Improving Mathematics Teaching and Learning Through School-Based Support: Champions or Naysayers

Authors: Marilyn E. Strutchens, Daniel Henry, W. Gary Martin, Lisa Ross

As Creswell (2006) tells us, one of the most efficacious uses of qualitative data is to give width, breadth, and depth to data collected for quantitative analysis.  In addition, such data collection can not only provide answers about the "why" and the "to what extent" of understandings generated by number-based analyses, they can in themselves raise further questions which bring about clarification and understanding.  In the present analysis, a case study approach (Creswell, 2006) allows the ties between surveys, test scores and other scaled items to be explored in more depth.  Project leaders and staff familiar with the participation level of the 85 schools that have participated in TEAM-Math were asked to rank schools based on the number of teachers who had attended training, levels of administrative support, requests for follow-up, turnover of teacher leaders, numbers of teachers who repeated TEAM-Math training and commitment at the school and district level to fund and support teachers involved in TEAM-Math.  Three general categories emerged:

1. Schools with High Commitment to TEAM-Math (HC schools)
2. Schools with Typical Commitment to TEAM-Math (TC schools)
3. Schools with Low or almost No Commitment to TEAM-Math (LC schools)

There was a high level of agreement about the schools that fit into the three categories.  Two schools were selected in each of the above categories in which a strong case had been made for them as exemplars of the category and for which a significant amount of quantitative data were available for later triangulation.  The six schools selected also included a variety of schooling levels: two elementary schools, two middle/junior high schools, and two high schools.

Given the categories of questions above, the principal investigators and evaluators participated in an iterative process of developing protocols reflecting specific areas of data collection within each question set.  Several versions of each protocol were discussed and in the end the protocols used reflected a balance of data collection, practical length, and rapport establishment advocated by Kvale (2007).

At the time of this report, extensive interviews were conducted during site visits with one school from each category (HC, TC, and LC).  Using protocols developed by the team, teachers, teacher leaders, parents, students, and administrators were interviewed about typical math teaching methodology in the school, participation level in TEAM-Math staff development, administrative support and commitment levels from individual teachers. Results were obtained that provided data for preliminary conclusions and further investigation in these areas:

1. Student report of actual classroom practices at the three schools studied
2. Teacher self-report of commitment level and daily practice
3. Teacher report of the role of the teacher leaders in implementing TEAM-Math strategies and approaches
4. Teacher and team-leader report of administrative support levels
5. Parent report of student homework practices as well as knowledge of TEAM-Math as an entity
6. Administrative and teacher plans for continuation of TEAM-Math practices aimed at sustaining the initiative after the funding cycle ends

All stake holders interviewed during the site visits appeared to be open, and those who found the TEAM-Math project to be less efficacious for their classrooms were not reticent about sharing such information.  Students and parents were also forthcoming in their views of how mathematics was being taught in each of the schools visited.