MSU faculty share expertise at Mississippi Council of Teachers of Mathematics conference at The Mill at MSU

Contact: Bethany Shipp

STARKVILLE, Miss.—MSU College of Education faculty recently shared their expertise with more than 300 attendees at the Mississippi Council of Teachers of Mathematics conference.

Held at The Mill at MSU, the event drew math teachers, principals, district math supervisors, university faculty and pre-service teachers from across the state, including more than 50 MSU teacher education majors.

Rebecca Robichaux-Davis, College of Education associate dean of academics and professor of mathematics education, presented “Bringing JOY to the Mathematics Classroom” as the keynote speaker. During her address, she explained why joy in the classroom matters, what research on emotions says about the emotions that indicate joy, and the obstacles to joy that might be present in a mathematics classroom, notably fear of making a mistake and anxiety. Using the acronym Joke Observe Yip, she shared ways that JOY can be facilitated into the math classroom and gave attendees an opportunity to put it into practice through telling math jokes, making observations about skittles and playing with polygons. 

Robichaux-Davis ended her engaging keynote address with a quote from “The Joy of Mathematics” by Theoni Pappas:

“The joy of mathematics is similar to the experience of discovering something for the first time. It is an almost child-like feeling of wonder. Once you have experienced it, you will not forget that feeling.”

Fellow presenters from MSU’s Department of Teacher Education and Leadership included Liza Bondurant, professor of secondary mathematics education; Sarah Salisbury, assistant professor of elementary mathematics education; and Rebecca Kellum, elementary education instructor.

Bondurant presented “Cultivating Rehumanized Embodied Approaches to Education (CREATE) Math.” She also co-presented “Introducing the Math Narrative Project” alongside some of her students and Salisbury. Salisbury delivered “Using the CSA Approach to Teaching Fraction Comparison” and co-presented “Discovering Triangle Types Through Exploration” with Kellum. Additionally, ten MSU pre-service teachers facilitated a session on math games led by Jennifer Crissey, a two-time MSU College of Education alumna and conference program chair.

“This year’s MCTM conference was full of excitement and joy as attendees from across the state learned new pedagogical approaches that could be implemented in their classrooms immediately,” Robichaux-Davis said. “The energy and passion for mathematics teaching of the attendees was apparent and inspiring. Congratulations to Dr. Crissey for her outstanding work as the conference program chair.” 

MSU’s College of Education is home to five academic departments, a division of education, one research unit and numerous service units. Learn more at www.educ.msstate.edu.

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