Empowering children and teachers in the elementary mathematics classrooms of urban schools

Project IMPACT is a school-based teacher enhancement model for elementary mathematics instruction designed to foster student understanding and to support teacher change in predominantly minority elementary schools. Project teachers consider instructional approaches consistent with a cognitive, constructivist perspective for mathematics learning, emphasizing interaction and collaboration rather than limiting instruction to a direct model. Data from the primary grades revealed that significantly higher mathematics achievement scores for the children in the IMPACT schools emerged gradually and persistently over time, becoming more evident as the mathematical abstraction of the curriculum increased. Supported by mathematics specialists, instructional change occurred in most treatment classrooms, particularly in those schools where the principal encouraged the reform.