Investigating Co-planning and Co-teaching in Higher Education Statistics
Emma White
Honors College, East Carolina University
HNRS 4500: SHP
Dr. Maureen Grady
August 10, 2021
Introduction
Studies have shown that students entering mathematics programs and mathematics
education struggle with statistics (Cook & Connelly, 2016). This honors project study will strive
to increase statistical knowledge of college students, locating and evaluating resources for
teaching statistics, and developing a co-planning and co-teaching relationship between a
college math education student and a college math education professor. They will then attempt to
resolve the statistical gaps of math education majors, increase teacher identity in the
math education major, and improve the introductory statistics course for all math majors.
Background
Dr. Maureen Grady is an associate professor of mathematics education. She has taught a
variety of math classes, ranging from middle school mathematics to the university
level. Currently, Dr. Grady teaches mathematics for math education majors at ECU. She pointed
out that in-coming freshmen really struggle with statistics and that she would be interested in
partnering with an honors student in mathematics education to investigate how co-planning and
co-teaching with the college math education major could improve the course development for
MATE 2700 Applications in Statistics and Probability and help develop teacher identity in the
math education major through the co-planning and co-teaching process. I have already taken the
MATE 2700 course with Dr. Grady. Therefore, my personal insight will provide a unique
perspective as to how the course can be improved. Co-teaching and co-planning is a subject that
Dr. Grady has been a part of researching, for the use of both techniques can improve the methods
used to train our future educators. There are multiple steps in the process of co-teaching, and
each step provides the less experienced educator with various opportunities to teach in a
controlled environment. When the new educator begins, they are only observing. As the co-
teaching and co-planning process continues, the new teacher is gradually given more freedom
with each step. By the end of the process, there is no longer one teacher coaching the other.
Instead, the two teachers work together through team teaching (Grady et al., 2016).
This study is a little different because of the range of experience between the two
educators. The research done on co-planning and co-teaching has been primarily between an
educator doing their student teaching and their mentor with the goal of honing their teaching
abilities. This study will be done by a sophomore and an associate professor with the goal of
improving a statistics course, creating a better sense of teacher identity, and discovering how coteaching and co-planning can be better applied amongst mathematics education.
Purpose of the Study
Co-planning and co-teaching with a college student and college professor for a college
course has not been done at East Carolina University, so the study will achieve a new perspective
on a new research front. Furthermore, the purpose of this study is to investigate the principles of
co-planning and co-teaching at the college level to not only improve my teacher identity but also
improve the content knowledge of statistics in incoming math education students. Working with
Dr. Grady will create opportunities for me to grow as a student and as an educator, but it also
provides Dr. Grady with a learning experience as well. By working with a previous student to
better her statistics course, she can see a different side of how the course is being taught. A
different perspective can help her not only improve the course but improve her methods as an
educator as well. Furthermore, by working with someone who has no teaching experience, she
will become more adept in applying the tactics of efficient co-planning and co-teaching. Our
research could benefit students not only at ECU, but at other universities as well. When coteaching and co-planning is done correctly, it serves to create significant growth of knowledge
and skills for both parties involved. Therefore, by working together, we can find ways to
improve the systems of co-teaching and co-planning to create better educators across all ages.
Research Questions
1. How does co-planning and co-teaching affect the structure, design, and resources of the
MATE 2700 Applications in Statistics and Probability course?
2. How does co-planning and co-teaching affect the teacher identity in the math education major
involved in co-teaching with a mathematics education professor?
3. How does co-planning and co-teaching affect the classroom experience of college students
taking MATE 2700 Applications in Statistics and Probability at East Carolina University?
Methodology
This study will take a qualitative approach. For at the end of the semester, I will be
analyzing the information that the students provide through an survey form on their perceptions
of co-teaching, and my continued notes throughout the semester. The students taking this course
are planning on becoming math teachers, so MATE 2700 is critical for our mathematics
educators. The class ensures that the student completes the course with a sufficient knowledge of
statistics and how to effectively teach it.
In the fall our main goals will be to assemble a literature review, create and submit IRB
for approval, and to co-plan how we will teach the revised MATE 2700 course in the spring. We
will be utilizing co-planning methods while researching what curriculum would be most
effective, developing a course calendar, and creating lesson plans. During the spring we will be
working together to teach the course through the methods of co-teaching. We will use each
strategy: one teach/one observe, one teach/one assist, station teaching, parallel teaching,
alternative teaching, and team teaching (Grady et al., 2016).
Dr. Grady and I will be using multiple forms of data collection to demonstrate my
personal progress and the progress of the students throughout our research. The qualitative aspect
would utilize a journal that I would keep throughout the
experience, providing a thorough description of experiences and the process of gaining an
understanding of statistics and how to manage a classroom in this content area. Dr. Grady could
also provide a summary of how this experience affected MATE 2700 for this semester and
compare it to the previous years she had taught the course. The Teacher Identity Measurement
Scale would also provide a quantitative element where I could quantify my development as a
teacher from the beginning of the year to the end of the year. This measurement scale has four
primary objectives that they use to determine growth: motivation, self-image, self-efficacy, and
task perception (Hannah et al., 2020). Each aspect of this measurement scale will be taken into
consideration when determining my growth at the end of the year.
Closure
Any math education major would be lucky to walk this path with Dr. Grady. This
research will allow for me to co-plan and co-teach in a math course that I took previously this
year and having such unique insight into this course will assist me as an educator. Dr. Grady is
also interested in presenting the findings from this honors project at the North Carolina Council
of Teachers of Mathematics and the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics conferences. I
believe that our research will be of great benefit to the mathematics education community.
Works Cited
Grady, M., Cayton, C., Sinicrope, R., Preson, R., & Funsch, A. (2016). Shifting paradigms for
pre-service teachers’ internship experiences: Co-teaching as a model for relationships. In
M. B. Wood, E. E. Turner, M. Civil, & J. A. Eli (Eds.), Proceedings of the 38th Annual
Meeting of the North American Chapter of the International Group for the Psychology of
Mathematics Education (pp. 869-872). Tucson, AZ: The University of Arizona.
Hanna, F., Oostdam, R., Severiens, S. E., & Zijlstra, B. J. (2020, March). Assessing the
professional identity of primary student teachers: Design and validation of the Teacher
Identity Measurement Scale. In https://www.sciencedirect.com/. Retrieved from
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191491X19301142
Samuel A. Cook & Timothy Fukawa-Connelly (2016) The incoming statistical knowledge of
undergraduate majors in a department of mathematics and statistics, International Journal
of Mathematical Education in Science and Technology, 47:2, 167184, DOI: 10.1080/0020739X.2015.1060642