Drexel University will conduct a two-year program to enable 58 elementary school teachers to become mathematics teaching specialists who will do all the grades 1-8 mathematics teaching in 10 elementary and 3 middle schools in the School District of Philadelphia. The 13 Principals from participants' schools will also participate in the program. The project will improve the content knowledge, pedagogical skills and assessment techniques used by the participants. Mathematical content knowledge will include estimation, measurement, probability and statistics, transformational and projective geometry, topology, applied mathematics and problem solving. Participants will learn to use diagnostic teaching strategies in teaching mathematics and will incorporate assessment as an interactive feedback device to focus instruction. The project will involve the private sector in creating a video tape resource library of activities concerning real world mathematics applications for classroom use. It will engage private sector engineers and scientists in one-to-one mentoring partnerships with teacher participants. The project will also involve the active participation of the Franklin Institute Science Museum. Participants may earn 11.5 graduate quarter credits which may be applied toward a Master's degree. This project has the potential for causing systemic change in grades 1 through 8 mathematics instruction in the School District of Philadelphia.
