Andrew M. Tyminski

Using Educative Curriculum Materials to Support the Development of Prospective Teachers’ Knowledge:

Building on the work of Ball and Cohen and that of Davis and Krajcik, as well as more recent research related to teacher learning from and about curriculum materials, we seek to answer the question, How can prospective teachers (PTs) learn to read and use educative curriculum materials in ways that support them in acquiring the knowledge needed for teaching? We present two extended conceptual examples of ways in which educative curriculum materials might be used to support PTs in developing the knowledge needed for teaching. We follow these examples with a set of empirically based design principles and conclude with a brief consideration of unanswered questions related to the use of educative curriculum materials in teacher education.

Preservice Elementary Mathematics Teachers’ Emerging Ability to Write Problems to Build on Children’s Mathematics

It has become increasingly important for mathematics teacher educators to assist elementary preservice teachers (PSTs) in leveraging the knowledge of children’s learning of mathematics during instruction. Professional noticing (Jacobs et al. J Res Math Educ 41(2):169–202, 2010) involves the interrelated skills of attending, interpreting, and responding to children’s mathematics. Responding with problems that build on children’s mathematical thinking is a skill that is both difficult to learn and a critical practice in teaching elementary mathematics. We present our analyses of PSTs’ responses to a sequence of three increasingly complex methods course activities designed to scaffold PSTs’ engagement in professional noticing, and to develop their abilities to write problems that build on children’s mathematics. Supported by our series of activities, PSTs demonstrated a strong foundation in attending to and interpreting children’s mathematics. In comparison, however, these experiences did not result in comparable gains in responding to the children’s mathematical thinking, a result with implications for mathematics education.