Principal and superintendent interest

[Lee Williams]

Are principals and superintendents more likely to hire a person with
this kind of programmatic background?

Also, is PDE thinking of creating a new certification area?

[Jason]

As a 'former' Director of Mathematics and Science, I would definitely
hire elementary and middle school teachers with specialized knowledge
in mathematics teaching and learning. I find it amazing how many
district's Title I Math teachers have little mathematics background.
Rather, they often hold reading specialist certification.

[CIC Mercyhurst team]

Jason, I agree.  As a reading specialist myself, I see a math specailist as a coach for teachers who are behind in math pedagogy.  Some of the senior teachers at the high school where I taught for 29 years area still teaching math like they were taught in the 60s.  Sad, but true, and I think newer math pedagogy will excite kids about math again.

During my stint as a reading specialist I also tutored students in an academic literacy class who were in various math courses.  These students had little of what my math teacher husband calls math automaticity.  This was the result of their vaguely knowing basic math facts and order of operation, which children begin to learn in grade 1 now.  These kids had no number sense whatsoever. You can't ad and subtract positive and negative numbers when you have not clue how to add or subtract double diget numbers in high school.  When I asked math teachers to give me some math strategies, I got blank "deer in the headlights" looks from math teachers who have master's degrees.

I see the math specialist as the expert who leads professional development for math teachers and also teachers other content area teachers how incorporate mate in other content areas. FOr example, I taught journalism for over 30 years to high school students.  I had not a scrap of background in probability and stats, so had no clue how to set up a good survey or teach students to portray data is a clear way for the reader, until my math teacher husband said Jane, you need to teach them this before you teach them to gather the data.  I was fortunate because my math specialist was here guiding me.  What about the soc. studies teachers who have no clue how to really teach economics and data gathering analysis or English teacher who are asked to do teach yearbook design and have no clue about proportion?  That would be a problem with photo enlarging in a page, because kids always mess this up in PhotoShop resulting in weird head and body sizes.  How about the math of music?

Jane

I believe math crosses all contents - like reading