Middle

Equity-Focused, Rubric-based Coaching: An Incremental Improvement Approach to Supporting Teachers to Shift Toward More Equitable Mathematics Instruction

Historically, inequities in mathematics education have resulted in mathematics classrooms that do not support all students, and particularly students from marginalized backgrounds. Efforts to transform mathematics classrooms to be culturally responsive, sustaining, and justice-oriented have met limited success at scale. It may be that supporting teachers to develop more equitable teaching practices would benefit from a more incremental improvement approach.

Author/Presenter

Erica Litke

Jonee Wilson

Heather C. Hill

Year
2025
Short Description

This article considers how school-based mathematics coaches can support teachers to make incremental shifts toward more equitable instruction. We describe a coaching model designed to include elements of incremental improvement, in which coaches and teachers analyze video against a set of rubrics that delineate equitable teaching practices.

Equity-Focused, Rubric-based Coaching: An Incremental Improvement Approach to Supporting Teachers to Shift Toward More Equitable Mathematics Instruction

Historically, inequities in mathematics education have resulted in mathematics classrooms that do not support all students, and particularly students from marginalized backgrounds. Efforts to transform mathematics classrooms to be culturally responsive, sustaining, and justice-oriented have met limited success at scale. It may be that supporting teachers to develop more equitable teaching practices would benefit from a more incremental improvement approach.

Author/Presenter

Erica Litke

Jonee Wilson

Heather C. Hill

Year
2025
Short Description

This article considers how school-based mathematics coaches can support teachers to make incremental shifts toward more equitable instruction. We describe a coaching model designed to include elements of incremental improvement, in which coaches and teachers analyze video against a set of rubrics that delineate equitable teaching practices.

Equity-Focused, Rubric-based Coaching: An Incremental Improvement Approach to Supporting Teachers to Shift Toward More Equitable Mathematics Instruction

Historically, inequities in mathematics education have resulted in mathematics classrooms that do not support all students, and particularly students from marginalized backgrounds. Efforts to transform mathematics classrooms to be culturally responsive, sustaining, and justice-oriented have met limited success at scale. It may be that supporting teachers to develop more equitable teaching practices would benefit from a more incremental improvement approach.

Author/Presenter

Erica Litke

Jonee Wilson

Heather C. Hill

Year
2025
Short Description

This article considers how school-based mathematics coaches can support teachers to make incremental shifts toward more equitable instruction. We describe a coaching model designed to include elements of incremental improvement, in which coaches and teachers analyze video against a set of rubrics that delineate equitable teaching practices.

An Analysis of Unexpected Responses in Middle School Students’ Mathematical Problem Posing from the Perspective of Problem-Posing Processes

Using data from a problem-posing project, this study analyzed the characteristics of middle school students’ responses to problem-posing prompts that did not match our assumptions and expectations to better understand student thinking.

Author/Presenter

Hua Ran

Jinfa Cai

Faith Muirhead

Stephen Hwang

Lead Organization(s)
Year
2025
Short Description

Using data from a problem-posing project, this study analyzed the characteristics of middle school students’ responses to problem-posing prompts that did not match our assumptions and expectations to better understand student thinking. The study found that the characteristics of middle school students’ unexpected responses were distributed across three different problem-posing processes: 1) orientation responses related to different interpretations of the problem-posing prompt or situation accounted for the majority; 2) connection responses related to making connections among pieces of information accounted for the second most common type; and 3) generation responses related to generation of problems only accounted for a very small proportion.

A Comparison of Responsive and General Guidance to Promote Learning in an Online Science Dialog

Students benefit from dialogs about their explanations of complex scientific phenomena, and middle school science teachers cannot realistically provide all the guidance they need. We study ways to extend generative teacher–student dialogs to more students by using AI tools. We compare Responsive web-based dialogs to General web-based dialogs by evaluating the ideas students add and the quality of their revised explanations.

Author/Presenter

Libby Gerard

Marcia C. Linn

Marlen Holtmann

Year
2024
Short Description

Students benefit from dialogs about their explanations of complex scientific phenomena, and middle school science teachers cannot realistically provide all the guidance they need. We study ways to extend generative teacher–student dialogs to more students by using AI tools.

Quenching a Thirsty Planet: Teaching the Dynamics of Water Scarcity and Sustainability Through the Water Cycle

Water scarcity poses a significant global challenge, which is often overlooked, particularly in regions with abundant water resources. This article outlines a curriculum designed for middle school students (grades 6–8) that addresses the dynamics of water scarcity and sustainability through five detailed lessons centered around the water cycle. The curriculum is designed to meet the Next Generation Science Standards, specifically focusing on standards ESS2.C and ESS3.C.

Author/Presenter

Rebecca Lesnefsky

Natasha Segal

David Fortus

Troy D. Sadler

Year
2025
Short Description

Water scarcity poses a significant global challenge, which is often overlooked, particularly in regions with abundant water resources. This article outlines a curriculum designed for middle school students (grades 6–8) that addresses the dynamics of water scarcity and sustainability through five detailed lessons centered around the water cycle.

Middle School Mathematics Teachers’ Proportional Reasoning and Its Relation to Their Content and Pedagogical Content Knowledge

Proportional reasoning is an important but challenging skill for students and teachers. This article, presents findings from two studies investigating whether four categories of reasoning identified by Copur-Gencturk et al. (2022, A Closer Look at Teachers’ Proportional Reasoning. International Journal of Science and Mathematics Education, 21(1), 113–129) apply to a national sample of U.S. middle school mathematics teachers (N = 1,320) and can be captured consistently by similar tasks.

Author/Presenter

Yasemin Copur-Gencturk

John Ezaki

Year
2025
Short Description

Proportional reasoning is an important but challenging skill for students and teachers. This article, presents findings from two studies investigating whether four categories of reasoning identified by Copur-Gencturk et al. apply to a national sample of U.S. middle school mathematics teachers (N = 1,320) and can be captured consistently by similar tasks.

Lifting Noticing: Critical Events That Mathematics Teacher Educators Notice During Coaching Cycles

Building on research on teacher noticing, the goal of this study was to understand what and how mathematics teacher educators notice critical events and how they make connections to consider the characteristics of distinguished coach noticing, meaning the noticing we would hope those coaching would attain to support teachers. We interviewed 29 mathematics teacher educators in two different experience groups and asked them to respond to vignettes of coach–teacher interactions.

Author/Presenter

Julie M. Amador

Ryan Gillespie

Jennifer Kruger

Adam Hanan

Jeffrey Choppin

Kenley Ritter

Year
2025
Short Description

Building on research on teacher noticing, the goal of this study was to understand what and how mathematics teacher educators notice critical events and how they make connections to consider the characteristics of distinguished coach noticing, meaning the noticing we would hope those coaching would attain to support teachers. We interviewed 29 mathematics teacher educators in two different experience groups and asked them to respond to vignettes of coach–teacher interactions.

Lifting Noticing: Critical Events That Mathematics Teacher Educators Notice During Coaching Cycles

Building on research on teacher noticing, the goal of this study was to understand what and how mathematics teacher educators notice critical events and how they make connections to consider the characteristics of distinguished coach noticing, meaning the noticing we would hope those coaching would attain to support teachers. We interviewed 29 mathematics teacher educators in two different experience groups and asked them to respond to vignettes of coach–teacher interactions.

Author/Presenter

Julie M. Amador

Ryan Gillespie

Jennifer Kruger

Adam Hanan

Jeffrey Choppin

Kenley Ritter

Year
2025
Short Description

Building on research on teacher noticing, the goal of this study was to understand what and how mathematics teacher educators notice critical events and how they make connections to consider the characteristics of distinguished coach noticing, meaning the noticing we would hope those coaching would attain to support teachers. We interviewed 29 mathematics teacher educators in two different experience groups and asked them to respond to vignettes of coach–teacher interactions.

Effective Strategies for Learning and Teaching in Times of Science Denial and Disinformation

The modern information landscape offers an abundance of options to learn about science topics, but it is also ripe for the spread of mis- and disinformation and science denial. Science education can play a pivotal role in mitigating harm from untruthful information, strengthening trust in science, and fostering a more informed and critically engaged public. Across the articles in this special issue, 10 pedagogical strategies to address mis- and disinformation in the classroom were synthesized.

Author/Presenter

K. C. Busch

Doug Lombardi

Year
2025
Short Description

The modern information landscape offers an abundance of options to learn about science topics, but it is also ripe for the spread of mis- and disinformation and science denial. Science education can play a pivotal role in mitigating harm from untruthful information, strengthening trust in science, and fostering a more informed and critically engaged public.