The Effect of a Calculator Training Workshop for High School Teachers on their Students' Performance on Florida State-Wide Assessments

摘要

This paper details the motivation, background, and analysis for studying the effect that an Increasing Achievement on Algebra Assessment (IAAA) workshop for a group of Florida high school teachers had on student performance in statewide testing. The main focus of the workshop was to provide participating teachers with both instruction and activities related to problem-solving techniques using the TI-83 Plus handheld graphing calculator that the teachers could then use in an effort to better prepare their students for state-wide testing. Overall, students (n = 328) who were taught by IAAA-trained teachers between consecutive annual statewide assessments had a greater gain in test scores than students (n = 202) who were taught by non-trained teachers. In particular, the data indicates a significant increase in scores for students taught by IAAA-trained teachers in a general mathematics course, as compared to no significant increase in scores for students taking that same course taught by non-trained teachers.