ICOTS8 (2010) Invited Paper Madden In C. Reading (Ed.), Data and context in statistics education: Towards an evidence-based society. Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on Teaching Statistics (ICOTS8, July, 2010), Ljubljana, Slovenia. Voorburg, The Netherlands: International Statistical Institute. www.stat.auckland.ac.nz/~iase/publications.php [© 2010 ISI/IASE] OVERCOMING OBSTACLES TO SUPPORTING SECONDARY TEACHERS’ STATISTICAL CONTENT KNOWLEDGE FOR TEACHING Sandra Madden University of Massachusetts Amherst, United States of America smadden@educ.umass.edu Supporting teachers’ statistical content knowledge for teaching poses a number of challenges. Many grades 6-12 mathematics teachers’ prior experiences with statistics insufficiently prepared them to support students grappling with big ideas of statistics. Teachers’ view of statistics tends to be procedural and cookbook-oriented. Many mathematics teachers feel that statistics has little place in their instruction, thus professional development is unnecessary. Finally, many teachers have not experienced learning statistics in an environment in which student-centered discourse, learner-centered technology, and worthwhile statistical tasks has been the norm. Research from two professional development projects in which significant changes in teachers’ understanding of statistical big ideas occurred is presented. Potential solutions to obstacles, tasks with potential for engaging and challenging teachers, and lessons learned are discussed. INTRODUCTION The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) Principles and Standards for School Mathematics (PSSM) recommends that data analysis ands probability be part of the curriculum experience for all students across grades preK-12. The Guidelines for Assessment and Instruction in Statistics Education (GAISE) (Franklin, et al., 2007) augment the NCTM’s recommendations by specifically addressing statistical ideas developmentally and especially with a focus on the nature of variability and its relationship to statistics. Both the NCTM’s recommendations and those detailed in GAISE, suggest the importance of the use of technology for supporting student learning of mathematical and statistical ideas as they explore the generation of statistical questions, collect and analyze data, and interpret and communicate results and conclusions. For this vision to be enacted in classrooms, critical to the mission is that teachers are equipped with personal understanding of statistical concepts and connections, and facility with tools for supporting the exploration of such concepts and connections by students. Teaching mathematics requires both common mathematical knowledge and specialized content knowledge in order to support students’ mathematical learning (Hill & Ball, 2004). Common mathematical knowledge may be considered as the type of knowledge developed in a mathematics class (e.g., know how to solve problems, computing correctly, using logical arguments), whereas specialized mathematical knowledge includes knowledge that teachers need to attend to the teaching of mathematics (e.g., multiple solution methods, constructing worthwhile mathematical tasks, recognizing and supporting student mathematical reasoning). Groth (2007) extended this work by proposing a framework for thinking about aspects of statistical knowledge for teaching. He differentiated between common and specialized statistical knowledge and within both, he accounted for mathematical and nonmathematical knowledge needed by teachers. While teaching statistics in a mathematics classroom context, teachers’ specialized content knowledge must allow them to connect statistical big ideas within the domain of mathematics while being sensitive to the stochastic versus deterministic differences of the disciplines, all the while understanding issues of student learning, curriculum, technology, equity, and assessment. Teachers’ professional preparation to support the advancement of students’ learning of data analysis and probability is likely inadequate (College Board of Mathematical Sciences, 2001; Madden, 2008). Though statistics has made its way into national curricular recommendations (e.g., NCTM, GAISE) and state level curriculum framework documents, a cursory examination of textbooks used in many schools reveals a strong disconnect between what visionary documents intend and the actual opportunities students have to learn statistics. When teachers hold procedural views of statistics, even when they read curricular recommendations, they may fail to fully appreciate what is really being asked of them. When their instructional resources further exacerbate this issue, teachers may believe that the familiar procedural approach to supporting students’ statistical understanding is appropriate.