Guiding Principles for MR Teaching:

1. The teaching approach is problem based. "Children routinely are engaged in thinking hard to solve numerical problems that for them are quite challenging".

2. Teaching is informed by an initial comrehensive assessment.

3. Teaching is focused just beyond the 'cutting edge' of the child's current knowledge.

4. Teachers exercise their professional judgement in selecting from a bank of instructional settings and tasks.

5. The teacher understands children's numerical strategies and deliberately engenders the development of more sophisticated strategies.

6. The teacher provides the child with sufficient time to solve a given problem. Consequently the child is frequently engaged in episodes that involve sustained thinking, reflection on her or his thinking and reflecting on the results of her or his thinking.

7. Children gain intrinsic satisfaction from their problem-solving and the realization that they are making progress.

Proceed

May 21, 2003

Email: dale.burnett@uleth.ca