Author: Mike Steele

Tuesdays at 5:30-6:30pm Central on 12 April, 17 April, 25 April, and 3 May

WI-AMTE is proud to announce an opportunity to come together and discuss the recent book, Invigorating High School Math: Practical Guidance for Long-Overdue Transformation, authored by longtime friends of the Badger State Steve Leinwand and Eric Milou. This book addresses the most critical challenges facing high school mathematics and provides practical guidance for creating long-term change to the content, pedagogy, and assessment of high school mathematics.

Our different kind of book study group is designed to be the start, but not the end, of a conversation across the state about modernizing mathematics. In addition to discussing some sections of the book (but not all of it!), we’ll be reviewing the resources that exist to support schools and districts in modernizing high school mathematics, and working to create resources of our own to support the invigoration of high school mathematics. We want to position the team that engages in this book study to be able to consult with and support schools and districts as they take on this long-term work. 

Our four sessions will focus on these four topics:

April 12:          Modernizing HS math: opportunities and challenges (Part 1 of the book)
                        discussing opportunities and challenges, exploring the national landscape

April 19:          Content, Courses, and Pathways Session 1 (Chapter 4 of the book)
                        discuss chapter 4, explore available resources, discuss resources to develop

April 25:          Content, Courses, and Pathways Session 2 (Chapter 5 of the book)
                        discuss chapter 4, explore available resources, discuss resources to develop

May 3:             Supporting & promoting high school math invigoration (Chapter 10 of the book)
                        what additional resources do we need and how can we support others?

The book study is free, in part because we’ll be asking for your intellectual contributions in developing resources and your willingness to be a resource to others in the future moving down this path.  To sign up for the session, please use this link. You will need to purchase your own book; the print version is available here and the digital resource is available here.

We have three outstanding candidates for the 2019 WI-AMTE Board of Directors. You can meet them here! Ballots will be mailed the week of September 9th to active WI-AMTE members.

Make sure your membership is up to date!

WI-AMTE will be holding our first Dynamic Discussion of Teaching Mathematics at 8 PM CST on January 15th, 2019.  This will be a fast paced-sixty minutes of sharing research-based teaching practices – give us an hour and we’ll give you something exciting to try in your classroom the next day!

The session will focus on problem solving strategies and provide educators with a platform to share ideas and instructional strategies.  The idea is to have open forum for people to network from across the state.   We encourage people to bring their own resources to share with the group.

We will be meeting via Zoom (https://uwmsoe.zoom.us/j/923820465) to discuss problem solving strategies used in the classroom.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us.  If you know of any fellow educators who would be interested in joining, please let them know about this meeting.

You can find the resources for our Dynamic Discussions on this page.

April 17, 2018 • Mid-States Technical College, Stevens Point • 9am-3pm

The Wisconsin Mathematics Council (WMC) and Wisconsin Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators (WI-AMTE) recently released a joint statement describing what college readiness in mathematics looks like for all students.
In addition, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics is set to release Catalyzing Change in High School Mathematics: Initiating Critical Conversations, a document which has the potentially to meaningfully reshape the landscape of high school mathematics.

Join us for a day-long dialogue about college and career readiness, designed to answer the following questions:
• What does effective mathematics teaching that supports college and career readiness look like in high schools?
• What innovations are being implemented in entry-level university mathematics teaching that supports reasoning and sense making?
• How can high schools be thinking about coherent mathematics pathways for students to support college and career readiness for all students?

We will engage in example mathematical activities from entry-level university mathematics courses, discuss innovative practices in high school course design, and identify questions for further discussion and study to be presented to state leadership at the WMC Annual Meeting in May.

Middle and high school teachers, curriculum directors and specialists, coaches, and university mathematics educators are all welcome to attend!

To RSVP, please fill out the following form no later than April 10th:
http://bit.ly/ccr041718
Registration is free. Lunch will be provided at a $5 cash cost.

As many of you are aware, a number of changes are being made and/or proposed to licensure in the State of Wisconsin. In response to those changes and proposals, the Wisconsin Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators puts forward the following white paper regarding implementation of new state licensure regulations.

White Paper on Licensure Guidance (pdf)

On December 6th, WI AMTE hosted a statewide webinar to continue the discussion about college readiness.  You can find the recording of that webinar below.

College Readiness December 17 from Mike Steele on Vimeo.

Additional relevant resources:

• The Role of Calculus in the Transition from High School to College Mathematics (MAA report)
• Wisconsin Early Mathematics Placement Tool

Thank you to everyone who participated in our 2017-2018 election.  We were electing six WI AMTE board positions this year, for 1-, 2-, and 3-year terms.  Going forward, we will elect two members of the board each year to 3-year terms.  I’d like to thank all the candidates that ran and everyone who voted in the election.

Hi folks – Mike Steele here from the leadership team.  The recent AMTE Standards for Preparing Teachers of Mathematics have sparked a lot of conversation and debate recently.  There are a number of ideas that I find to be intriguing and have sparked additional thinking on my part about how I organize my mathematics methods courses.  In particular, candidate standard C.4 on the Social Contexts of Mathematics, and Indicator C.3.3, Anticipate and Attend to Students’ Mathematical Dispositions stand out for me as areas in which I could personally strengthen my methods repertoire.  I wondered what messages I am (or am not) sending to my students about what it means to know and do mathematics, how we structure the learning opportunities with respect to mathematics and the teaching and learning of mathematics in our methods courses, and what changes I might consider making to provide a more transparent and coherent message.  When we discussed this matter as a leadership team, it was suggested that we perhaps take a look at our syllabi as a starting point for this work.  As such, I’m providing the syllabus for my fall course – essentially the ‘middle’ course in a three-course methods sequence at UWM – as sacrificial analytic fodder.  I’ll reflect a little bit about what I notice in this syllabus with the lenses of the Standards, as well as some comments about edTPA and state licensure.  I invite you all to comment and engage in further discussion using my syllabus as a starting point. Continue reading “Thinking about our Methods syllabi…”

WI AMTE is pleased to announce a track devoted to mathematics teacher education at the WMC Annual Meeting in Green Lake, WI on May 5th, 2017.  Please see the flyer below for session information.

We are also pleased to announce the first annual Preservice and Early Career Teacher Poster Session!  Please encourage your preservice teachers and early-career colleagues to showcase their work at this relaxed, informal poster session on Thursday prior to Celebrate WMC.  Submit your poster proposal here!

2017 Green Lake Sessions