Building Content and Communities: Developing a Shared Sense of Early Childhood Mathematics Pedagogy
Source: Journal of Early Childhood Teacher Education, Volume 33, Issue 2, May 2012, pages 109-126
The current article presents results from a case study analyzing the process of change for early childhood educators as they engage in a semester-long professional development (PD) experience focused on developing a teacher research agenda related to mathematics instruction.
The participants were 11 teachers: 5 second-grade and 6 third-grade teachers.
During this PD experience, the participants developed a research question, collected and analyzed data, and used results to inform mathematics instruction.
The overarching question guiding this study was: How does an ongoing mathematics PD model focused on developing a teacher research agenda impact the instructional practice of second- and third-grade teachers?
Instructional shifts were apparent across participants, but only after building a shared sense of community during PD sessions.