Even though K-12 mathematics educators have embraced the role of graphing calculators and computers, student use of technology in tertiary mathematics has been slow to implement in the USA context. Enter March 2020, a global health crisis, and the shift to online and remote learning. The immediate and dramatic cessation of in-person modes of instruction was experienced at all levels of education and in all disciplines. With respect to tertiary mathematics, student use of instructional technology shifted from optional use of homework websites, digital discussion boards and flipped classrooms to an absolute necessity to support student participation in mathematics courses. Our research group has been studying the process of departmental change towards active learning in the undergraduate calculus sequence. During the COVID-19 pandemic, we worked with twenty-three university mathematics departments in the United States as part of a Networked Improvement Community (NIC). During the pandemic, we observed the adaptation of instructional practices to sustain student interaction in remote virtual environments. This paper highlights changes observed within our NIC regarding attempts to sustain active learning during the global pandemic. In addition, a NIC can provide the necessary community for grappling with challenging problems at any time.

Actively engaging students in learning mathematics is crucial to student success and equitable teaching and learning. Yet, this practice requires instructors to shift teaching strategies, which is not easily accomplished, particularly by themselves. In this chapter, we report on a longitudinal study of mathematics departments in the process of shifting department norms and practices in support of active learning and inclusive teaching. The research-informed change efforts have drawn on theories of institutional change and Networked Improvement Communities (Bryk AS, Gomez L, Grunow A, LeMahieu P. Learning to improve: how America's schools can get better at getting better. Harvard Education Publishing, 2015). Data include interviews with tertiary mathematics instructors, course coordinators, department chairs, deans, other campus administrators, and students, as well as document analyses. Analyses of the data from three institutions, through the lens of networked improvement communities, reveal that some of the most important drivers of change related to institutional change to enact active learning are shared tools and resources, professional development, policies and structures, and connections across a network to other mathematics departments engaged in similar efforts.

The history of Realistic Mathematics Education (RME) in the United States has positioned teachers at the centre of innovation from its early years to present day. From the first proof-of-concept study at a high school in Milwaukee to localised professional development opportunities, the application and spread of RME is best characterised as a teacher-centred approach to principled reconsideration of how students learn mathematics. Such reconsideration of beliefs and conceptions is often motivated when teachers re-experience mathematics through the lens of progressive formalisation and related didactic approaches. Through a series of cases that articulate teacher interpretation and application of RME in U.S. classrooms, we highlight how teacher participation has led to greater exploration of student-centred practices. These efforts, while inspired and supported by professional development and curricula, have been inspired and sustained by teachers who provide colleagues a proof-of-concept in local contexts.

This paper compares student outcomes from 75 K-12 teachers who participated in either online, blended, or face-to-face professional development design to support teacher implementation of a programming curriculum during the regular school day. The results are based on survey responses collected over two years from 4,832 students. With only one exception, the results showed no negative student outcomes when comparing student survey results from teachers who participated in online professional development compared to students of teachers who participated in face-to-face professional development. Students who had teachers who participated in face-to-face professional development, however, expressed stronger interest in designing their own games at home. These results suggest that online professional development that is designed to support K-12 teacher classroom implementation of CS education curricula is a viable model with respect to student outcomes. Recommendations for the design of online curricula for CS education are discussed.

Through the transformation of undergraduate STEM courses, the Colorado Learning Assistant Program recruits and prepares talented STEMmajors for careers in teaching by providing them with early, sustained teaching experiences. The research reported here compares teaching practices of K-12 teachers who served as learning assistants (LAs) as undergraduates to colleagues that were certified through the same teacher certification program but did not serve as LAs. Observations of teacher practices revealed that former LAs used significantly more reformed teaching practices than their colleagues, especially in their first year of teaching. These results suggest the LA Program serves as a valuable supplement to traditional teacher certification programs.

This paper summarizes findings from a Student Motivation Survey (SMS) developed to monitor students' dispositions toward CS education. This survey was administered as part of the iDREAMS project, which involved creating in-school computer programming opportunities for middle school students. The analysis reported here is based on survey responses collected over 3.5 years from 2,473 girls and 3,247 boys. Results include students' use of technology, computer courses completed, and dispositions towards CS education. Our findings reveal several significant differences between boys and girls regarding their use of technology and dispositions toward CS education.

A study of 48 completed Frogger games created by middle school students using the Scalable Game Design curriculum were studied to determine how completion rates varied based on race and gender. Results to a student survey administered to the same sample was also analyzed to compare those who completed fully functioning games to those whose games were not fully functioning. Overall, 67% of the girls, and 50% of minority students submitted fully functioning games; however, African American and Hispanic/Latino boys had lower completion rates. Survey results provide some insight to factors that may influence who submits a fully functioning game. Students' whose games were not fully functioning were less likely to see themselves as computer problem solvers, and were less likely to they see themselves pursuing computer classes in the future.

An educated citizenry that participates in and contributes to science technology engineering and mathematics innovation in the 21st century will require broad literacy and skills in computer science (CS). School systems will need to give increased attention to opportunities for students to engage in computational thinking and ways to promote a deeper understanding of how technologies and software are used as design tools. However, K-12 students in the United States are facing a broken pipeline for CS education. In response to this problem, we have developed the Scalable Game Design curriculum based on a strategy to integrate CS education into the regular school curriculum. This strategy includes opportunities for students to design and program games and science technology engineering and mathematics simulations. An approach called Computational Thinking Pattern Analysis has been developed to measure and correlate computational thinking skills relevant to game design and simulations. Results from a study with more than 10,000 students demonstrate rapid adoption of this curriculum by teachers from multiple disciplines, high student motivation, high levels of participation by women, and interest regardless of demographic background.

This article presents several of the challenges facing postsecondary mathematics education and describes how the undergraduate Learning Assistant (LA) program has been used as a catalyst to engage faculty and students in redesigning opportunities to learn mathematics. Characteristics of the LA program that have been used to transform introductory undergraduate science courses are discussed. We then describe how the LA program was implemented in a mathematics department vis-à-vis the specific contextual features of a mathematics department at the University of Colorado Boulder.

This paper describes our large reformed introductory physics course at UC Davis, which bioscience students have been taking since 1996. The central feature of this course is a focus on sense-making by the students during the five hours per week discussion/labs in which the students take part in activities emphasizing peer-peer discussions, argumentation, and presentations of ideas. The course differs in many fundamental ways from traditionally taught introductory physics courses. After discussing the unique features of CLASP and its implementation at UC Davis, various student outcome measures are presented showing increased performance by students who took the CLASP course compared to students who took a traditionally taught introductory physics course. Measures we use include upper-division GPAs, MCAT scores, FCI gains, and MPEX-II scores.

Visual programming in 3D sounds much more appealing than programming in 2D, but what are its benefits? Here, University of Colorado Boulder educators discuss the differences between 2D and 3D regarding three concepts connecting computer graphics to computer science education: ownership, spatial thinking, and syntonicity.

The role of autonomy in the student experience in a large-enrollment undergraduate introductory physics course was studied from a self-determination theory perspective. A correlational study investigated whether certain aspects of the student experience correlated with how autonomy supportive (versus controlling) students perceived their instructors to be. An autonomy-supportive instructor acknowledges students' perspectives and feelings and provides students with information and opportunities for choice while minimizing external pressures (e.g., incentives or deadlines). It was found that the degree to which students perceived their instructors as autonomy supportive was positively correlated with student interest and enjoyment in learning physics (beta = 0.31***) and negatively correlated with student anxiety about taking physics (beta = -0.23**). It was also positively correlated with how autonomous (versus controlled) students' reasons for studying physics became over the duration of the course (i.e., studying physics more because they wanted to versus had to; beta = 0.24***). This change in autonomous reasons for studying physics was in turn positively correlated with student performance in the course (beta= 0.17*). Additionally, the degree to which students perceived their instructors as autonomy supportive was directly correlated with performance for those students entering the course with relatively autonomous reasons for studying physics (beta = 0.25**). In summary, students who perceived their instructors as more autonomy supportive tended to have a more favorable motivational, affective, and performance experience in the course. The findings of the present study are consistent with experimental studies in other contexts that argue for autonomy-supportive instructor behaviors as the cause of a more favorable student experience.

This study examines two weeklong implementations of technology-enhanced mathematics units. Pre and post-survey data, student interviews, audio and video recordings of classroom sessions, and participation log data were collected and analyzed using quantitative and qualitative methods. Constructs measured included self-efficacy in mathematics and computers, triggered and maintained interest, future pursuits, and engagement. Survey constructs were verified using factor analysis procedures, and t-tests and effect sizes were calculated for pre and post-survey differences of means. Further analysis using ANCOVA and mixed ANOVA procedures examined constructs and sub-populations flagged as potentially having statistically significant differences of means. No statistically significant differences were found between pre and post-survey means for any construct or population of students. Students reported high self-efficacy and interest in both mathematics and computer use overall on both surveys. Analysis of interview and observation data found evidence of students' interest states shifting from triggered to maintained situational interest during the course of unit implementation. Students with repeated exposure to the Simulations in Statistics units were more likely to show evidence of transitioning interest states. Analysis of participation logs showed that, on average, students were highly engaged throughout the units. Engagement rates did not differ by gender, but the nature of engagement did. Female students engaged in more collaborative behavior, while male students engaged in more independent work and off-task behaviors. Two teachers simultaneously implemented the units in two separate computer labs. The learning environments in these two labs were different: one emphasized collaborative work and student self-directed use of online wiki and tutorial resources; the other teacher did not. In the collaborative focused lab, a larger percentage of behavior was on-task for all students, especially female students. The learning environment was critical to the engagement of female students. Latino/a students reported lower self-efficacy beliefs than white students especially in mathematics. Participation in these units gave students the opportunity to develop new self-efficacy beliefs in math and computer use in this context. These findings inform research efforts to increase interest and motivation for women and people of color to pursue STEM related careers.

The physics instruction at UC Davis for life science majors takes place in a long-standing reformed large-enrollment physics course in which the discussion/lab instructors (primarily graduate student teaching assistants) implement the interactive-engagement (IE) elements of the course. Because so many different instructors participate in disseminating the IE course elements, we find it essential to the instructors professional development to observe and document the student-instructor interactions within the classroom. Out of this effort, we have developed a computerized real-time instructor observation tool (RIOT) to take data of student-instructor interactions. We use the RIOT to observe 29 different instructors for five hours each over the course of one quarter, for a total of about 150 hours of class time, finding that the range of instructor behaviors is more extreme than previously assumed. In this paper, we introduce the RIOT and describe how the variation present across 29 different instructors can provide students in the same course with significantly different course experiences.

The Colorado Learning Assistant (LA) Program serves as a content-specific supplement to standard teacher preparation programs. In addition to transforming undergraduate STEM courses, it recruits and prepares math and science majors for teaching careers by involving university STEM faculty. The research reported here compares the teaching practices of in-service teachers who participated in the LA experience as undergraduates to a comparison group of teachers who did not participate in the LA program as undergraduates but were certified to teach through the same program. We report on teachers' views of assessments and differences in their teaching practices. This analysis is based on interviews with approximately 30 teachers and observations of their classrooms throughout their induction years of teaching. This work considers how the LA program may help improve current teacher preparation models.

End-user game design tools are effective in motivating and exposing students with no prior programming experience to computer science. However, while there is good evidence that these environments are effective motivators, the question remains what do students actually learn? For our purposes, using AgentSheets, we would like to know if students can apply the knowledge obtained from programming games to creating science simulations. Specifically, we want to better understand if students are able to recognize Computational Thinking Patterns (CTP) from their game programming experience. Computational Thinking Patterns are abstract programming patterns that enable agent interactions not only in games but also in science simulations. Students and teachers who participated in a game design summer institute were administered a Computational Thinking Pattern Quiz (CTP Quiz). This quiz tested the participants' ability to recognize and understand patterns in a context removed from game programming. We found that participants, for the most part, were able to understand and recognize the patterns in a variety of contexts