IES_Ideas

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1. Draft research question: How do prospective K-6 teachers learn the mathematics that they use in teaching?

2. At UMB, we have a regular education track for both graduate and undergraduate candidates, as well as two full-time-in-schools models (Teach Next Year and Boston Teacher Residency). The courses that candidates take in each track are similar, although the residency programs are mostly not taught by the same faculty. EWU is primarily undergraduate, so that will be great since UMB is mostly graduate.

3. We want to research how well each of our programs prepare teachers from the perspective of their Mathematical Knowledge for Teaching. Teacher's MKT has been shown to be a predictor of student achievement (also attached). But the research done so far has only been with inservice teachers. We can investigate how much preservice candidates' MKT changes throughout their coursework. By the way, the initial thinking was that teachers learned their MKT in the act of teaching. Building on this, the University of Michigan (Deborah Ball et al) has developed some MKT content course materials for a preservice teacher audience. I piloted a course for them this spring, and have incorporated their materials into the UMass system's course sequence for undergraduate elementary candidates (our version of 211 and 212).

4. Data to be collected would include: a. Pre and post candidate scores using Michigan's LMT measures (to assess growth of MKT) and Louisville's DTAMS (to assess overall content knowledge)

b. State certification test scores for candidates (we have something called MTEL. Don't you <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1f497d; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13.3333px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">have the praxis?) <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1f497d; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13.3333px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">c. Yearly administrations of the MKT and DTAMS to teacher participants each year of the <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1f497d; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13.3333px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">project <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1f497d; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13.3333px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">d. Classroom observations (during practicum as preservice teachers and then follow-up <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1f497d; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13.3333px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">observations in schools over the course of the four years of the project) using an observation protocol based on Michigan's Mathematical Quality of Instruction and Horizon's Classroom Observation Protocol. <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1f497d; font-family: Arial; font-size: 13.3333px; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">e. Yearly student pre and post tests for participant's students after they graduate

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