The Learning Mathematics for Teaching Project
Posted by Jacqueline Iger on Fri, Feb 03, 2012 @ 04:24 PM
How does a teacher’s understanding of mathematical concepts affect students’ learning outcomes? What types of math skills do teachers themselves need to effectively teach mathematical concepts? How does a teacher’s knowledge of these concepts develop through experience in the classroom and professional development?
The Learning Mathematics for Teaching (LMT) Project at the University of Michigan has been investigating these questions since 2000, when they set out to develop survey measures to evaluate educators’ knowledge for teaching elementary mathematics. Drawing on research, theory, personal experience, and the study of math curricula and student work, the LMT team developed surveys quite different from traditional subject matter or certification assessments. These survey questions ask teachers how they would address common problems that may occur during a math lesson. For example, a question may ask a teacher to explain a mathematical procedure. For more examples, check out this list of sample items released by LMT.
Since the initial development of these surveys for elementary math, LMT has created additional surveys that can be used to measure elementary and middle school teachers’ math content knowledge for teaching number and operations; patterns, functions, and algebra; geometry; rational numbers; proportional reasoning; and data, probability, and statistics.
These surveys have been used in a number of research studies, such as assessing the extent to which various professional development programs improve teachers’ mathematical knowledge for teaching, how knowledge of math for teaching develops, and how knowledge of math for teaching corresponds to instructional practice or attitude toward teaching. With this data and continued research, we can see a future with great advances in teacher training for math educators.