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perspectives in Education and Deafness Practical Ideas for the Classroom and Community Volume 16, Number 5, May/June1998 Mathematics Successful Transition Requires Curriculum Reform Mathematics curriculum must be reformed to enable deaf and hard of hearing students to attain meaningful employment in the 21st century. by Thomas E. Allen Thomas E. Allen, PhD, is Director of the Gallaudet Research Institute and professor in the Department of Education at Gallaudet University. The workplace is changing. According to projections from United States Department of Labor, the fastest-growing industry between years 1996 and 2006 is the computer and data-processing services industry, which will more than double in the next ten years. At the same time, the US Department of Labor predicts large decreases in jobs requiring labor and manual skills, a reduction in federal and state government workers, and an overall slowing of the growth rate in the number of jobs available to workers. Clearly, the best jobs in the 21st century will be occupied by individuals who have high levels of critical thinking skills and ability to reason mathematically. Are deaf students being adequately prepared? Cham Dee, of California School for the Deaf-Fremont, learned to design his school's homepage in a business office technology class and then was selected to be a web designer intern at NASA. Photo courtesy of California School for the Deaf. Traditionally, research into the achievement levels of deaf students has the shown that their mathematics skills are, on average, significantly higher than their reading skills. However, this research has been based on tests of mathematics computation; generally, these tests do not assess the students' ability to solve higher-order quantitative tasks. With the spread of computer technology in the workplace, it is unlikely that pure computational skills, without underlying critical thinking ability and the ability to apply mathematical concepts to everyday situations, will be sufficient to ensure job placement and success. In the 1980s and early 1990s several important papers, for example, A Nation at Risk (National Commission on Excellence in Education, 1983) decried the condition of mathematics education in United States. These papers and demands from industry for a workforce with increased technical and mathematical ability made it clear that mathematics education in United States needed to be reformed. In the late 1980s, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) published a set of standards for curricula reform in mathematics education. At the center of these standards is the desire that all students learn to reason mathematically and become mathematical problems solvers. In 1995, a committee to develop a national action plan for mathematics education reform for deaf students questioned whether educational programs for deaf students were keeping pace with programs for hearing students in adopting the NCTM standards. The committee recommended that, by the year 2000, mathematics curriculum and assessment programs for deaf and hard of hearing students be in harmony with the NCTM standards. The following year, researchers from the Gallaudet Research Institute (GRI), working with educators from this committee, developed a survey for mathematics teachers of deaf students that assessed the degree to which the NCTM standards were being implemented throughout United States in deaf education programs. This survey was administered at the same time the GRI was conducting a study to establish norms for deaf and hard of hearing students for the Stanford Achievement Test, 9th edition. The mathematics subtests of the Stanford Achievement Test are designed to be consistent with the NCTM standards. In the GRI survey, mathematics teachers were asked to report whether various standards reflected in the test item content of the Stanford were included in their current mathematics curricula. They were also asked some general questions about their mathematics teaching practices. The responses for teachers of the 798 students taking the Mathematics Procedures subtests and the 686 students taking the Mathematics Problem Solving subtests show that in the Mathematics Procedures, more than 80 percent of the items were reported as being either adequately or heavily covered, but only a third of the items were reported as being heavily covered. The percentages were lower for the Mathematical Problem Solving items. Less than 14 percent of the Problem Solving items were reported as being heavily covered, and less than 60 percent were reported as being either adequately or heavily covered. These results indicate that there is considerably less curricular focus on mathematics problem solving than on procedures. (See Table 1). The results also show that the more traditional strategies, such as strategies that emphasize memorization and paper-pencil computation, received higher overall ratings than those which are based on the NCTM standards. Emphasis on students reading about mathematics and on probability and statistics received particularly low ratings. These preliminary results show that mathematics curricula in classrooms for deaf students are not fully meeting the NCTM standards (nor focused on developing the critical thinking skills that the 21st century clearly requires). In order for deaf students to be adequately prepared for the workplace, it is essential that the mathematics curricula be reformed. Table 1 Degree of Coverage Teachers were more likely to cover math calculations and procedures than work on problem solving skills, according to a survey by the Graduate Research Institute at Gallaudet University. Mathematics Procedures Mean Percent Test items adequately or heavily covered in mathematics curricula 85% Test items heavily covered in mathematics curricula 33% Mathematics Problem Solving Mean Percent Test items adequately or heavily covered in mathematics curricula 59% Test items heavily covered in mathematics curricula 14% Table 2 Degree of Emphasis on Mathematics Instructional Strategies Teachers were more likely to emphasize paper and pencil skills than skills that lead to problem solving. The results below show teachers' responses, based on a 4-point scale, where 1=No emphasis and 4=Considerable emphasis. the Graduate Research Institute at Gallaudet University. Math Teachers Reported They Emphasized Paper & pencil computation 3.48 Applications 3.37 Memorization 3.31 Problem solving 3.28 Peer interaction 3.27 Cooperative learning 3.07 Use of manipulatives 2.98 Use of workbook 2.87 Student evaluations 2.75 Computers 2.20 Use of calculator 2.46 Estimation 2.60 Writing about mathematics 1.77 Probability and statistics 1.83