Voicing the New Pedagogy, Teachers Write About Learning and Teaching Mathematics

By Deborah Schifter

Detailed descriptions of classroom process are needed in order to ground discussion of the principles animating the mathematics education reform movement. In response to this need, teachers who were already engaged in transforming their mathematics instruction were invited to write reflective narratives about their evolving instructional practice. This paper describes the structure of that project and presents excerpts from some representative narratives. It also considers how writing these narratives contributed to the continuing development of their authors and discusses how reading them affected students in teacher education courses. Finally, it urges that such narratives be seen as a medium through which teachers can become centrally involved in the national conversation about mathematics education reform.

Contact Info: Glenn Natali (1-800-225-4276 x2525)

Project Website: Teaching to the Big Ideas (TBI)

Published by: Center for the Development of Teaching

Please order at: http://www.edc.org/MLT/CDT/paperabs.html

Price: $4.50
(24 pp.) Print