| NSF Org: |
DUE Division Of Undergraduate Education |
| Recipient: |
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| Initial Amendment Date: | July 26, 2014 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | May 19, 2017 |
| Award Number: | 1431641 |
| Award Instrument: | Standard Grant |
| Program Manager: |
Sandra Richardson
srichard@nsf.gov (703)292-4657 DUE Division Of Undergraduate Education EDU Directorate for STEM Education |
| Start Date: | August 1, 2014 |
| End Date: | July 31, 2019 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $546,836.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $652,936.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
FY 2016 = $106,100.00 |
| History of Investigator: |
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| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
2601 WOLF VILLAGE WAY RALEIGH NC US 27695-0001 (919)515-2444 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
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| Primary Place of Performance: |
Poe Hall, Stinson Drive Raleigh NC US 27695-7801 |
| Primary Place of
Performance Congressional District: |
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| Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
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| Parent UEI: |
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| NSF Program(s): |
S-STEM-Schlr Sci Tech Eng&Math, IUSE, REAL |
| Primary Program Source: |
04001617DB NSF Education & Human Resource 1300XXXXDB H-1B FUND, EDU, NSF |
| Program Reference Code(s): |
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| Program Element Code(s): |
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| Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.076 |
ABSTRACT
Improving mathematics instruction and learning is a priority for increasing the success and persistence of undergraduate students interested in careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. The central goal of this collaborative project (including Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Florida State University and North Carolina State University) is to develop an understanding of what is needed to support instructional change in undergraduate mathematics. In particular, the project will design, investigate, and evaluate a system of supports for mathematics instructors interested in implementing student-centered curricular innovations. Such curricular innovations have been shown to support conceptual learning gains, diminish the achievement gap, and improve STEM retention rates. However, research has also found that simply developing and disseminating curricular innovations fails to support meaningful instructional change. By developing and researching a system of supports for instructional change, the project will address this particularly important (and often missing) component needed for taking curricular innovations to scale. By supporting instructional change, and therefore supporting the propagation of research-based curricular innovations, the project will have broad impacts on undergraduate STEM education. These impacts include: improving instruction for STEM students, thus broadening the pipeline for undergraduate students pursuing STEM careers; advancing teaching practices and instruction that have been shown to be particularly beneficial for women and minority students in STEM; and, developing an infrastructure and model that can be used to support instructional change and professional development in other undergraduate STEM areas.
The project will research the following question: How can the program better support instructional improvement in undergraduate mathematics? More specifically, what are the relationships among instructional supports, instructors, and instruction that are important for informing effective instructional change? To do this, the project will design, investigate, and evaluate a system of supports for mathematicians interested in instructional change. The instructional support model will consist of three interrelated components: curricular support materials, summer workshops, and online instructor work groups. These supports will be developed using design-based research including iterative cycles of designing, field-testing, analyzing, and refining. The project will then investigate instructor change in the context of our model. This investigation will focus on the relationships and interactions between the supports, the instructors, and their instructional practices. Finally, in order to evaluate the program's instructional support model, the project will assess student learning and develop a measure for inquiry-oriented instruction. In addition to assessing the efficacy of the support model, the project will use the evaluation tools to identify aspects of the supports and instruction that have a positive impact on students' learning.
PUBLICATIONS PRODUCED AS A RESULT OF THIS RESEARCH
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PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT
Disclaimer
This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.
Improving mathematics instruction and learning is a priority for increasing the success of undergraduate students interested in careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. The central goal of Teaching Inquiry Oriented Mathematics: Establishing Supports was to develop an understanding of what is needed to support instructional change in undergraduate mathematics. The project team designed, investigated, and evaluated a system of supports for mathematics instructors interested in implementing one student-centered (inquiry-oriented) instructional innovation. The project addressed this particularly important (and often missing) component needed for taking curricular innovations to scale. By supporting instructional change, and therefore supporting the propagation of research-based curricular innovations, the project has broadly impacted undergraduate STEM education. Highlights include:
- 73 TIMES Fellows, including 42 Research Participants
- 13 Facilitated Online Working Groups (which met for 1 hour/week for a semester)
- 4 Summer Workshops (typically 16 hours in length)
- 52 research conference presentations given by the research team
- At least 6 presentations related to TIMES given by participants
- Over 500 instructors receiving to the curricular materials associated with TIMES (inquiry-oriented abstract algebra, linear algebra, and differential equations)
Over the 5-year project, the 3 Principal Investigators worked with 22 graduate students and 12 faculty members to produce 11 journal articles (thus far) and over 30 refereed conference proceedings. Some research highlights include:
● A model for long-distance professional development
● The development of an Inquiry Oriented Instructional Measure (IOIM) and training protocol
● A validated assessment of students’ understanding in introductory linear algebra
● A deeper understanding of the relationship between active learning and gender inequity
From our perspective, our project was largely successful in developing a model for scaling instructional innovations for instructors interested in implementing them. We argue this is an important contribution of our work. Additionally, we feel that this project, which sought to take a narrowly defined instructional intervention (IOI) to scale, has the potential to uncover nuances linking particular forms of instruction with student outcomes. There is a need to understand how different instructional practices may have differential impacts on different student populations, and we did in fact see some evidence for this in our student outcome measures. By working in the context of a more narrowly defined form of student-centered instruction, we can begin to better understand the way in which such instruction may benefit or marginalize particular groups of students. The measurement instruments comprised in the IOIM, paired with other measurement tools (e.g., of students’ conceptual understandings, affective experiences, and other observation protocols) will be important for continuing to move forward the field’s understanding of these issues.
Last Modified: 12/04/2019
Modified by: Paola Sztajn
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