Swimming With Sharks
June 30, 2025
Wading in the creek behind University of Delaware’s The College School, elementary students laughed and cheered as they met a challenge their teacher Laurie Drumm posed only a few months prior: build a robot that travels through water, mimics the characteristics of underwater animals and doesn’t scare the other fish. Through …
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Lifetime Achievements in Mathematics Education
November 18, 2024
James Hiebert, professor emeritus in the University of Delaware’s College of Education and Human Development (CEHD), didn’t set out to be a mathematics educator. But he was inspired to pursue mathematics by a college professor whose enthusiasm for the subject was contagious. After studying for hours for an especially difficult final exam, …
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Research Spotlight: Lynsey Gibbons
September 30, 2024
When asked to imagine classroom learning, some people envision a teacher at the front of the room, guiding their students’ learning through a series of questions without much connection to the students’ interests or experiences. Many teachers envision the same model when they think about their own professional learning. But, …
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Research Spotlight: Amanda Jansen
March 27, 2024
If your high schooler has ever complained about their math homework—wondering when they’ll ever need the pythagorean theorem after graduation—they are not alone. Research in mathematics education often shows that students’ motivation to learn math tends to decline as students move through the K-12 school system. So University of Delaware …
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Research Spotlight: Jessica Namkung
December 19, 2023
“How do I multiply fractions again? How much time do I have left to finish this test? I’m not good at math and I never will be!” Math anxiety, which can begin as early as kindergarten, negatively affects students’ math performance both in the moment and throughout their math …
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Research Spotlight: Leigh McLean
October 17, 2023
In a new study funded by the Institute of Education Sciences, University of Delaware Associate Research Professor Leigh McLean and her co-authors Jayley Janssen, Paul Espinoza, Sarah Lindstrom Johnson of Arizona State University and Manuela Jimenez of Glendale Community College found that teachers’ math and science anxiety were each positively …
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A Novel Approach to Teaching Algebra
May 19, 2022
Unlike other elementary and middle school mathematics courses, algebra begins to introduce abstract relationships and ideas. While textbooks attempt to give students real-world illustrations of these new concepts, many students struggle to match what they’re learning in the classroom with concrete experiences. For students who struggle to master these foundational …
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Helping Math Teachers
August 20, 2021
Teachers continue to learn after they leave college through experiences they have with their students and through formal professional development. Offered through school districts and other educational organizations, professional development (commonly referred to as PD in the educational setting) often encourages teachers to change their instruction using research-based methods that …
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Research Spotlight: Erica Litke
June 25, 2021
Drawing on video from 108 ninth-grade algebra lessons from 5 school districts, a recent study by University of Delaware assistant professor Erica Litke found that teachers engaged in specific instructional features that benefit student learning of algebraic ideas to a modest degree. Ninety-five percent of the lessons included teacher-centered instruction …
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CEHD Graduate Student Awarded NSF Fellowship
May 24, 2021
Fourteen University of Delaware undergraduate and graduate students and alumni have been awarded National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowships. An additional three current students and six alumni received honorable mentions. The highly competitive fellowship, the oldest of its kind in the nation, is among the most prestigious awards for graduate …
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Teaching, Technology and Teacher Education
November 17, 2020
The beginning of the coronavirus pandemic presented many challenges for educators, as teachers across grade levels, content areas, and geographic regions quickly transitioned their in-person classrooms to online environments. Many educators found themselves engaged in online teaching for the first time with little knowledge about how to deliver effective instruction …
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Faculty Receive Grants to Study Fractions Learning
July 18, 2020
Many students struggle with a deep understanding of fractions, even after several years of instruction in elementary and middle school classrooms. Nancy C. Jordan, Dean Family Endowed Chair and professor in the School of Education (SOE), and Christina Barbieri, assistant professor in the SOE, have received a nearly $892,000 National Science Foundation grant to …
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