This is a Full Scale Research TPC Project that is using classroom and individual teaching experiments, along with numerous and extensive interviews, to investigate how pre- and in-service elementary school teachers construct meaning and pedagogical relevance for research on students' mathematical thinking before, during and after instruction that presents teacher-friendly syntheses of that research. The project is investigating: (a) the nature of teachers' understandings of students' mathematical thinking before and after instruction on that thinking, (b) the processes by which teachers learn about students' mathematical thinking while participating in instruction, (c) factors affecting teachers' learning of this material and (d) effects of learning this material on teachers' conceptualizations of mathematics learning, teaching and assessment (including annual state mathematics assessments).
Such research is crucial for designing, implementing and assessing mathematics education programs throughout the teacher professional continuum. It is helping educate teachers to deal with two major forces: teaching mathematics in ways that produce deep conceptual understanding and achieving success in annual state mathematics assessments. Project results are being disseminated through two other grant projects, a "Teachers for a New Era" project and a "PROM/SE NSF MSP" project.
