CBMS Forum 2010: Today's Ideas in Teaching

  

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Last month I attended the Conference Board of the Mathematical Sciences Forum (CBMS) on Content-Based Professional Development for Teachers of Mathematics in Reston, VA. The CBMS is an umbrella organization representing seventeen professional societies, including math education groups like NCTM, NCSM, and TODOS; associations of mathematicians, such as the Mathematical Association of America and the American Mathematical Society; and other math-related groups. This is the third CBMS forum I've attended. Two years ago the focus was the Report of the National Math Panel. Last year we concentrated on the emerging draft of the Common Core State Standards. The goal of each forum has been to generate discussion and distill policy recommendations for decision-makers at the federal level. With a focus on teacher professional development, last month's forum tackled what is arguably the most important lever for improving math performance. The speaker and panel presentations are available on the CBMS website. I just want to share a few quick highlights:

• Several speakers used different terms – structures, trajectories, content progressions – to describe the same idea. The Common Core State Standards is built on content and skills that connect from year to year. The objectives should not be considered in isolation. They are part of threads that run, for instance, from Base Ten Number and Operations through the Number System and into Algebra. Understanding those interconnections is critical for teachers, and one of my breakout groups recommended incorporating the trajectories into math teacher education. Elementary teachers need to see where the content they're teaching will be leading their students. And middle and high school teachers need to follow the threads back to what their students learned in 3rd or 4th grade.
• Teachers are learners too. Kind of a "duh" realization, but we often neglect to apply basic learning theory when we're working with adult teachers. We need to respect background knowledge, provide appropriate scaffolds and supports, and connect procedures to meaning. What we do to ensure successful instruction of children, we should also do for teachers in pre-service and professional development.
• We need to provide teachers with new ways to assess student work, particularly student understanding. Much of what currently happens in the classroom focuses on measuring skill and procedural knowledge. What kinds of tasks can provide windows into student thinking and strategic competence? There's much work to do here, but some of the presentations from the forum offer a glimpse of the possibilities.

A synthesis of ideas and recommendations from the forum should be available soon, so check back on the CBMS website next month.

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