A Pedagogical Framework for Effective

Delivery of Online Professional

Development in Statistics Education

Maria Meletiou-Mavrotheris
Efstathios Mavrotheris
Efi Paparistodemou

Cyprus College
 Presentation Overview

 Background to the project EarlyStatistics

 EarlyStatistics Project Overview
 Effective Learning Environment
Framework
 Implementing the Effective Learning
Environment Framework
 Concluding Remarks
 Background to the
EarlyStatistics Project
Importance of Statistics Education
 Statistics education is becoming the focus of
reformers in mathematics education as a vital
aspect of the education of citizens in democratic
societies (NCTM, 2000)
 The ability to analyze, interpret and communicate
information from data are fundamental skills for
daily life and effective citizenship
 Statistical concepts are occupying an increasingly
important role in mathematics curricula
 Statistics already established as a vital part of the
K-12 math curriculum in many countries
Poor Teacher Training in Statistics
 Statistics introduced into mainstream mathematics
curricula without adequate attention to teacher
professional development
 Substantial evidence of poor understanding and
insufficient preparation to teach statistical concepts
among pre-service and practicing teachers
 Focus of instruction on the procedural aspects of
statistics, and not on conceptual understanding
(Nicholson & Darnton, 2003; Watson, 2001)
 Intuitions and mindset about data systematically
ignored in the mathematics classroom
Traditional Approaches to Teacher
Professional Development

 Professional isolation of teachers

 Limited opportunities for professional
development
 Very limited opportunities for collegial interactions
and exchanges
 Individualistic approaches to teacher professional
development
 Need for New Approaches to
Teacher Professional Development
 Grown satisfaction with traditional approaches to
teacher professional development
 Recognition of need for adopting new approaches
to produce real changes in classroom practices
 New pedagogical models that foster a culture of
sharing and sustained support for teachers
 Opportunities for teachers to engage in
collaborative learning communities where they can
exchange ideas with other teachers and garner
support as they try new strategies in their
classrooms (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1999)
 WWW: Opening New Possibilities
for Professional Development
 Web-based training opens up new possibilities for
communication and collaboration among teachers
 Can overcome restrictions of shrinking resources
and geographical locations and offer, in a cost-
effective and non-disruptive way, high quality
collaborative learning experiences to teachers
 Possible for teachers in different countries to
collaborate and build communities of practice in
social constructivist learning environments
 Collaborative and participatory communities of
teachers have been shown to act as vehicles that
promote teacher learning and development (Tinker
& Haavind, 1996)
 EarlyStatistics:
Project Overview
 The EU Project EarlyStatistics
 A 3-year project (Oct. 2005-Sept. 2008) funded by
the EU under the Socrates-Comenius action
 Consortium comprised of five partner institutions in
four EU countries: Cyprus, Greece, Norway, Spain
 Overall aim: Enhance development of early
statistical reasoning of European children by
facilitating intercultural professional development of
their teachers using exemplary web-based
educational tools and resources
 Project will harness the power of the Internet to
provide European teachers with access to a wide
array of colleagues, discussions, and resources
eluding them in their workplace (Zern, 2002)
 Project Activities:
Development of course content
 Development, using contemporary technological
and web-based resources, of curricular and
instructional materials on statistics for elementary
and middle school teachers and students
 Central to the development of the material the
functional integration of technology with existing
core curricular ideas
 Integration of new types of tools (e.g. the dynamic
statistics software Fathom and Tinkerplots), which
provide students with the opportunity to model and
investigate real world problems of statistics
 Material produced in partners’ national languages
(Greek, Norwegian, Spanish), as well as in English
 Project Activities:
Development of knowledge base
Technical design and implementation of
infrastructure and services for the project dedicated
knowledge base, implemented as a multilingual web
portal. Knowledge base will contain:
 A hypertextbook with the material, resources, and
activities of the professional development course
 Technologically enhanced curricular and instructional
materials for teaching and learning statistics in
elementary and middle school
 Reports and articles developed through project
 Links to statistics education resources on the Internet
 A Video Case Library containing segments of real
teaching episodes
 A database containing Student Work Samples
 Tools for professional dialogue and support (e.g.
discussion forums, chat rooms, blogs, wikis etc.)
 Project Activities:
Course Pilot delivery
 During final year of project, course will be pilot
tested with a group of 25-30 teachers from the
partner countries, and revised based on feedback
received from pilot testing
 Delivered through text, illustrations, animations,
audio/video, technology-rich interactive problem-
solving activities, and multilingual interfaces
 Instructional content and services on the dedicated
knowledge base will be utilized for teaching,
support and coordination purposes
 Course material also available in CD/DVD format to
overcome potential bandwidth limitations
 EarlyStatistics Pedagogical
Approach
 EarlyStatistics adopts best practices in
statistics education, adult education, and
distance learning
 Program design guided by the Effective
Learning Environment Framework, a research-
based theoretical framework that identifies the
components which are essential for the
establishment of an effective learning
environment
Effective Learning Environment
Framework
 Effective Learning Environment
Theoretical Framework (NRC, 2000)
Research on cognition and learning synthesized as
to focus on four components essential for the
development of effective learning environments:
Community-Centered
Learner-Centered
Knowledge-Centered
Assessment-Centered
Components fundamental for the successful
establishment of an effective learning environment,
whether for student or teacher learning
 Community-Centered
 Community-centered aspects of effective learning
environments are important in building a comfortable
atmosphere whereby learners are encouraged and
able to articulate their own ideas, challenge those of
others, and negotiate deeper meaning (NRC, 2000)
 When ideas are exchanged and subjected to
thoughtful critiques, they are often refined and
improved (Borasi, Fonz, Smith, & Rose 1999)
 Research indicates that communication is often
motivational and helps learners to persist in
completing tasks and striving for understanding
(Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt,
1997; NCTM, 2000)
 Learner-Centered
 For effective learning to occur education needs to
take into account that all people come to know is
filtered through their own identities, experiences,
and perspectives (Dewey, 1902)
 Our attention is caught by things that interest us,
that so intrigue us, that we are compelled to find
out more about, that we believe we had better
attend to or we might miss something
 Teachers need to consider and honor this research
related to learner-centered aspects of effective
learning environments when designing educational
activities (NRC, 2000)
 Knowledge-Centered
 Knowledge-centered aspects of effective teaching
environments are important in helping students
develop well-organized bodies of knowledge and
organize that knowledge so that it supports planning
and strategic thinking.
 In knowledge-centered environments, students are
able to "learn their way around" a discipline (NRC,
2000). Like experts, they are able to make
connections among ideas. They think the general
principles or "big ideas"
 Students should also learn where the ideas they
learn apply and how, and have opportunities to
practice using them in novel situations
 Assessment-Centered
 Instruction should help students learn to monitor
and regulate their own learning; learn to question
"why it is they believe what they believe, and
whether there is sufficient evidence for their
beliefs" (White & Frederiksen, 1998, p. 7)
 Good learners articulate their own ideas, compare
and contrast them with those of others, and
provide reasons why they accept one point of view
rather than another. They are "metacognitive," i.e.
aware and capable of monitoring and regulating
their thoughts and their knowledge
 "Self-assessment nurtures discovery, teamwork,
communication, and conceptual connections"
(NRC, 1997)
 Implementing the Effective
Learning Environment Framework:
The EarlyStatistics Project
 EarlyStatistics : Learner-Centered
 Project adopts an approach that respects and utilizes
teachers’ professional knowledge
 Distance education environment designed as a framework
for flexible learning, with teachers as the main agents of
their professional development
 A supportive and engaging learning environment, in which
teachers will be actively involved in constructing their own
knowledge, through their own experiences and
participation in authentic activities (projects, experiments,
computer explorations, group work, and discussions)
 Functional integration of new types of tools (e.g. the
dynamic statistics software Fathom© (Finzer, 1999) and
Tinkerplots© (Konold, 2005), statistical applets, etc.), which
will provide teachers, and subsequently their students,
with ample opportunities for experimentation with
statistical ideas in varied contexts
 EarlyStatistics : Community-
Centered
 A central conviction underlying the design of
EarlyStatistics is that learning is a social act best
supported through collaborative activities (Vygotsky,
1978), and thus learning as part of a community of
practice can provide a useful model for teacher
professional development (Barab & Duffy, 2000).
 Teachers will interact and learn about statistics by
engaging in joint activities and discussions, helping
each other, and sharing best pedagogical strategies
 Forming of a self-sustaining online community of
practice that will support the sharing of multiple,
multinational perspectives, and will shape not only
teachers’ identity as practitioners, but also the identity
of the practice itself (Gray, 2004)
 EarlyStatistics: Knowledge-Centered
 Course organized around the “big” ideas of statistics
 Designed activities emphasize and revisit a set of
central statistical ideas, rather than presenting
statistical content as a sequenced list of curricular
topics
 The conceptual “Framework for Teaching Statistics
within the K-12 Mathematics Curriculum”, developed
by a group of leading statistics and mathematics
educators (GAISE, 2005), is being used to structure
the presentation of content
 A conceptual structure that gives a coherent picture
of the overall statistics school curriculum
 K-12 Pedagogical Framework
(Franklin et al., 2005)
Framework uses a spiral approach to statistics
curriculum, so that instructional programs from pre-
kindergarten through high school encourage students
to gradually develop understanding of statistics as an
investigative process that involves four components:
 clarifying the problem at hand and formulating
questions that can be answered with data
 designing and employing a plan to collect appropriate
data;
 selecting appropriate graphical or numerical methods
to analyze the data, and
 interpreting the results
K-12 Pedagogical Framework
(Franklin et al., 2005)
K-12 Pedagogical Framework Model
 Statistical education should be viewed as a
developmental process.
 Framework uses three developmental Levels, A, B, and
C
 Although the three levels may parallel grade levels, they
are based on development, not age. Thus, a middle
school student who has had no prior experience with
statistics will need to begin with Level A concepts and
activities before moving to Level B.
 Learning is more teacher-driven at Level A, but becomes
student driven at Levels B and C.
 EarlyStatistics:
Assessment-Centered
 Assessment an integral component of
EarlyStatistics, aligned with learning goals, focusing
on understanding of key ideas and not just on skills,
procedures, and computed answers (GAISE, 2005)
 Online learning environment designed so as to
enable the research team to continuously monitor
teachers’ progress and to provide timely feedback
 Teachers provided with multiple opportunities for
self-assessment
 EarlyStatistics:
Assessment-Centered
 Most of the hands-on and technology-supported
instructional activities developed through the
program require teachers to first make conjectures
about the expected results, then to test these
conjectures through computer simulations or other
data explorations, and finally to reflect on and to
evaluate on their results and to compare and
contrast them to those of other people
 Several low-stakes assessments included for
participants to monitor their own progress (Gould
and Peck, 2004).
Concluding Remarks
 Concluding Remarks
 One of the most important factors in any
educational change is the change in teaching
practices
 Taking into account best practices in statistics
education, adult education, and distance learning,
EarlyStatistics aims to help European teachers
improve their instructional practices in statistics
through exposure to exemplary learning
methodologies and resources, intercultural
awareness, and exchange of experiences
 Teachers will be able to connect and learn from
each other in ways that would not have been
possible in a more traditional, face-to-face
professional development program
 Concluding Remarks
In addition to teachers, project outputs and
services will also benefit other target groups:
 Students will benefit from improved curricula and
teaching practices
 Academic experts and material developers will get
more sensitized to the needs of statistics teachers
in different countries, supporting the development
of new methodologies and materials
 National and transnational education authorities
responsible for setting mathematics curricula will
get useful information regarding new
developments in statistics education
 Concluding Remarks
 Teacher training institutions will gain a clearer
understanding of the issues facing statistics
teaching and learning and will be able to utilize the
project outputs for further improvement of their
teacher preparation programs
 Online professional development designers will
benefit from access to the pedagogical framework
for the effective delivery of high-quality online
professional development to mathematics
teachers, which could also act as a model for
professional development in other content areas
 The industry and community in general will benefit
from a statistically literate society