Improving Mathematics Discourse through Action Research

2019 ◽  
Vol 112 (4) ◽  
pp. 302-306 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher W. Parrish ◽  
Ruby L. Ellis ◽  
W. Gary Martin
Keyword(s):  
Mathematics Teaching ◽  
Mathematics Classroom ◽  
Central Element ◽  
Success For All ◽  
Mathematical Ideas ◽  
Mathematical Connections ◽  
Mathematics Discourse ◽  
Mathematics Educators ◽  
Mathematical Success ◽  
Support Students

NCTM identified eight Mathematics Teaching Practices within its reform-oriented text, Principles to Actions: Ensuring Mathematical Success for All (2014). These practices include research-informed, high-leverage processes that support the in-depth learning of mathematics by all students. Discourse within the mathematics classroom is a central element in these practices. The goal of implementing the practice facilitate meaningful discourse is to give students the opportunity to “share ideas and clarify understandings, construct convincing arguments regarding why and how things work, develop a language for expressing mathematical ideas, and learn to see things from other perspectives” (NCTM 2014, p. 29). To further support implementing meaningful discourse, mathematics educators must become adept at posing questions that require student explanation and reflection, hence, pose purposeful questions, which is another of the eight practices. Posing purposeful questions allows “teachers to discern what students know and adapt lessons to meet varied levels of understanding, help students make important mathematical connections, and support students in posing their own questions” (NCTM 2014, pp. 35-36).

Promoting Mathematical Connections Using Three-Dimensional Manipulatives

2017 ◽  
Vol 22 (8) ◽  
pp. 488-492
Author(s):  
Farshid Safi ◽  
Siddhi Desai
Keyword(s):  
Middle School ◽  
Problem Solving ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Mathematical Understanding ◽  
Success For All ◽  
Sense Making ◽  
Problem Solving Skills ◽  
Mathematical Ideas ◽  
Mathematical Connections ◽  
Mathematical Success

Principles to Actions: Ensuring Mathematical Success for All (NCTM 2014) gives teachers access to an insightful, research-informed framework that outlines ways to promote reasoning and sense making. Specifically, as students transition on their mathematical journey through middle school and beyond, their knowledge and use of representations should continually develop in complexity and scope. “[Students] will need to be able to convert flexibly among these representations. Much of the power of mathematics comes from being able to view and operate on objects from different perspectives” (NCTM 2000, p. 361). In fact, when students represent, discuss, and make connections among different mathematical ideas by using different methods, they engage in deeper sense making and improve their problem-solving skills while refining their mathematical understanding (Fuson, Kalchman, and Bransford 2005; Lesh, Post, and Behr 1987).

The Decision-Making Protocol for Mathematics Coaching: Addressing the Complexity of Coaching With Intentionality and Reflection

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 27-43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Courtney Baker ◽  
Melinda Knapp
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Mathematics Teaching ◽  
Professional Growth ◽  
Classroom Practices ◽  
Success For All ◽  
Classroom Teachers ◽  
Mathematics Coaching ◽  
Mathematics Coaches ◽  
Mathematical Success ◽  
Coaching Activities

More than ever, mathematics coaches are being called on to support teachers in developing effective classroom practices. Coaching that influences professional growth of teachers is best accomplished when mathematics coaches are supported to develop knowledge related to the work of coaching. This article details the implementation of the Decision-Making Protocol for Mathematics Coaching (DMPMC) across 3 cases. The DMPMC is a framework that brings together potentially productive coaching activities (Gibbons & Cobb, 2017) and the research-based Mathematics Teaching Practices (MTPs) in Principles to Actions: Ensuring Mathematical Success for All (NCTM, 2014) and aims to support mathematics coaches to purposefully plan coaching interactions. The findings suggest the DMPMC supported mathematics coaches as they worked with classroom teachers while also providing much-needed professional development that enhanced their coaching practice.

Tools for Facilitating Meaningful Mathematics Discourse

2019 ◽  
Vol 24 (6) ◽  
pp. 354-361
Author(s):  
Michael D. Steele
Keyword(s):  
Classroom Discourse ◽  
Success For All ◽  
Mathematics Discourse ◽  
Mathematical Success ◽  
Research Based Practices

This article explores facilitating meaningful mathematics discourse, one of the research-based practices described in Principles to Actions: Ensuring Mathematical Success for All. Two tools that can support teachers in strengthening their classroom discourse are discussed in this, another installment in the series.

Engaging Students with Mathematics through Play

2018 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 179-183
Author(s):  
Karina K. R. Hensberry ◽  
Ian Whitacre ◽  
Kelly Findley ◽  
Jennifer Schellinger ◽  
Mary Burr Wheeler
Keyword(s):  
Mathematics Teaching ◽  
Teaching Practices ◽  
Success For All ◽  
Virtual Tools ◽  
Link Type ◽  
University Of Colorado ◽  
Mathematical Success ◽  
The University ◽  
Interactive Simulations ◽  
Mathematics And Science

Mathematics teaching that provides opportunities for play embodies many of the Mathematics Teaching Practices described in Principles to Actions: Ensuring Mathematical Success for All (NCTM 2014). PhET interactive simulations (or sims), developed by the PhET Project at the University of Colorado Boulder (http://phet.colorado.edu), are freely available virtual tools that promote play and exploration in mathematics and science topics for K-16 students.

Sharing Teaching Ideas: Journal Writing in the Mathematics Classroom: A Beginner's Approach

2000 ◽  
Vol 93 (2) ◽  
pp. 132-138
Author(s):  
Nancy Williams ◽  
Brian Wynne
Keyword(s):  
Journal Writing ◽  
Mathematics Classroom ◽  
Alternative Form ◽  
Evaluation Standards ◽  
Mathematical Ideas ◽  
Mathematics Educators ◽  
Teaching Ideas

Today's mathematics educators are advocating methods of assessment other than frequent tests, quizzes, and daily worksheets. In fact, the NCTM's Curriculum and Evaluation Standards states,“The assessment of students' ability to communicate mathematics should provide evidence that they can express mathematical ideas by speaking, writing, demonstrating and depicting them visually” (1989, 214). One alternative form of assessment that incorporates these standards is journal writing

Launching mathematical success

2019 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 249-252
Author(s):  
Dittika Gupta ◽  
Lara K. Dick
Keyword(s):  
Real World ◽  
Success For All ◽  
Design Task ◽  
Mathematical Ideas ◽  
Mathematical Success ◽  
Paper Airplane

Principles to Actions: Ensuring Mathematical Success for All (NCTM 2014) calls for integrating into the classroom real-world activities that connect mathematical ideas to other subjects and contexts. Motivated by the desire to make these connections, we devised a paper airplane design task to engage students in various STEM concepts.

Mathematics Teaching: Practices in Action

2014 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
pp. 188
Keyword(s):  
Mathematics Teaching ◽  
Teaching Practices ◽  
Success For All ◽  
Mathematical Success ◽  
Mathematics Teaching Practices

This call for manuscripts is requesting articles that provide evidence to support the Mathematics Teaching Practices found in NCTM's Principles to Actions: Ensuring Mathematical Success for All.

Teaching Mathematics: It's Time to Tell Some New Stories

2005 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-151 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Westwell
Keyword(s):  
Mathematics Teaching ◽  
Mathematics Classroom ◽  
Human Life ◽  
Teaching Mathematics ◽  
Florence Nightingale ◽  
Mathematics Educators ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Teaching Of Mathematics

A NUMBER OF mathematics educators have called in recent years for a ‘humanising’ of the teaching of mathematics and even of the subject itself. One important way in which this can be done is by recognising the importance of story in human life and understanding in general and in mathematics teaching in particular. Using as an example the story of Florence Nightingale and her rose statistical diagrams, three ‘stories within the story’ are identified: the ‘human-story’, the ‘mathematics-story’ and the ‘knowledge-story’. A way of making use of these within the mathematics classroom is suggested and areas for further research are identified.

Designing Elementary Mathematics Games using Effective Mathematics Teaching Practices

2016 ◽  
pp. 406-432
Author(s):  
Beth Bos ◽  
Theressa Engel
Keyword(s):  
Mathematics Teaching ◽  
Teaching Practices ◽  
Digital Games ◽  
Success For All ◽  
Careful Study ◽  
Mathematical Concepts ◽  
Future Potential ◽  
Mathematics Games ◽  
Mathematical Success ◽  
Mathematics Teaching Practices

Problem-solving digital games that make sense of mathematics do not happen by accident but by careful design. This chapter looks at a popular design framework, Game Network Analysis (GaNA), and examines how teachers can use it to turn popular digital games into strong mathematical experiences grounded in effective teaching practices that use play, purposeful explorations, and focused dialogue to make mathematical concepts more meaningful. The chapter involves a careful study of the GaNA framework in comparison with the eight Mathematics Teaching Practices of Principles to Actions: Ensuring Mathematical Success for All. The findings encourage further analysis of the GaNA framework in terms of specific academic areas. Explicit clarification is needed to use the framework to effectively move mathematics education toward its future potential.

Promoting a Conceptual Understanding of Mathematics

2018 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Margaret Smith ◽  
Victoria Bill ◽  
Mary Lynn Raith
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Understanding ◽  
Mathematics Teaching ◽  
Teaching Practices ◽  
Success For All ◽  
Mathematical Success ◽  
Mathematics Teaching Practices

This article provides an overview of the eight effective mathematics teaching practices first described in NCTM's Principles to Actions: Ensuring Mathematical Success for All.

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