{"id":3975,"date":"2018-11-06T08:00:54","date_gmt":"2018-11-06T13:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/braindevs.net\/blog\/blog\/?p=3975"},"modified":"2018-11-03T10:44:46","modified_gmt":"2018-11-03T15:44:46","slug":"evaluating-the-best-classroom-practices-for-teaching-math","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/evaluating-the-best-classroom-practices-for-teaching-math\/","title":{"rendered":"Evaluating the Best Classroom Practices for Teaching Math"},"content":{"rendered":"

What strategies work best for math teaching?<\/p>\n

\"math<\/a><\/p>\n

And, crucially, how do we know<\/strong>?<\/p>\n

To answer this question, we might rely on our teacherly instincts. Perhaps we might rely on various educational and scientific theories. Or, we might turn to data. Even\u00a0big<\/em> data.<\/p>\n

Researchers in Sweden wondered if they could use the TIMSS test to answer this question.<\/p>\n

(“TIMSS” stands for “Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study,” given every four years. In 2015, 57 countries participated, and 580,000 students<\/a>. That’s A LOT of students, and a lot of data.)<\/p>\n

3 Math Teaching Strategies<\/h2>\n

When students take these tests, they answer questions about their classroom experience.<\/p>\n

In particular, they answer questions about 3 math teaching strategies. They are asked how often they…<\/p>\n

Listen to the teacher give a lecture-style presentation.<\/p>\n

Relate what they are learning in mathematics to they daily lives.<\/p>\n

Memorize formulas and procedures.<\/p>\n

Researchers want to know: do any of these teaching practices correlate with higher or lower TIMSS scores? In other words, can all these data help us evaluate the effectiveness of specific teaching practices?<\/p>\n

2 Math Teaching Theories<\/h2>\n

Helpfully, the researchers outline theories why each of these practices might be good or bad.<\/p>\n

As they summarize recent decades of math-teaching debate, they explain that “researchers with their roots in psychology and cognitive science” champion<\/p>\n

formal mathematical notions,<\/p>\n

explicit instruction where teachers show students how to solve math problems,<\/p>\n

practicing and memorizing rules and worked examples.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, “researchers with their roots in the reform movement” champion<\/p>\n

connecting math to students’ daily lives,<\/p>\n

a problem-solving approach,<\/p>\n

understanding ideas and connections, rather than memorization.<\/p>\n

Doubtless you’ve heard many heated debates championing both positions.<\/p>\n

Predictions and Outcomes<\/h2>\n

These theories lead to clear predictions about TIMSS questions.<\/p>\n

A cognitive science perspective predicts that “lecture-style presentations” and “memorizing formulas” should lead to higher TIMSS scores.<\/p>\n

A reform-movement perspective predicts that “relating math to daily life” should lead to higher scores.<\/p>\n

What did the data analysis show?<\/p>\n

In fact, the cognitive science predictions came true<\/strong>, and the reform predictions did not.<\/p>\n

In other words: students who listened to presentations of math information, and who memorized formulas did better on the test.<\/p>\n

Likewise, students who applied math learning to daily life learned less.<\/p>\n

An Essential Caveat<\/h2>\n

As these researchers repeatedly caution, their data show CORRELATION not causation.<\/p>\n

It’s possible, for instance, that teachers whose students struggle with math resort to “daily life” strategies. Or that both variables are caused by a third.<\/p>\n

Potential Explanations<\/h2>\n

“Connecting new math learning to real life situations” seems like such a plausible suggestion. Why doesn’t it help students learn?<\/p>\n

These researchers offer two suggestions.<\/p>\n

First<\/strong>, every math teaching strategy takes time. If direct instruction is highly effective<\/a>, then anything that subtracts time from it will be less effective. In other words: perhaps this strategy isn’t harmful; it’s just less effective than the others.<\/p>\n

Second<\/strong>, perhaps thinking about real-life examples limits transfer. If I use a formula to calculate the area of a table<\/em>, I might initially think of it as a formula about tables<\/em>. This fixed notion might make it harder for me to transfer my new knowledge to — say — rugby fields or floor plans.<\/p>\n

At present, we can’t know for sure.<\/p>\n

A final point. Although this research suggests that direct instruction helps students learn math, we should remember that bad direct instruction is still bad<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Lectures can be helpful, or they can be deadly tedious.<\/p>\n

Students can memorize pertinent and useful information. Or, they can memorize absurd loads of information.<\/p>\n

(A student recently told me she’d been required to memorize information about 60 chemical elements. Every science teacher I’ve spoken with since has told me that’s ridiculous.)<\/p>\n

And so: if this research persuades to you adopt a direct-instruction approach, don’t stop there. We need to pick the right pedagogical strategy. And, we need to execute it well.<\/p>\n

Cognitive science can help us do so..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Analyzing TIMSS data, researchers draw tentative conclusions about math teaching: memorizing formulas & hearing lectures vs. applying math to “real life.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":3980,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[15,39,50,32],"class_list":["post-3975","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lb-blog","tag-classroom-advice","tag-elementary-school","tag-middle-school","tag-stem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3975","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3975"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3975\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3983,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3975\/revisions\/3983"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3980"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3975"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3975"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.learningandthebrain.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3975"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}