Every April, we observe Mathematics and Statistics Awareness month to increase public understanding of math and stats and to celebrate the unique role that math and stats play in solving critical real-world problems. In that spirit, we want to share some exciting progress that SEERNet has made in supporting math education research over the past three years.
In 2021, IES established SEERNet, a network of platform developers, researchers, and education stakeholders, to create and expand the capacity of digital learning platforms (DLPs) to enable equity-focused and rigorous education research at scale. Since then, SEERNet has made significant progress, and we are starting to see examples of how researchers can use this new research infrastructure.
Recently, IES held two rounds of a competition to identify research teams to join SEERNet to conduct a study or series of studies using one of the five DLPs within the SEERNet network. Two research teams joined the network from the first round, and the second round of applications are now under review. We want to highlight the two research teams that joined SEERNet and the important questions about math education that they are addressing.
- Now I See It: Supporting Flexible Problem Solving in Mathematics through Perceptual Scaffolding in ASSISTments – Dr. Avery Closser and her team are working with the E-Trials/ASSISTments team. ASSISTments is a free tool to support math learning, which has been used by over 1 million students and 30,000 teachers across the nation. IES has supported its development and efficacy since 2003. E-Trials is the tool that researchers can use to develop studies to be implemented within ASSISTments. The research team's studies are designed to test whether perceptual scaffolding in mathematics notation (for example, using color to highlight key terms such as the inverse operators in an expression) leads learners to pause and notice structural patterns and ultimately practice more flexible and efficient problem solving. This project will yield evidence on how, when, and for whom perceptual scaffolding works to inform classroom practice, which has implications for the development of materials for digital learning platforms.
- Investigating the Impact of Metacognitive Supports on Students' Mathematics Knowledge and Motivation in MATHia – Dr. Cristina Zepeda and her team are working with the Upgrade/MATHia team. MATHia is an adaptive software program used in middle and high schools across the country. UpGrade is an open-source A/B testing platform that facilitates randomized experiments within educational software, including MATHia. The research team will conduct a series of studies focused on supporting students' metacognitive skills, which are essential for learning in mathematics but not typically integrated into instruction. The studies will seek to identify supports that can be implemented during mathematics learning in MATHia that improve metacognition, mathematics knowledge, and motivation in middle school.
Both research teams are conducting studies that will have clear implications for curriculum design within DLPs focused on math instruction for K-12 students. The value of conducting these studies through existing DLPs rather than through individual researcher-designed tools and methods includes—
- Time and cost savings – Without the need to create materials from scratch, the research teams can immediately get to work on the specific instructional features they intend to test. Additionally, since the intervention and pre/post assessments can be administered through the online tool, the need to travel to study sites is reduced.
- Access to large sample sizes – Studies like the ones described above are frequently administered in laboratory settings or in a handful of schools. Since over 100k students use these DLPs, there is the potential to recruit a larger and more diverse sample of students for studies. This provides more opportunities to study what works for whom under what conditions.
- Tighter feedback loops between developers and researchers – Because the research teams need to work directly with the platform developers to administer their studies, the studies need to be designed in ways that will work within the platform and with the platform content. This ensures their relevance to the platform and means that the platform developers will be knowledgeable about what is being tested. They will be interested to hear the study's findings and likely to use that information to inform future design decisions.
We look forward to seeing how other education researchers take advantage of this new research infrastructure. For math education researchers in particular, we hope these two example projects inspire you to consider how you might use a DLP in the future to address critical questions for math education.
This blog was written by Erin Higgins (Erin.Higgins@ed.gov), Program Officer, Accelerate, Transform, Scale Initiative.
