SimCalc

Jeremy Roschelle, Sara Carriere, Gucci Estrella, Larry Gallagher, Bowyee Gong, Jennifer Knudsen, Yesica Lopez, Vanessa Oseguera, Ken Rafanan, Luisana Sahagun, Nicole Shechtman, Phil Vahey, Teresa Lara-Meloy

The SimCalc project seeks to democratize access to the mathematics of change, making concepts of proportionality, linearity, and rates of change accessible to ordinary middle school students. The project teaches core concepts in the strand that leads to Algebra and eventually to Calculus. To accomplish this, we develop and study restructured curriculum and innovative graphing technologies, seeking an integration that supports students in developing a robust, integrated, multi-faceted understanding of the concept of "rate of change."

Current Studies

Scaling Up SimCalc - Phase II
We are studying the viability of research-based, technologically-enhanced mathematical pedagogy as a large-scale innovation across a range of teachers, students, and educational environments. Our emphasis is the challenge of understanding whether a wide variety of teachers can succeed with materials that integrate technology, curriculum, and teacher professional development. Our starting point is the investigation of the robustness of a replacement unit model for teaching core concepts in complex and conceptually difficult mathematics, specifically rate and proportionality. To do this we are developing techniques for improving and measuring teachers' content, pedagogical content, and technology integration knowledge.

In school year 2005-2006, we completed a randomized, controlled experiment with over a 100 7th grade teachers in Texas. In school year 2006-2007, we continued with the cohort of 7th grade teachers from the prior year. We also expanded into the 8th grade and designed another replacement unit focusing on linear function. In both years, we are collecting data for two primary outcomes: (1) strong evidence on which educational leaders can base decisions about using technology to address the national challenge of improving students' ability to do complex and conceptually difficult mathematics, and (2) new insights into specific teaching and professional development practices that leverage technologies to improve learning.

Visit our project website (http://math.sri.com) to learn more about this phase of the Scaling Up SimCalc project and read about results from the 7th grade study in school year 2005 – 2006.

9/2004 - 8/2008 (current)

Prior Studies

Scaling up SimCalc - Phase I was a pilot of a randomized, controlled experiment with 7th grade teachers in Texas. This took place in the 2003-04 school year. We found significant learning gains for teachers who received training in our intervention (compared to those who did not). Furthermore, we found significant learning gains for their students. This phase was completed in August 2004.

In NetCalc explored the potential of wireless handheld devices in implementing the SimCalc vision. Working closely with a local school and teacher, we designed new activities that utilized the mobility and "beaming" capability of handhelds in the context of focused interventions, including an 8th grade month-long introduction to concepts such as the meaning of the area under a curve. Our research examined learning gains, patterns of attention and engagement, and the new learning opportunities possible within classroom activities supported by handheld devices. The project was completed in December 2003.

Funders & Clients 

National Science Foundation

Partners 

Publications

Research Areas

Assessment
Learning Environments
Teacher Learning
Technology Development

Keywords 

calculus
diversity
English Language Learners
experiment
Mathematics learning
Mathematics Learning & Teaching
representation
Simcalc