DEVELOPING TEACHERS' REPRESENTATIONAL FLUENCY AND ALGEBRAIC CONNECTIONS

This study examined the development of thirty-seven elementary and middle grades teachers’ algebraic connections and representational fluency during a six-month professional learning project. To evaluate the collaborative nature of designing professional development, the team of professional developers/researchers used the collective self-study method (Samaras & Freese, 2006) to examine how purposively designed experiences such as the content-focused institute in the summer with school-based follow-up Lesson Study cycles (Lewis, 2002) in the fall encouraged vertical articulation of algebraic connections. The analysis of teachers’ reflections from problem solving tasks and Lesson Study and researchers’ memos from observed research lessons revealed more flexibility in teachers’ representational fluency with problem solving strategies in the classrooms.