Developing the teaching practices necessary to create accessible math classrooms at the school, jurisdiction and classroom structures will require significant investment in professional development.
1. Most teachers, principals and senior administrators recognize the experience described by Mrs. Jamieson. They, themselves, have had unfortunate experiences with math in school—or they know many people in the same boat. Teaching mathematics that makes mathematics accessible to all students requires that teachers design learning experiences in mathematics that many of them have never experienced.
Progress will require the active engagement of mathematicians and math educators to design pedagogical content knowledge, mathematical knowledge for teaching and mathematical content knowledge. More math courses of the procedural sort will not get teachers out of their current dilemma. While most need more mathematics, it is mathematics of a particular sort: the kind that permits them to design more robust mathematical engagement with topics that gives students access to complex mathematical ideas.
Changing teaching practices to facilitate accessible classrooms requires significant investment in professional development that would permeate both the school district, and the classroom. Leadership to support teachers, including providing them with useful feedback and to have sound judgments made in terms of timetables and resources at the administrative level is essential. It requires a degree of understanding of UDL principles. The teacher must also have a strong sense of the mathematical learning in order to determine the next teaching steps and to provide students with timely, specific feedback. But because most teachers learned mathematics in the traditional procedural sense, teaching the subject in a new way, that makes is truly accessible for all, is a challenge. They’re attempting to design learning experiences in mathematics they haven’t personally experienced.
Mrs. Jamieson, the Grade 7 teacher participating in this study, was in that boat. “As a student, I struggled with math all the way through school and it wasn’t until I got to university that it actually started to click for me,” she said.
“But having said that, sitting in a classroom that has math delivered in one way – ‘here it is, now do it, now hand it in and I’ll mark it’ – I’m not sure that reaches the majority of students. I think it hits the middle of the road, most of the kids get it, many of them get a little.”
Progress in creating accessible mathematics classrooms will happen when math educators and other experts design more effective pedagogical and mathematical content knowledge. This would permit educators to have more of a robust mathematical engagement that allows students to access the complex mathematical ideas of which they’re capable of accomplishing.
