Interweaving Deep Mathematics and Equitable Participation
Dr. Susan Jo Russell and Dr. Deborah Schifter
December 12, 2024 (7-8 pm EST)
Description: A classroom practice that emphasizes mathematical discussion in which students build on each others’ ideas requires a dual commitment on the part of the teacher to deep mathematics and equitable participation. In this session, we will view video from elementary classrooms in which teachers strive to enact this dual commitment while students dig into an investigation of arithmetic structure. We will consider how engaging with complex ideas can support equitable participation and how giving attention to a wide range of student ideas deepens the mathematics.
Dr. Deborah Schifter has worked as an applied mathematician; has taught elementary, secondary, and college level mathematics; and, since 1985, has been a mathematics teacher educator and educational researcher at Mount Holyoke College and at the Education Development Center. She has written several books in collaboration with colleagues, including: Reconstructing Mathematics Education: Stories of Teachers Meeting the Challenge of Reform; the professional development series, Developing Mathematical Ideas; and a two-volume anthology of teachers’ writing, What’s Happening in Math Class? for which she received the American Educational Research Association Professional Service Award in recognition of an outstanding contribution relating research to practice. Her most recent publication, co-authored with Susan Jo Russell, is Interweaving Equitable Participation and Deep Mathematics: Building Community in the Elementary Classroom, a text and video resource for educators based on a partnership with teachers in Boston Public Schools.
Dr. Susan Jo Russell began her career in education as a K–3 classroom teacher and elementary mathematics coach. For the last four decades, she has been a senior researcher at TERC, where she directed projects on children’s mathematical understanding and on supporting teachers to learn more about mathematics and about children’s mathematical thinking. She spearheaded the original development and second edition of the K–5 mathematics curriculum, Investigations in Number, Data and Space, co-authored the Developing Mathematical Ideas professional development series, and contributed to the launching of the Forum for Equity in Elementary Mathematics (https://www.terc.edu/mathequityforum/) . She co-authored But Why Does It Work? Mathematical Argument in the Elementary Grades, and, most recently, co-authored with Deborah Schifter Interweaving Equitable Participation and Deep Mathematics: Building Community in the Elementary Classroom, a text and video resource for educators based on a partnership with teachers in Boston Public Schools.