Lesson Study Professional Learning Community in Elementary Mathematics: A Randomized Controlled Study

• In Event: Responsive Teaching: Practices and Models of Professional Development

Abstract

One widely used method for increasing teacher effectiveness is professional development (PD). However, there is little consensus on how best to facilitate teacher skill acquisition due to the fact that most of the existing research on formal, in-service professional development is based on samples where teachers and/or schools are self-selected into training. This makes it unclear whether one can credibly compare the outcomes of teachers who undergo training to the outcomes of those who do not. This paper aims to build on our understanding of effective teacher PD by presenting an experimental evaluation of a teacher PD program – Lesson Study Professional Learning Community (PLC) in Elementary Mathematics.

Authors

• Cynthia DuBois, Northwestern University

• Kirabo Jackson, Northwestern University

• Hiromi Masunaga, California State University - Long Beach

• Linda Symcox, California State University - Long Beach