The MMSA provides assistance to schools, districts, and other organizations seeking to improve their mathematics curriculum, instruction, assessment, content knowledge, and other areas related to math education. Audiences include classroom teachers, committee members, math specialists, administrators, and other educators from schools and organizations that support math education.
Consulting services are based on need, availability of staff,
and the nature of the request. MMSA consulting services include
at their core, the skills, content knowledge, and connections
to standards necessary to achieve mathematical literacy. To
discuss your needs, inquire about fees, or schedule consulting
services, contact a member of the
MMSA
Mathematics Staff who will work with you to match your
needs to MMSAs professional offerings. Technical assistance
can be customized to meet a specific school, district, or
organizational need or schools and organizations can select
from the following menu of mathematics consultation services
offered by our staff:
Administrators Investigating Mathematics
Assessment for Learning in Mathematics
Building Connections Between Literacy and Numeracy
Building Professional Learning Communities
Curriculum Development
Curriculum Selection
Curriculum Implementation: Beginning
Curriculum Implementation: Ongoing
Curriculum Topic Study
Demonstration Lessons
Dynamic Classroom Assessment
Embedded Professional Development Planning
Examining Student Thinking in Mathematics
Examining Teaching through Video Cases
Examining the Maine Learning Results
Learning with Technology
Professional Book Discussions
Reading to Learn Mathematics
Relearning to Teach Arithmetic
Writing to Learn Mathematics
Administrators Investigating Mathematics
Purpose: To help develop and/or refine the
skills needed to support math teaching and learning through
observation, supervision, and inquiry.
Description: Four 3 hour sessions allow participants
to explore math concepts and instructional techniques to reach
a deeper understanding of standards-based mathematics classrooms.
Participants will discuss implications for administrators
after engaging in math activities, viewing and analyzing videotapes
of math instruction and reading relevant articles.
Contact: Leslie Minton or Cheryl
Rose
Assessment for Learning in Mathematics
Purpose: To learn about formative assessment
as a significant way to improve student learning and teacher
practice in mathematics.
Description: Sessions range from single day
to a multi-day series to help teachers learn how to use formative
assessment strategies with differentiated instruction, to
identify students ideas, diagnose difficulties, inform instructional
practice, and monitor student learning. Probing, questioning,
metacognitive strategies, and self-assessment will be addressed.
Participants will learn about the research on formative assessment
and students ideas in mathematics, utilize assessment probes
to help them uncover their students thinking and alternative
conceptions, and learn how to use a process to develop and
use research-based formative assessment probes. (K-12, school,
or by grade levels)
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Building Connections Between Literacy and Numeracy
Purpose: To explore the connections between reading and math content and the instructional strategies that support teaching and learning both.
Description: Sessions range from single day to a multi-day series to help teachers explore the connections between content areas and discover how they can use what they know and understand about reading development to enhance their mathematics instruction. Participants will focus on the following questions; What good readers and mathematicians do?, What does understanding look like?, How do students apply their understanding of numbers?, and How do teachers connect ideas to practice? (K-8, or by grade levels)
Contact: Leslie Minton
Building Professional Learning Communities
Purpose: To Understand the purpose and value
of creating a mathematics learning community and to examine
tools and resources specific to the context, process, and
content of a mathematics learning community
Description: Learn to create an environment
in which to reflect and refine, and to develop a shared language
and common understanding of content and issues related to
mathematics teaching and learning through supportive and shared
leadership, collective creativity and supportive conditions.
(k-12 teachers, teacher leaders, Administrators)
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Curriculum/Scope & Sequence Development
Purpose: To identify factors comprising a
coherent curriculum and correlate factors to construct a curriculum
guide
Description: Using tools and processes for
examining K-12 coherent scope and sequence of curriculum,
as recommended by state and national mathematics standards,
and a process for developing the parts of a curriculum guide.
This session can also be designed for reviewing existing curriculum
guides. (K-12 teachers, Administrators)
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose, Meghan Southworth
Curriculum Selection
Purpose: To support schools in selecting
high quality math curriculum programs.
Description: An MMSA consultant will work
with teachers and administrators to review current resources
and to set criteria and develop a plan for the review and
selection process. (Curriculum committee,K-12 teachers, Administrators)
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Curriculum Implementation: Beginning Stages
Purpose: To support schools in the beginning
stages of implementing a high quality curriculum program or
helping support teachers as they learn to use high quality
materials effectively.
Description: An MMSA consultant will work
with teachers and administrators to understand the components
of the selected curriculum program. Implementation support
includes helping teachers understand the content, organization,
the instructional approach, and the assessment components.
(by school, grade levels, or subject areas)
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Curriculum Implementation: Ongoing
Purpose: To support schools in the ongoing
implementation of a high quality curriculum program or helping
support teachers as they learn to refine their use of the
high quality materials effectively.
Description: An MMSA consultant will work
with teachers and administrators to examine specific content
strands across the grade levels, understand the use of assessment
to make instructional decisions that support the development
of student learning, and examine the role of student self
assessment, create a structure for collegial conversations
to support continued math learning (by school, grade levels,
or subject areas)
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Curriculum Topic Study (CTS)
Purpose: To learn how to utilize a comprehensive
resource that enables teachers to deeply examine all aspects
of science teaching and learning related to the topics they
teach and to bridge the gap between standards, research, and
classroom practice.
Description: CTS is a comprehensive professional
development strategy, supported with funding from the National
Science Foundation, that targets all areas of teacher learning
in mathematics. Overall, CTS helps teachers use standards
and cognitive research to better understand the topics they
teach. Sessions can be comprehensive or specifically designed
to focus on using CTS for any of the following: improving
content knowledge, curriculum coherence, curriculum materials
implementation, instructional design and strategies, or assessment
purposes. CTS workshops can be designed for specific mathematics
content topics or include topics that integrate both mathematics
and science. CTS will also help teachers learn how to clarify
the meaning and intent of Maine's
Learning Results.
(K-12 or by grade level or subject area)
Contact: Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Demonstration Lessons and Coaching
Purpose: To improve practice through modeling
of instruction and the use of a coaching model.
Description: An MMSA consultant will work
with selected teachers to demonstrate teaching of a lesson
or co-teach a lesson, and support peer-coaching and classroom
observations. (by grade levels or subject areas)
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Dynamic Classroom Assessment
Purpose: To help elementary, middle and high
school mathematics teachers learn how to gather information
about students mathematical thinking, make inferences about
what students know and can do, and then make instructional
decisions that are better aligned with students mathematical
understanding.
Description: Dynamic Classroom Assessment
supports the important work of teaching and learning mathematics
in elementary, middle and high school classrooms. DCA consists
of a core module addressing three main ideas:
- Model for classroom assessment and study of different
assessment methods (session 1-3)
- Scheme for distinguishing between the substance and
the presentation of a mathematical idea and study of how
clarity of language can influence students learning (sessions
4-6)
- Categorization of questions according to their purposes
and opportunities to develop questioning skills (sessions
7-9)
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Embedded Professional Development Planning
Purpose: To develop a site-based professional
development program for mathematics teachers within a school
or district.
Description: An MMSA consultant will work
with school staff or leaders to develop a plan, learn the
requirements and features of a specific strategy, and help
support the implementation of embedded, practice-based professional
development. Schools can choose from a selection of practice-based
strategies such as study groups, action research, examining
student work or thinking, CIEST, lesson study, curriculum
implementation, demonstration lessons, book studies, mentoring,
or coaching. The MMSA will help schools establish these strategies
and access the tools and resources they need in order to successfully
develop and sustain a teacher led learning community within
the school (by school or grade level teams).
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Examining Student Thinking in Mathematics
Purpose: To use a variety of tools, resources,
and strategies to learn more about student conceptions which
have implications for teaching and learning mathematics
Description: Designing and using diagnostic
probes, collecting and utilizing the data, and instructional
implications. Participants will have an opportunity to analyze
the thinking in student work samples and examine research
findings. An additional component on designing staff development,
using a protocol for examining student thinking, can be offered
for staff development leaders in mathematics.
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Examining Teaching through Video Cases
Purpose: To examine videos of real teaching
episodes for the purpose of analyzing instruction to learn
more about effective teaching practices.
Description: Sessions are designed to examine
and discuss videotapes of mathematics teaching episodes in
a variety of contexts. Teachers will use a protocol to view,
evaluate, and discuss the teaching seen on videotapes for
content as well as effective pedagogical strategies and discuss
implications for their own instruction. (by grade levels,
grade spans, or subject areas)
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Examining the Maine Learning Results
Purpose: Utilize a resource that enables teachers to deeply examine aspects of mathematics teaching and learning related to the topics they teach and to bridge the gap between standards, research, and classroom practice.
Description: Curriculum Topic Study (CTS) helps teachers learn how to clarify the meaning and intent of Maine's Learning Results. (K-12 or by grade level or subject area) Overall, CTS helps teachers use standards and cognitive research to better understand the topics they teach. Sessions can be comprehensive or specifically designed to focus on using CTS for any of the following: improving content knowledge, curriculum coherence, curriculum materials implementation, instructional design and strategies, or assessment purposes. CTS workshops can be designed for specific mathematics content topics or include topics that integrate both mathematics and science. (K-12 or by grade level or subject area)
Contact: Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Learning with Technology
Purpose: To engage in problem solving situations
and in the use of technology as a tool for learning mathematics
and develop familiarity with the TI-83 Plus or TI-83 Plus
Silver.
Description: Addressing the use of technology
to support student inquiry. Components will include analysis
processes that support students questions about data they
have collected. The exploration/investigation mode of teaching
mathematics including pre-algebra, algebra, data analysis,
and other topics is modeled throughout the session.
Contact: Cheryl Rose
Professional Book Discussions
Purpose: To become aware of the use of shared
reading and discussion as a professional development strategy
and to learn how to design and facilitate an onsite book discussion.
Description: Choosing a book to fit your
purpose, designing a book study, types of book studies, implementation
requirements, facilitator roles and strategies, and a bibliography
and display of selected mathematics publications recommended
for math discussion groups. Participants will experience a
Òmock session and begin plans for their own book study and
discussion.
Contact: Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Reading to Learn Mathematics
Purpose: To learn strategies and implement
tools to support the reading of mathematics.
Description: Using tools and ideas from McRels
Teaching Reading in Mathematics, teachers will explore
the rationale for and unique challenges of teaching reading
in the context of mathematics by examining what the research
says about the role of the reader, the role of climate, and
the role of text features in mathematics. Two processes used
by effective readers of mathematics, strategic processing
and strategic thinking, are linked to specific instructional
strategies.
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose or Meghan Southworth
Relearning to Teach Arithmetic
Purpose: To facilitate teacher discussion
on elementary topics including the base ten number system,
number relationships, the characteristics of each operation,
and how the different operations are related.
Description: Sessions are designed to help
teachers, incorporate meaningful learning experiences into
the math classroom, discuss and compare their own classroom
experiences and reflect on how students process mathematical
ideas, get to the root of how students comprehend whole number
computation, and add clarity and meaning to the learning process
by understanding how students think about math.
Contact: Leslie
Minton
Writing to Learn Mathematics
Purpose: To explore the relationship between
math and writing and provide a multiple strategies for classroom
implementation.
Description: Sessions are designed to introduce
and explore multiple strategies of using writing in mathematics
for both process and content purposes. Using student work,
key discussion ideas including providing criteria, giving
feedback, assessment and structured instructional approaches
are the focus.
Contact: Leslie Minton, Cheryl Rose, or Meghan Southworth
