The Nueva School's Innovative Learning Conference

This session is a part of our special Wednesday focus on professional development in mathematics. It will take place at Hillcrest Elementary School in San Francisco.

SFUSD has been making notable strides toward our vision that all students make sense of rigorous mathematics in ways that are creative, interactive, and relevant in heterogeneous classrooms. Through efforts to design and refine a problem-based curriculum, detrack high school math, and increase participation in advanced math courses, and through the development of math teacher leaders and math coaches in our schools, SFUSD has been a role model for other urban districts seeking to shift the practice of mathematics toward inquiry, critical thinking, and equitable outcomes. This impact has been accomplished in part through ongoing, responsive professional development efforts, including complex instruction, problem-solving cycles, and lesson study. A cohort of SFUSD schools has been committed to whole school lesson study within mathematics, focused on Teaching Through Problem Solving (TTP). These schools seek to ensure the participation of all educators in one or more rigorous lesson study cycles annually, toward the goal of accelerating math achievement for each and every student — so that students are confident, independent learners able to engage in high-level problem-solving and productive discussion, and able to use evidence and reason to construct viable arguments. Our cohort of schools believes that lesson study is a powerful lever for enhancing teachers' pedagogical content knowledge through the development of a research question, collaborative research and lesson planning, detailed observation, and the moderated debriefing of lessons. Using the Teaching Through Problem Solving protocol, Lauren Williams and the team will present a fifth-grade mathematics lesson with a class of Hillcrest Elementary students. Observers will have the opportunity to hear how the group developed their inquiry and resulting lesson, watch the lesson live with students, and participate in the debriefing. Expert commentary on the mathematics of the lesson will come from Dr. Harold Asturias. Final comments on the day will be from Annie Fetter.