Bridging the Worlds of Math and Education

Katherine Friedrich

Natasha Speer is fascinated by the subtle educational shifts that make the difference between mathematics courses where students are learning and courses where students can slip through with a passing grade, memorizing information they don’t truly understand. She will bring these insights from her research into mathematics education to a new K-12 teacher preparation initiative within the CIRTL Network.

Speer, a professor in the Division of Science and Mathematics Education at Michigan State University, has researched instructors’ beliefs about teaching and problem solving by interviewing and videotaping mathematics teaching assistants. Then, she identified how TAs’ views about teaching were related to their questioning patterns and to their effectiveness in the classroom.

“One of the TAs… believed that students could say the correct answer… and still not understand the ideas behind it. He was constantly asking students to explain their answers,” Speer said. “Students knew that the reason he was asking those questions was that he wanted to help them learn the material well.”

Persistent questioning to tease out the reasons behind student responses, Speer said, is more effective than assuming that students have fully thought through their answers. She also recommends that mathematics instructors talk with students about their own thinking processes, demonstrate problem solving strategies, and identify possible mistakes. “It’s that type of detective work that makes a difference,” she said.

Modeling the problem-solving process may be particularly valuable when future K-12 teachers are in the classroom. “Experienced math professors have a lot of knowledge,” Speer said. However, there is little dialogue between the mathematics community and the educational science community. “The world[s] and cultures of education and math or science are quite different,” she said.

This cultural difference has resulted in a stark shortage of resources that show higher education instructors in science and mathematics how to prepare the K-12 teachers in their classes for their future work. Quality K-12 education is vital to public science and mathematics literacy. K-12 teachers need a strong command of course content to impart science and mathematics skills to students who are entering college or the workforce.

Speer and her colleagues – CIRTL partners at Vanderbilt University and the University of Colorado at Boulder – are working together to develop materials for STEM instructors. These materials will raise awareness of the need for effective teacher preparation, provide strategies for preparing future teachers, and offer suggested ways of encouraging students to consider teaching careers. This initiative will begin in early 2008.

“We’d be eager to have other [CIRTL partners] involved,” Speer said. “It would be nice to interact with people from other types of institutions.” For more information on participating in the K-12 teacher preparation initiative, CIRTL partners can contact Natasha Speer (nmspeer at msu.edu).

12/4/2007

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