The goal of this session is to assist other project teams in the design and testing of game-based mathematics products. The session includes a discussion of recently completed randomized control trials of the Math Snacks games. Participants leave with concrete ideas on designing and testing e-learning products designed for classroom use with a focus on middle school concepts.

Current knowledge assessment techniques, such as paper-and-pencil or performance assessments, can provide robust data about gross changes in the distribution of student knowledge over the course of instruction. However, we lack effective ways of coordinating student data collected across varied instruments, time points, and activity contexts to examine patterns of change and dynamics of growth across large numbers of students.

The LAMP project has developed a sequence of lessons in a hypothetical learning trajectory that targets students’ ability to write viable arguments in algebraic contexts. Most of the lessons encourage students to produce a referent (e.g., variable expression or equation, generic example, diagram) as the foundation of their argument. Students come to the lessons with a predisposition for example production in support of their claims and to augment arguments.

Algebraic habits of mind, at the core of five of the Standards for Mathematical Practice, become both a potent and appealing intervention for at-risk algebra students and a solid prevention-model middle-school course either to accelerate algebra or to ensure success in a later algebra course. The session focuses on the habits of mind in that context, in related professional development work that addresses the Standards for Mathematical Practices, and on assessment of algebraic habits of mind in teachers.

Over a period of five years the SmartGraphs project developed HTML5 software for teaching and learning STEM subjects that make use of line graphs and scatter plots. SmartGraphs activities help students understand the “story” represented by a graph. The project created dozens of activities for algebra, physical science, and other STEM subjects, as well as an authoring system allowing non-computer-programmers to create and disseminate free online activities.

DR K–12 projects have been funded to conduct (1) activities and develop materials that are beneficial to the STEM education community (teachers and students) and (2) education research to ensure continuous improvement of these activities and materials.

Examples of research practices that limit the validity of research syntheses are not difficult to find. For example, Education Development Center, Inc. (EDC), and Abt Associates reported in their Compendium of STEM Instruments that psychometric reporting practices in the STEM community tend to be insufficient, and this limited what they could learn from their synthesis.

The Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (CCSSM) offer an opportunity for districts to push teachers to enact ambitious practices around instruction and curriculum use. However, taking up ambitious practices entails a number of challenges, some of which were evident during the NCTM Standards reform movement in the 1990s and early 2000s, and some of which reflect new approaches and new policy contexts.

The Next Generation Science Standards present important shifts for science teaching, assessment, and curriculum materials—focusing on core explanatory ideas, a central role for science and engineering practices, and coherence across time and science disciplines. These challenges for practice require new theoretical advances.

Biological Sciences Curriculum Study (BSCS) and project partners are developing an online course for high school science teachers. The purpose of the course is to help teachers understand key energy concepts in alternative energy contexts. The course includes three interactive learning experiences (interactives) that use life cycle data from the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL).