2013 Conference Proceedings - University of Nevada, Las Vegas

The researcher also found numerous advantages and disadvantages to using children’s fictionto supplement the geometry content. One benefit included getting teachers excited about readingin their mathematics classrooms. One teacher brought in an additional text she loved using in hermathematics classroom, which she shared with others. During the academic portion of the grant,another teacher commented on how she decided to use books in her mathematics classes thissemester and how surprised and excited the students were to be given the opportunity to learnmathematics in this way.Even though there are many advantages to utilizing literature in the classroom, one cannotneglect to mention the drawbacks. Some difficulties consisted of having to eliminate otheractivities to include story time in the agenda, as well as trying to find engaging hands-onmathematics lessons to tie the books into the lessons. The researcher only chose books whichcould be connected directly to activities conducted in class. This type of daily routine took muchtime and reflection on the researcher’s part, which she felt was well worth the effort.Based on the findings, college instructors can see the influence of including children’sliterature in their mathematics instruction to middle school inservice teachers, which in turn canimpact the way children learn in middle schools. There are many helpful tricks the researcherfound for utilizing children’s literature for inservice mathematics teachers. For example, modelhow to read and how to connect the literature to the concepts. There are numerous online lessonswritten for specific books available for teacher use, which teachers may be unfamiliar of theirexistence. Besides online lessons, authors, such as Thiessen (2004), have published books thatcontain classroom-ready lessons with teacher notes that span many grades and explore numerousbook titles. If you do not include such a critical step in the learning process, teachers will oftennot know how to implement reading into their curriculum. Also, select books that integrate wellwith course goals and curriculum. This can be a time consuming, but beneficial, part of thepreparation time for the class. Another tip is give a list of books to teachers so they can referenceany text used in class. Finally, encourage active discussion about the pedagogical features of theliterature. This could consist of pausing during certain portions of the book to elicit groupdiscussion or to lead into hands-on activities.Since this study consisted of only one class of middle school teachers, the findings arelimited, but other studies could be conducted in comparable courses. In addition, researchersProceedings of the 40 th Annual Meeting of the Research Council on Mathematics Learning 2013 131