calculator module within a national program for mathematics in-service teacher education. The aim was to challenge the teachers’ conceptions about the role of the calculator in mathematics teaching and to promote their reflection about professional practices. The research methodology was qualitative and interpretive, with data collection through interviews and observation of teacher education and classroom supervision sessions, as well as analysis of teachers’ portfolios. The results indicate that some teachers are clearly against the use of the calculator in the mathematics classroom, while others allow students to use it in a passive way and some others are very affirmative about its use. The teachers who argue against the use of the calculator seem to predominate, suggesting a great distance between the curriculum orientations and classroom practice. The methodology of the course, combining collective sessions and individual classroom supervision, proved to be fruitful, providing new information, practice and discussion that allowed teachers to analyze different kinds of tasks in which the calculator might be useful, experiment using them in the classroom and reflect about the students’ work. The no imposing and questioning approach used in collective discussions encouraged teachers to assume their own positions; sharing and discussing in the collective reflections during the course stimulated a deeper reflection of their practice. Therefore, in this course, in-service teacher education focused on practice contributed to teachers to reflect on their conceptions and practices.     

Students constructing meaning for the number line in small-group discussions: negotiation of essential epistemological issues of visual representations

In mathematics classroom interaction, the multiple meanings of mathematical visual diagrams are often ignored; instead, depending on the given situation, they are read in a well-defined and unitary way. Mathematical visual representations are thus used even less in their epistemological function for learning, but more as pre-given subject matter. The purpose of this paper is to elaborate opportunities for negotiating and clarifying differences, dealing with a great variety of ways of interpreting visual diagrams that are brought into focus in interaction. Theory-based qualitative analyses of two exemplifying video episodes of small-group discussions negotiating their ideas on the topic “number line” show differences of meaning and the importance of conventions followed by mathematical deductions. Two mutually exclusive teacher behaviors within the communicative acts, reconstructed as a dominating way of instruction and a moderating way of focusing, are identified.