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| Vol. 18, No. 38 | Aug. 5, 1999 |
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| Vol. 18, No. 38 | Aug. 5, 1999 |
Project investigators include (from left) Katheen Hollowell, Jon Manon and Sarah Caldwell.
The $1.35 million grant-which began July 1 and continues through Aug. 31, 2002-will support the project over four summers and throughout three academic years.
According to Kathleen Hollowell, Mathematics & Science Education Resource Center and co-principal investigator of DEMCI, the project is designed to provide intensive training during summer sessions along with additional support throughout the school year so that teachers can implement new material and approaches in the discipline.
To accomplish this year-round program that incorporates training, support, monitoring and mentoring, five secondary-level math specialists have been hired. While intensive instruction is part of the project, the purpose and application of DEMCI involves more than summer session orientations and training, Hollowell explained.
"We want the schools to develop mentoring models to sustain mathematics implementation beyond the end of the funding period," she said. "We also want to build capacity within the schools so that participating teachers will be able to carry out the project's goals of improving both mathematics teaching and student learning."
Middle school teachers during math initiative training include (from left)
Tammy Trelford, Kirk Middle School; Sondra Jones, Drew Pyle
Middle School; and Amy Hoath, Redding Intermediate School.
Notification of the grant was not received until June 1, but Hollowell said response and registration have already been overwhelmingly positive.
"We have more than 200 teachers signed up for this first summer of the grant," Jon Manon, Mathematics & Science Education Resource Center and DEMCI principal grant investigator, said, "and we expect an additional 100 teachers to be involved in the project next summer."
Both Hollowell and Manon said they are excited about the potential to involve between two-thirds and three-fourths of all public middle and high school mathematics teachers in the state.
As a program participant, each teacher will have the opportunity to be involved in more than 150 hours of professional development, including summer orientation and instruction, in-service sessions during the school year and periodic meetings with math specialists. There will also be biweekly meetings in schools and bimonthly dinner meetings involving all of the participants statewide.
"These large gatherings," Manon said, "will provide excellent opportunities for cross-district fertilization of ideas."
Participating teachers are given the choice of a stipend or University graduate course credits.
"Our hope," Hollowell said, "is that the teachers leave these training sessions with a conviction that instruction of mathematics in middle school and high school has to change, and that they will have the confidence that they can be a part of that change. We want math teachers to rethink pedagogy and to rethink content and, as a result, to move toward adoption of a new curriculum."
"But," Manon added, "you can's simply pass out books on the new curriculum. It requires a tremendous amount of sustained professional development to implement these changes effectively."
The new mathematics teaching, he said, uses real data and presents it in a fashion that requires students to use mathematical models to address practical, contemporary issues.
"One of our goals," Hollowell said, "is to help students establish quantitative literacy, rather than simply be able to push symbols around in algebraic formulas."
Contemporary Mathematics in Context: A Unified Approach, one of the curricula used during the training, states that the textbook series was developed to "prepare students for success in college, in careers and in daily life in contemporary society. The series builds upon the theme of mathematics as sense-making. Through investigations of real-life contexts, students develop a rich understanding of important mathematics that makes sense to them and which, in turn, enables them to make sense out of new situations and problems."
"These characteristics, Hollowell said, "apply to all four curricula chosen by DEMCI for implementation in Delaware schools."
"UD's participation in this project," Manon said, "is the result of years of involvement in working to determine the nature of mathematics instruction and content that needed to be changed. The DEMCI project is using curricula that have been modified and tested with positive results over the last six or seven years. It also matches the Delaware mathematics content standards, which are based on the national mathematics standards."
"This is a way to assist teachers in a positive fashion," Hollowell said, "and to provide new techniques and approaches. The four focus areas include mathematics content, pedagogy, curriculum and assessment, and all four are necessary components in standards-based teaching. We are asking teachers to rethink their practices in significant ways. These are not small, incremental changes. These are new ways to think, to teach and to evaluate."
Manon explained that training teachers in the new methodology-showing how they will incorporate the new curriculum into the classroom and documenting increased student achievement-will take time.
"We've found that we begin to see results after about three years of practice," he said. "That's why our project extends for three full school years and over four summers."
The Mathematics & Science Education Resource Center (MSERC) was established to assist K-12 mathematics and science teachers in implementing Delaware's new content and performance standards in the classroom. Standards-based lessons incorporate four features: Problem solving, communication, reasoning and connections.
In addition to Hollowell and Manon, others playing a significant role in the project and serving as co-principal investigators include Clifford Sloyer, mathematical sciences; Sarah Caldwell, Delaware Department of Education; and Mary Lynn Vincent, mathematics curriculum supervisor, Colonial School District. Sloyer is the principal author of one of the two high school curricula chosen for the project.
"One of the most satisfying things about both the preparation of the grant application and the upcoming implementation of the program," Hollowell said, "is the collaborative spirit among the participants. Everyone has been cooperative and enthusiastic. This includes everyone from grant writers to school district administrative personnel, to teachers involved as participants and math specialists and investigators. And," she added, "I believe this positive attitude will contribute to the program's success."
With the involvement of more than two-thirds of the state's mathematics teachers, Hollowell and Manon said they believe the new program has the potential to make a major impact on mathematics education statewide. 
-Ed Okonowicz
Photos by Jack Buxbaum
