An Assessment of Teachers' Mathematical Meanings for Teaching Secondary Mathematics and its Implications for MSPs
Abstract
"This session discusses preliminary results from a project to assess high school teachers' mathematical meanings for teaching secondary mathematics. Instead of assessing the extent to which teachers are able to answer questions correctly or possess correct mathematical understandings, the instrument reveals meanings teachers actually have for ideas that are foundational to the secondary curriculum. The ideas assessed are in the areas of variable, function, equation, rate, quantity, and structure. The assessment's items are designed so that teachers' interpretations of mathematical situations reveal the meanings they have for the mathematics entailed in them. The session invites discussion of this approach and of implications of a focus on meanings for teacher professional development and for teacher preparation programs."
