Internet Study Groups

The digital world has opened up a vast array of possibilities for learning. From 2000 to 2005 we received funding from NSF to design digital environments for professional development. We filmed our exemplary teachers over time and built questions around the clips, provided notepads and other tools, and built interactive multi-level learning environments for the professional continuum. These are now available through Heinemann Press.

The materials bring the context of the classroom to the fingertips of the teacher/learner. Users can be immersed in the study of children over time in exemplary classrooms; they can examine the teacher's didactical employment of context; they can inquire about and analyze the pedagogy; they can clip and paste moments from footage and build learning trajectories (or "landscapes of learning" as we prefer to call them) that show children constructing "big ideas," developing strategies, and/or using mathematical models as tools. Within the environments we have placed questions: users are asked to solve mathematical problems in several ways and anticipate student strategies, which they subsequently examine; they are asked to design investigations and mini-lessons for the next day; they can then examine how the teacher in the environment continues and subsequently analyze children's work to assess the effectiveness of the teacher's decision. They can even add clipped footage as hypertext-evidence to support arguments and provide examples in term papers and literature reviews, or as sample evidence of the NCTM or state standards, or focal points. The materials are cross-platform, thus enabling users to work at home on assignments as well as in college classrooms, successfully. The PK-3 materials are on early number sense, addition and subtraction, the 3-5 materials are on multiplication and division, and the 5-7 materials are on fractions, decimals, and percents. They are accompanied by facilitator guides and a related text, i.e. (1 of 3 volumes) Fosnot and Dolk (2001a and b, 2002). Each of the environments is directly connected to a unit in the curriculum, Contexts for Learning Mathematics, as a powerful, directly-linked approach uniting classroom practice to professional development. And, you can choose the size of your study group. The size can be as small as 1 or as big as 50. Facilitators in the past have found 20-25 to be a nice size, easily manageable group. Although it is not a requirement to complete a Learn to Lead Seminar first, facilitators usually find that it is helpful.

Our internet study groups provide direct support, by the authors of the materials, to math curriculum coordinators, coaches, teacher leaders, or professors who want to use the materials. The study groups work in the following way:

The on-site group leader chooses a digital environment from among the list of cdroms and invites a group of grade level teachers appropriate to that specific cdrom and topic to become part of a collaborative study community. Each participant purchases the cdrom. The group leader receives a complimentary copy of a facilitator guide, an information booklet on using the technology for professional development, and the cdrom for enrolling the group with us.

The study group can be used as preparation for using the related unit from the Contexts for Learning Mathematics series, or the unit can be used concurrently with the running of the study group. The group usually meets once a week. Prior to the group meeting, e-mails between us help you feel comfortable with the technology and ensure that your group is ready with the first set of assignments. Participants in your study group explore the technology and the assignments at the first session and then work at home using their own cdrom. The questions are built right into the environments (on the cdrom) and there is a notepad there as well for their answers. There is also a HELP page built in.

Each week the group meets and discusses the assignments, discusses and debates the evidence they found in the clips for their responses, revising their ideas (often needing to re-examine the clips) until consensus is met, and then writes a final response onto a master group file. The file is sent to us three times during the course as an attachment in an e-mail. We read what the group has written and enter our notes of what we see on the clips as well. In essence, we become part of your community of discourse-a member of your study group. We work together with you examining the clips, the teacher decision-making, the role of questioning, the use of context, etc. We write our notes in a different color and send the file back to you. And, if you need tech support along the way, you can always e-mail us.

The cost for enrolling an internet study group is $1500. This fee provides you with one facilitator guide and cdrom, access to one of our instructors, and the ability to submit your group's file and receive comments three times.