Best wishes from a teacher who has done all those things you listed at the beginning of the post.

Although these are my biases, I think you can benefit from looking into Self Determination Theory (http://www.psych.rochester.edu/SDT/) as it fits in with what I see in your posts. It will give you a theoretical framework, necessary in a PhD program, with a lot of research to back it. Here is the first line of an article by Ryan and Deci, ”Human beings can be proactive and engaged or, alternatively, passive and alienated, largely as a function of the social conditions in which they develop and function.” Your approach seems to be largely about finding ways to keep students “proactive and engaged” rather than “passive and alienated” in the classroom.

In a more recent post you wrote:
“This math thing is easier to approach if I ask myself, what about this concept is useful, interesting, essential, or satisfying, and then work backward along that vector, rather than working toward it from a disjoint set of scattered skills. There is probably a book I should read somewhere in all of this.”

Try Vygotsky and his followers who have applied his theory to math education. One of his principles is that cognitive development occurs when a problem is encountered for which previous methods of solution are inadequate. Their lessons stretch the students minds by creating a need for a new way of understanding.

Wish you the Best.

I remember that you have blogged often about the bathetic sensibilities of “doing it for the kids,” and have argued passionately that this is not why you entered the profession.

And I challenge you, nonetheless, to consider the notion that your degree will mean nothing unless you find a way to get back to them– the kids– somehow.

Good luck.

I think there are many readers who feel that without this blog they would’ve ended up a very different teacher. I’m one of them. I’m a new teacher in a school where there is very little support. With the advice and help that I was getting I felt like I was engaging in defensive teaching. I know I was doing things that didn’t upset the administration, the math department, and the parents. But I felt that I was becoming the teacher that I didn’t like as a student, one that I wouldn’t wish on my kids or anyone else’s kids. The learning I do reading blogs, this one in particular, has far surpassed what I’m getting in PD and BTSA, though I think I barely scratched the surface.

Know that you’ve helped more students than the ones you see in your classroom. I wish you luck in your new endeavor and the fortune to be in a place to effect change.

I’ve learned so much from reading this blog, and your assessment system has solved so many problems. Thank you so much!