NSF Grant for up to $4.5 Million Will
Help ASU Faculty
Foster Student Learning of Math
The National Science Foundation (NSF) is awarding up
to $4.5 million to Arizona State University’s Center for Research
on Education in Science, Mathematics, Engineering and Technology (CRESMET)
to develop new ways to help middle and high school mathematics teachers
improve student learning.
The grant is awarded through the NSF’s Teacher Professional Continuum
program, which aims to bolster the recruitment, preparation and retention
of effective teachers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
It has an initial two-year award of $1.7 million and a pending $2.7 million
based on progress and NSF funding levels.
“We are bringing rigorous university research to bear on what
matters most in the mathematics classroom,” said Marilyn Carlson,
CRESMET director and principal investigator on the NSF grant. “We
want to learn how we can deepen teachers’ understanding of the
mathematics they teach, plus give them practical strategies to help their
students develop the mental skills to solve tough mathematical problems.”
Working with several hundred teachers in nine Arizona middle and high
schools (in the Gilbert and Glendale school districts initially), ASU
researchers will deliver a new graduate course on teaching pre-calculus-level
mathematics. Teachers will be able to take the ASU course tuition-free
in their own schools at times convenient for their schedules.
Then the teachers will work together in a professional learning community
to discuss what they learned in the course. They will also develop lessons,
test them in their classrooms, and – through use of videos made by the
ASU researchers – observe.
The project arises from a decade of mathematics education research by
Carlson, an ASU associate professor of mathematics and statistics. The
graduate course is the first of a series of combined mathematics and
science courses that CRESMET is creating for secondary school teachers.
This first
course in pre-calculus will focus on a strand of algebra concepts that
underlies all of high school mathematics. Research by Carlson and others
has shown that teachers can promote their students’ success only
when they themselves have strong problem solving abilities, a deep understanding
of the important ideas in mathematics and how they connect to one another,
and clear knowledge of the process by which students acquire those ideas
and learn to reason effectively.
Professional learning communities are
a potent strategy for school change and improvement that researchers
have been developing and refining since the late 1980s. In professional
learning communities, a school provides structured time during working
hours for teachers to reflect on the effectiveness of their instruction.
Working together, teachers in these communities explore their disciplines,
plan instruction, observe each other’s classrooms, and examine such “classroom
artifacts” as student work and videos to uncover what is and isn’t
working.
Research shows that learning communities significantly help teachers
to adapt and improve instruction for better student learning. An innovation
of the CRESMET project is to organize professional learning communities
among teachers taking a graduate course together. This intensive support
gives teachers a way to efficiently translate their new knowledge into
teaching methods that promote improved student learning and achievement.
Joining
Carlson on the project are Irene Bloom, Glen Hurlbert, Henry Kierstead,
Yang Kuang, Sharon Lohr, Michael Oehrtman, and Michelle Zandieh from
the ASU math department; Alfinio Flores from the College of Education;
and Hillary Burns and Nora Ramirez of CRESMET.
Media contact:
Skip Derra, (480) 965-4823
skip.derra@asu.edu
Source:
Marilyn Carlson, (480) 965-6168
Kristine Wilcox, (480) 965-6170
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