Professional Development
We believe that curricula alone can not guarantee student success or achievement gains. What happens in the classroom is equally important. In Project M3, teachers will receive training to increase their mathematical background in the content areas and to use teaching strategies developed to promote enrichment learning and mathematical discourse within the classroom.
During the first three summers, the teachers implementing the curriculum units will receive the training. During years 4 and 5, teams of teachers will receive training on curriculum differentiation in grades 3 and 4. A strong focus will be placed on developing mathematical discourse to encourage students to think deeply about the mathematics.
This training will take place during the summer for a 2-week period and during the school year (approximately 4 inservice days). Stipends will be awarded to teachers and they will receive and keep resource materials and manipulatives that support the curriculum units. Ongoing technical assistance in the classroom will include videotaping of lessons with conferencing to help teachers reflect on their teaching by witnessing the discourse in the classroom.
A lesson learned from previous grant projects is the desire and need for teachers to communicate with each other across schools and with the project staff on a regular basis. To this end, we will initiate an internet portal, a website with a discussion board. This technology will also allow us to keep teachers abreast of latest developments in the field of mathematics education and gifted education by providing links to resources and articles of interest.
We will also include vignettes of effective classroom discourse. Thus, this site becomes an additional source of professional development. In addition, we will create an on-line graduate course in developing mathematical talent at the elementary level to interest teachers throughout the nation. The University of Connecticut currently offers ten graduate courses online in a popular gifted education program.
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