Investigating Alignment Between Elementary Mathematics Teacher Education and Graduates' Teaching of Mathematics for Conceptual Understanding

In this article, Amanda Jansen, Dawn Berk, and Erin Meikle investigate the impact of mathematics teacher education on teaching practices. In their study they interviewed six first-year teachers who graduated from the same elementary teacher education program and who were oriented toward teaching mathematics conceptually. They observed each teacher teaching two lessons: one on a mathematics topic that was developed in their teacher education program (target topic) and one on a mathematics topic that was not addressed in their program (control topic). Based on their observations, the authors identified four instructional practices for teaching mathematics conceptually that the participants used in their classroom practice and found that these teachers were more likely to enact two of these instructional practices when teaching target topics: use of mathematical language to support students' sense making and use of visual representations. They also found that the teachers enacted two other instructional practices—use of story problems and pressing students for mathematical explanations—in both target and control topic lessons but did so with limitations in control topic lessons. For teacher education to influence teaching, the authors assert, it is important to develop content knowledge for teaching and pedagogical knowledge in tandem with developing beliefs.