Attitude shifts in high school math and science teacher practice through connecting math, science, and engineering in a math science partnership: Project pathways

Project Pathways is a Math Science Partnership (MSP) providing professional development to high school math and science teachers in Phoenix metropolitan area school districts. The NSF funded project is using four semester-long courses and professional learning communities to enhance teacher pedagogy for improving mathematics and science learning and achievement in grades 9-12. Mathematics, science, engineering and education faculty are teaming with community college master teachers in using the understanding of mathematical function as a unifying concept applied throughout the courses. Conceptual competence in core content subjects and problem solving process behaviors in scientific inquiry, mathematical problem solving, and engineering design is promoted using team-based, inquiry learning pedagogy with contextualized content in MSP-created modules. The unifying concept of function, developed in the initial Functions and Modeling course, is integrated into science and engineering topics in the subsequent science and engineering courses. For example, the functional nature of the mathematical concept of proportionality is applied in the second course on Connecting Math with Physics and Chemistry for understanding the Universal Gas Law. Subsequently, in the course on Connecting Engineering with Science and Math, the conceptual knowledge of proportionality and the Universal Gas Law is applied as a predictive tool in the design process for the Hot Air Balloon Project. Here we report on, from qualitative analysis of teacher reflections, the research question, "What is the effect of an integrated math-science-engineering professional development project on high school math and science teachers' classroom practice using the core concept of function that is integrated into the delivery of contextualized content by team-based inquiry learning.".