Hi, I am a math specialist in an elementary school in Marlborough, MA.  I learned math in a very procedural, memorization driven type of way.  When I was learning math, another way to solve a problem was not celebrated, it was marked incorrect because you did not follow the procedure, even when the answer was correct.  I am excited that that is changing for our students.  Jo talked about this in the preface.  "Students will be given more challenging tasks and spoon-fed less.  Instead of being told a method and then practicing it, they will need to learn to choose, adapt, and use methods."  She recognizes that this type of teaching and learning take more time.  Even though the standards have been reduced, I still feel the struggle daily of getting through a unit on time, while also still spending the time we need to explore and problem solve. 

I am in my 16 year of teaching high school mathematics and my thirteenth year as a high school mathematics department head.  Over the course of my career, I have taught in very traditional ways and in some non-traditional ways including using the SIMM-IM curriculum (a standards-based curriculum similar to IMP (Interactive Mathematics Project) based on learning mathematics in context and in collaborative groups.  

My own learning of mathematics was very traditional and focused, at least early on, on memorization.  I remember struggling to learn my times tables.  To this day, I only have the tables partially memorized and add/subtract to fill in the gaps.  This cut down on my speed as a student which made me think I was not good at mathematics.  Only later did I realize that I was probably understanding multiplication much better than many of peers -- they had simply memorized without knowing why the table actually worked.

Some thoughts (among many) I have so far:

• Jo is right -- The high school content standards are jam-packed.  As a high school teacher, I experience first hand the difficulty of slowing down to give students time to grapple with the mathematics.  The Common Core authors have not done much to help us focus the high school curriculum and provide time for students to learn deeply.
• I do question if all mathematics we teach needs to be "relevant" for the modern world.  Jo argues that we are teaching outdated mathematics that our students will never need.  This is an argument that many have made for quite some time.  Jo also argues that we cannot know "what" mathematics students will actually need in the future.  I think the question of relevance is nice for student interest, but not entirely relevant for student learning.  I would argue that any mathematical topic can be made interesting to students and can help students learn how to be mathematical thinkers.  I am very interested in reading more about Jo's thoughts on how to accomplish that thinking piece.  
• Jo includes some ideas from Conrad Wolfram in her Introduction.  She says that he believes we spend too much time on the parts of mathematics that can be done by a computer.  I have wondered about this more and more in recent years. Do we at the high school spend too much time even on things such as solving equations when a computer can easily do this for us.  Should we even spend anytime on this task?  What would the mathematics classroom look like if we were truly freed up to use technology to handle algebraic manipulations and computations? What would our assessments look like?

Hi, I am a developmental math teacher for grades k -2 in Norfolk, Ma. This is my third year in this position, prior to this i have been a classroom teacher for grades 3,4, and 5 for eight years. My math education was very traditional and I was only required to learn math until I was a sophomore in high school. Although I am sure I had wonderful teachers, my learning never went past the thought of just getting me to the next level.  

Determined to make math a learning and engaging subject, the first couple parts of this book pulled me in hook line and sinker. It is scary to think this is a nationwide issue, because I feel the heat of the math daily in my position. I sometimes feel like I am a defensive player on the math education team. Reading about the growth mind set to the emphasis on the mathematical practices to teachers encouraging students to grow and learn in math- that's what makes me excited to come to my job everyday.  In my position, working with the teachers and the parents is just as important as working with my students. In the last paragraph on xxii it states that we are in a position to change the landscape of mathematics teaching and learning in the United States…forever, that is very exciting and challenging all at once.  Connecting the curiosity of numbers and the intricate patterns of nature to "school math" in such a way that students are making discoveries is what math class should be like. We need to take the boring out of math. As a district we are working very hard to move our education for the students forward, but it is taking an ample amount of time to do that. Having open ended questions that are not teacher lead is so important for the students to think. As mentioned in the book, many people including educators and parents have a level of math anxiety. I think it would be truly awesome if our kids/students did not even know what that meant. Math is hard, reading is hard…but we can all learn it somehow some way. 

Hi 

I have been teaching math for over 30 years.    My personal experience in math learning experience in the lower grades has been more memorization of facts.   Now that I have been teaching math in elementary school, I have been trying to help my students understand why and to build my  student own techniques in problem solving.   I am hoping to find ways to help my parents understand that children will have a better understanding of all topics of math if they are allowed to explore before they are given a rule and to recognize that math is fun but challenging.   Also have my students be willing to be challenged and not afraid to take risks of attempting problems that might be hard.   

I am excited that we will be able to share our ideas as we read and discuss the book.

Hello!  I am Jen Hudak, I am a K-5 Math Coach in Beverly, MA.  This is my first year as a Math Coach.  I have 10 years experience teaching grades 4 & 5 math in the Lynn Public Schools District.

I remember my math learning being mostly skill and drill.  Most of my days were spent memorizing facts and rules. 

Some important points that jumped out at me from the preface and introduction are:

• The growth mind-set in math is something we need to instill in our Ss.  They need to believe that intelligence and "smartness" can be learned.  
• "For students to see mathematics as a subject of learning, they need tasks and questions in math class that allow for learning." (p. xvii)  This is a big point that I'm excited to learn more about.  As a coach, I'm trying to get my teachers to see that this model of a math block can work if we give them opportunities to try to figure it out for themselves.  So many of us are just used to giving them the lesson and then having them practice practice practice, whereas this suggests that maybe we need to let them explore and discover how to solve problems on their own.  I can't wait to read more about this!
• We need to tell Ss that mistakes are productive; when they make a mistake in math, their brain grows, synapses fire, and connections are made. (p. xix)  This seems like it will take a long time to shift the thought process because we are a culture of always wanting to get it right.  I think in order for students to know that mistakes are great, we also have to get the parents on board, and it will take a big shift in the teachers' mindsets too!  I am curious to see how to foster this shift in a school.
• "Instead of mathematics classroom lessons filled with short questions that students are intended to get right or wrong, they need to be filled with open-ended tasks that include space for learning as well as space for struggle and growth." (p. xx)  I'm hoping we can learn more about how to develop these tasks and learning spaces for the students through this book.