Distance Training of Mathematics Teachers: The EarlyStatistics Experience

Abstract

The affordances offered by modern Internet technologies provide new opportunities for the pre-service and in-service training of mathematics teachers, making it possible to overcome the restrictions of shrinking resources and geographical locations, and to offer, in a cost-effective and non-disruptive way, high-quality learning experiences to geographically dispersed teachers. This article focuses on how information and communication tools made available online could be exploited effectively to help improve the quality and efficiency of teacher training in statistics education. First, it describes the main pedagogical issues and challenges underlying distance education in general, and online teacher training in particular. Then, it provides an overview of EarlyStatistics, an online professional development course in statistics education targeting European elementary and middle school teachers, and the main lessons learned from the pilot delivery of it. The article concludes with some instructional implications.