by NCTM President J. Michael Shaughnessy
NCTM Summing Up, June 2010

In this message I bring to your attention two new opportunities in our great mathematics education profession. The first is an example of our profession’s ability to mount cooperative efforts to improve the teaching and learning of mathematics. The second is an opportunity for you and me to engage in some mathematical reasoning—to “walk the walk,” as it were, in step with NCTM’s new initiative on Reasoning and Sense Making, described in last month’s column.

Elementary Mathematics Specialists

Over the past 25 years, we have heard periodic calls for the creation of elementary mathematics specialist (EMS) positions and the development of appropriate preparation and certification programs for EMS professionals throughout our states and provinces. NCTM past president Skip Fennell stated the case for elementary mathematics specialists this way:

“Why do we need mathematics specialists at the elementary school level? A student’s view of what it means to know and do mathematics is shaped in elementary school; yet in the United States, elementary teachers are, for the most part, generalists. Their preservice teacher education typically includes two or three courses in mathematics content and one course in the teaching of mathematics. Their teaching load generally consists of a full range of subjects, with particular attention to reading or language arts in a self-contained classroom. A mathematics specialist is needed because the preservice background and general teaching responsibilities of elementary teachers do not typically furnish the continuous development of specialized knowledge required for teaching mathematics today.” (NCTM News Bulletin, November 2006). 

In the past five years, the voices advocating for elementary mathematics specialists have become stronger and clearer. Elementary specialists could reinforce the elementary mathematics content emphases and learning trajectories called for in NCTM’s  Curriculum Focal Points for Prekindergarten through Grade 8 Mathematics: A Quest for Coherence (2006). The report from the National Mathematics Panel (2008) pressed for the recruitment and training of elementary mathematics specialists. Now the forthcoming Common Core State Standards for Mathematics, spearheaded by the Council of Chief State School Officers and the National Governors Association (CCSSO/NGA), will call for a more in-depth treatment of some topics in grades K–6, requiring elementary teachers to have a deeper knowledge of the mathematics needed for teaching elementary students. As momentum for elementary mathematics specialists has continued to grow, a joint task force of mathematics teachers, mathematics teacher educators, and mathematics supervisors was assembled to develop a position statement on the need for elementary mathematics specialists. Within the past few weeks, NCTM, together with the Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators (AMTE), the National Council of Supervisors of Mathematics (NCSM), and the Association of State Supervisors of Mathematics (ASSM) have all approved a joint position statement on The Role of Elementary MathematicsSpecialists in the Teaching and Learning of Mathematics. The core of this statement follows:

Position 

“The NCTM, AMTE, NCSM, and ASSM recommend the use of Elementary Mathematics Specialists (EMS professionals) in pre-K–6 environments to enhance the teaching, learning and assessing of mathematics to improve student achievement. We further advocate that every elementary school have access to an EMS. Districts, states or provinces, and institutions of higher education should work in collaboration to create (1) advanced certification for EMS professionals and (2) rigorous programs to prepare EMS professionals. EMS professionals need a deep and broad knowledge of mathematics content, expertise in using and helping others use effective instructional practices, and the ability to support efforts that help all pre-K–6 students learn important mathematics. Programs for EMS professionals should focus on mathematics content knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, and leadership knowledge and skills.”

The joint position statement describes the multiple roles of elementary mathematics specialists: “At the classroom level, an EMS professional may teach mathematics to elementary students in one or more grade levels or work with particular groups of students to provide remedial or enrichment support services. At the school or district level EMS professionals may work primarily with teachers as coaches, in a professional development capacity or targeting school-wide improvement in mathematics. … EMS professionals build capacity by strengthening teachers’ understanding of mathematics content and helping them develop more effective instruction and assessment.”

The most critical recommendation in this joint position statement is that schools, states, provinces, and districts work together with mathematics educators in higher education to create and develop elementary mathematics specialist preparation and certification programs. Our national organizations—NCTM, AMTE, NCSM, and ASSM—have paved the way by cooperating in exemplary fashion in crafting this joint position statement. It is now up to states and provinces, along with institutions of higher education, to continue to collaborate in the development and implementation phases of EMS programs. The quality of any new programs for elementary mathematics specialists will be entirely determined by the level of cooperation between the preparation and the certification arms of our profession.

As of this writing, nine states in the United States already have an elementary mathematics specialist certification program of some kind. The research currently available on the effects of elementary mathematics specialists in school districts indicates that EMS professionals have a positive impact both on teachers and on students. However, because research on EMS programs is scarce, as more EMS programs are developed, we must carefully research, document, and evaluate the components and effectiveness of EMS programs on student achievement and teacher growth in instruction and assessment. More information about programs for elementary mathematics specialists can be found in the publication Standards for Elementary Mathematics Specialists: A Reference for Teacher Credentialing and Degree Programs available through the AMTE website.

Mathematical Reasoning and Sense Making—Walking the Walk 

As I was writing last month’s column, it occurred to me that if we want the mathematics in our classrooms to emphasize mathematical reasoning and sense making, we must engage in it ourselves. After all, we should walk the walk, as well as talk the talk. In this column, I share the first in what I hope to make a series of tasks that will focus on mathematical reasoning- Problem to Ponder. The tasks are intended for you and me to reason about, and for you to share with your students, letting them reason about them, too. I will include tasks that can be approached from a variety of levels of mathematical backgrounds. After you and your students have had an opportunity to explore and discuss the task, I’ll share some examples of student reasoning about the task in the next issue of Summing Up. Let’s see how this goes.  A Reasoning and Sense Making Problem to Ponder: Does It Matter Which Winner You Saw?