Mathematics Knowledge for Teaching: The Case of Preservice Teachers

Reforms seem to be happening all over the U.S. Ongoing education-reform efforts have escalated in response to new and ever-changing accountability systems. Mathematics education continues its “math wars” and is now struggling to put and keep teachers in the classroom. Another reform effort is new teacher education. New teacher education grows out of changing notions of accountability and more specifically, the recent educational reform movements in the U.S. (Cochran-Smith, 2005). The quality of classroom instruction was not been a major concern of policy makers and educators until it was compared to other educational systems (e.g., Silver, 1998). Now the ever-static American classroom (National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching for the 21st Century, 2000) is gradually seeing change thanks to numerous professional development programs, nationally-funded research projects in cooperation with major universities, and reform initiatives in teacher preparation programs.