DYNAMIC PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT: Strategies to Guide and Assess Teacher Growth

1. DYNAMIC PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT:Strategies to Guide and Assess Teacher Growth Jane Gawronski, Nadine Bezuk, and Steve Klass National Council of Teachers of Mathematics - Annual Conference, April 2008

2. Today’s Session • Welcome and introductions • Who we are • What we do in our professional development • Impact of our work on student achievement and teacher practice • Questions and discussion

3. Who We Are • San Diego State University Professional Development Collaborative (PDC) http://pdc.sdsu.edu • Supported by a $5.1M grant from to Improve Student Achievement in Mathematics (ISAM).

4. 2000-2001 Grades 4-6 low-performing schools (San Diego Unified School District) Grades 4-6 team teachers (SDUSD) Grades 4-6 teachers (SDUSD) Grades K-3 teachers (SDUSD) 2006-present Teachers from multiple districts K-12 History of Our Professional Development Work

5. Professional Development • Face-to-face • San Diego Unified School District (K-12) • Lemon Grove School District (K-8)* • Ramona Unified School District (K-12) • Sweetwater Union High School District (7-12) • *Blended online and face-to-face sessions • Math Specialist Certificate Program (MSCP)

6. What Makes it Dynamic? • PD leaders jointly plan and conduct sessions • The “math content leader” looks at the goals through a mathematics lens. • The “math ed leader” looks at the goals through a instructional practice lens. • Constant revision based on needs of participants • One size does NOT fit all!

7. Impact on Student Achievement and Teacher Practice • Student Achievement • Teacher Growth • Content • Pedagogy

8. Student Achievement • State-mandated test: CA Standards Test (CST) • Matched-pairs study in Year 6 (2006) • Students taught by MSCP teacher were paired with students taught by teacher without MSCP • 22 teachers • 580 pairs of students

9. Matched Pairs Study • Major criteria for matching • Same grade level • Same initial raw score on CST mathematics section • School with same Academic Performance Index (API)

10. Matched Pairs Results • Mean score of students with MSCP teacher was significantly greater than mean score of students with non-MSCP teacher • Students in lower API schools were impacted more than students in higher API schools

11. Assessing and GuidingTeacher Growth • Mathematics content knowledge and pedagogy • Informal assessment using “Try-it-on” • Embedded assessments • Changes reported by teachers • Impact on practice

12. Mathematics Content and Pedagogy • San Diego State University developed assessments • Including University of Michigan Items • Embedded assessments

13. Impact on Teachers’ Content Knowledge • Pre- and post-tests • Number and operations • Rational numbers • Geometry • In every cohort the mean scores increased from pre-test to post-test

14. Guiding Teacher Knowledge Through “Try-it-on” Tasks • Tasks developed for teachers to implement with their students • Teachers bring student work to subsequent PD sessions for analysis with colleagues • Teacher sharing informs PD leaders

15. Try-It-On Task – Grades 3-5 8 + 4 = + 5 • “Most said it means to find the answer.” • “Many students were shocked to see this, and I know it was part of the 4th grade curriculum.” • “I had a lot of students go OOOOOHHH, that’s right.”

16. Try-It-On Task – Grades 6–8 • Proportional reasoning: Punch Problem: If a gallon of punch will serve 12 people, how much punch would you prepare for a party at which you will have 50 guests? (Lamon, p. 111) • Most students did not use a proportion to solve this, though the procedure had been “taught”. • Teachers expressed surprise and conjectured that even though their students could solve a proportion, they may not be reasoning proportionally.

17. Try-It-On Task – Grades K-3 • Triangle or Not a Triangle • Fall: case study presented to teachers, and student pre-assessments in identifying triangles carried out by teachers • Winter: discussions during PD sessions designed to increase teacher content knowledge about triangles; teachers return to classrooms with try-it-on task for students using concept cards developed by teachers. • Spring: geometry project; student post-assessments; teacher analysis and discussion of results in PD sessions.

18. Triangle or Not a Triangle?

19. Embedded Assessments • Assessment items embedded into professional development sessions • Minimized testing time taken from instruction during PD sessions • Springboard for instruction - linked to PD • More authentic feel for teachers

20. Assessing Teacher Knowledge Through Embedded Assessments • Tasks developed for teachers of Grades 6 – Algebra I • Jay’s Lesson • Qualitative graph

21. Jay’s Lesson • Jay was talking with Allison, his 9th grade student, They were talking about the following word problem:  Suppose you have a large piece of fish that weighs 4 pounds. You are making servings from this large fish. Each serving will weigh of a pound. How many servings can you make from the fish?

22. Jay’s Lesson • Allison drew the following picture to help her solve the problem: Jay: How many servings do we have?  Alison: 6 and 2 left over. So each serving is and then… , right?  Jay: 6 is the answer? Alison: I’m thinking ‘cause there’s two left over out of 5.   How would you respond to this student?  

23. Qualitative Graph • Write a story about a journey that could be represented by the following graph. Make sure to tell what happened in each lettered section. 

24. Changes Reported by Teachers

25. Impact on Teachers’ Instructional Practices Teachers report that they now: • Try new strategies in their classrooms; • Select among many tools including the textbook, the pacing guide, and CGI principles; and • Recognize good mathematical problems from the text that will help students meet the standards.

26. One Teacher’s Comments About Our Impact on Her Teaching “I feel my knowledge and understanding of mathematics has been expanded to the point where I will never teach math the same again. I know too much about group/partner work, using manipulatives; reflective writing, student-directed teaching, student responsibility. In short, I feel enlightened. I feel I finally understand math.”

27. Questions/Discussion

28. Contact usjgawronski@projects.sdsu.edunbezuk@mail.sdsu.edusklass@projects.sdsu.eduSlides and samples available http://pdc.sdsu.edu