From elementary generalist to mathematics specialist: Examining teacher practice and student outcomes in departmental and self-contained models

从初级通才到数学专家：​​在部门和独立模型中检查教师实践和学生成果

• 批准号: 1414438
• 负责人: Corey Webel
• 金额: $ 228.88万
• 依托单位: University of Missouri-Columbia
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2014
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2014-08-01 至 2022-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1414438&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: elementary; generalist; mathematics; specialist; Examining

This research investigates student mathematics learning outcomes at the elementary level in relation to teacher expertise (elementary teachers with math specialist certification versus generally prepared elementary teachers) and school organization (departmentalized versus self-contained mathematics classrooms). University of Missouri researchers will organize and facilitate the research in multiple Missouri public and private school sites. Findings will provide evidence of the impact of content-specific teacher expertise and a departmentalized school organizational model that offers students access to well-qualified teachers of mathematics with no additional staffing costs. To investigate the impact of teacher expertise and school organization on student learning experimental, quasi-experimental, and qualitative designs are employed. Specifically, 80 teachers who have earned state certification as Elementary Mathematics Specialists (hereafter, "EMS teachers") will be selected to participate in the study. Employing a randomized experimental design, half of the EMS teachers will be assigned to teach in a departmental model (Condition 1) in their school, teaching two or more sections of grade 4 mathematics. The other half will remain in generalist (hereafter, self-contained) positions (Condition 2) in their school, teaching all regular subjects to a single class of students. A comparison group of 40 non-EMS teachers with self-contained teaching assignments (Condition 3) will be selected from the same schools in Condition 2. The Smarter Balanced assessment will provide a baseline measure of students' prior achievement in grade 3 and also a measure of the mathematics achievement of grade 4 students taught by the 120 teachers in the study. The project team will analyze student-level mathematics scores linked with specific teachers. Improving student achievement in mathematics at the elementary level is particularly challenging due to the way elementary students are generally organized for instruction (e.g., one teacher responsible for teaching all subjects to 25-30 students). Because elementary teachers must be knowledgeable about many content areas, they rarely study mathematics in depth, even though there is a growing body of evidence showing the impact of specialized mathematical knowledge for teaching on student learning outcomes. This study carefully researches an alternative model, where elementary teachers with special training in mathematics teaching and learning are assigned more than one single class of students for mathematics instruction. Findings from the research will provide evidence about the impact of both certification as an elementary mathematics specialist and teaching in a departmental assignment on student learning. The results will help school and district leaders better plan for assignment of staff to provide all students with access to high quality mathematics instruction.

本研究调查了小学阶段学生数学学习成果与教师专业知识（具有数学专家认证的小学教师与一般准备的小学教师）和学校组织（部门化与自给自足的数学教室）的关系。密苏里大学的研究人员将组织和促进密苏里州多所公立和私立学校的研究。研究结果将提供证据，证明特定内容的教师专业知识和部门化的学校组织模式的影响，这种模式为学生提供了接触高素质数学教师的机会，而不需要额外的人力成本。为了研究教师专业知识和学校组织对学生学习的影响，采用了实验设计、准实验设计和定性设计。具体而言，将选择80名获得国家小学数学专家认证的教师（以下简称“EMS教师”）参与研究。采用随机实验设计，一半的EMS教师将被分配到他们学校的部门模式（条件1）中，教授两个或多个四年级数学部分。另一半将继续在他们的学校担任通才（以下简称“独立”）职位（条件2），为一个班级的学生教授所有常规科目。另一组由40名非ems教师组成，他们将在条件2的同一所学校中担任独立的教学任务（条件3）。更聪明的平衡评估将为学生在三年级的成绩提供一个基准，也为研究中120名教师所教的四年级学生的数学成绩提供一个衡量标准。项目组将分析与特定教师相关的学生水平数学成绩。提高小学生的数学成绩尤其具有挑战性，因为小学生通常是组织教学的（例如，一名教师负责向25-30名学生教授所有科目）。因为小学教师必须了解许多内容领域，所以他们很少深入学习数学，尽管越来越多的证据表明，专门的数学知识对教学对学生学习成果的影响。本研究仔细研究了一种替代模式，即在数学教学和学习方面受过特殊训练的小学教师被分配到一个以上的班级进行数学教学。研究结果将提供证据，证明初等数学专家认证和部门作业教学对学生学习的影响。研究结果将有助于学校和地区领导更好地规划人员分配，为所有学生提供高质量的数学教学。