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An emphasis on examination of student
thinking guides all center projects and all grade level work is aligned
with the California Content Standards. The K-8 materials used the
Center's programs have been developed in partnership with Mathematics
in the City at City College New York and the Freudenthal Institute in
the Netherlands, a National Science Foundation funded project, and have
a substantial research base. The center has funding for partial support
of teacher participants and whenever possible seeks cost sharing
arrangements with local districts.
- Summer Workshops.
Two workshops were offered in summer 2006: one on
Algebra for teachers in grades 4-9 and a second on Number and Operation
for teachers in grades K-6. The goal is to provide teachers with
strategies to help their students succeed with the Standards in grades
K-7 and in Algebra 1. These workshops include substantial focus on
understanding number and calculation. By developing the important
representations for numbers (open number lines, arrays and area model,
ratio tables, and combination charts), the big ideas and strategies for
understanding arithmetic can be constructed by students in ways that
enable them to generalize and understand variation so they develop
lasting conceptual understanding. The workshops last one-week and
stipends are available to teachers from participating districts.
During the fall 2006, two versions of the summer
workshops will be offered for teachers whose districts agree to release
them from classes on three subsequent Tuesdays. These workshops have
been set up specifically so teachers, along with the credential
candidates working in their classrooms, can participate in Lesson Study
Groups.
- Thursday Afternoon Working Groups.
These working groups provide follow-up for the
summer workshops and opportunities for vertical teaming. Participants
are able to collaborate with teachers in their districts on: further
study of number and algebra topics, sharing student work and
collaborative planning, vertical teaming with an emphasis on
Elementary-Junior High collaboration. Follow-up can include class
visits by mentor teachers, UCSB faculty, and graduate students with
backgrounds in K-8 mathematical development.
- Project
DELTA.
These full-day workshops (usually on a Saturday)
will enable participants to study a single classroom topic in depth
using a lesson study approach using videos developed by Math in the
City for this purpose. DELTA stands for Digital Environments for
Learning and Teaching Arithmetic/Algebra. The videos bring the context
of K-8 classrooms to the fingertips of participants for inquiry and
examination. At each workshop, a single lesson will be studied in depth
during the morning, and then in the afternoon participants will
consider "mini-lessons" that help build and solidify the concepts and
skills developed in the lesson. Discussion will focus on student
thinking, how understanding is developed, and how context and
representation influences their development. Different grades, levels,
and topics are studied throughout the year.
- Lesson Study Groups.
This project is new for 2006-07 and was designed
in collaboration with the Teacher Education Program at UCSB.
Participants are credential candidates and cooperating teacher pairs
who have participated in summer workshops and want to deepen their
understanding of mathematical development by working in grade level
teams on lesson study using classroom materials that focus on the big
ideas developed in the summer workshops. During fall 2006, the lesson
study topics will be: inventory and early place value (K-1), the open
number line for addition/subtraction (2-3), the array the array model
for multiplication (3-5), and the ratio table (5-6).
- Focus on a School Site.
The center will collaborate with an entire school
or grade bands at a school. A good way to get to know the project is
for Center staff to run a workshop on the teaching and learning of a
mathematical topic K-8. School leadership will determine the exact
format and topics of the work. Possibilities include: study of big
ideas and representations in mathematical development in K-8 or
appropriate grade band, strategies for inquiry based development of
mathematical concepts, strategies for developing computational fluency
with understanding, vertical teaming, video case lesson study,
examining student work and curriculum planning, class visits, or
establishing math clubs for students.
For more information about the above projects, contact:
Bill Jacob, Professor of Mathematics, UCSB
Mathematics Dept., UCSB Santa Barbara, CA 93106
jacob@math.ucsb.edu
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