High School Mathematics Teacher Professional Development in Data Analysis, Probability, and Statistics

Quantifying Uncertainty and Analyzing Numerical Trends (QUANT) is a yearlong professional development program for high school mathematics teachers that is designed to develop their statistical proficiency for teaching. The mechanism used to develop such proficiency is technological pedagogical content knowledge in the areas of measurement, data collection, data analysis, probability, and statistics, combined with a classroom implementation focus on selecting, setting up, and enacting high cognitive level tasks. This paper describes the QUANT program, its aims, and the results from a series of exploratory investigations to measure and evaluate the program’s effectiveness. These studies have involved a total of 23 practicing teachers, and they have been used to refine and shape this ongoing professional development effort, which is part of a larger program to develop the overall mathematical proficiency for teaching as many U.S. states move toward requiring 4 years of mathematics for all high school students.