Internationally Recognized Keynote Speakers Build Bridges at National Conference

The theme of this year’s national Math Recovery Conference was “Building bridges to a child's mathematical future”. The three keynote speakers from around the globe provided a strong foundation to this theme.

Kicking off the conference was Dr. Penny Munn, a developmental psychologist at the University of Strathclyde, Scotland. Her presentation, Dynamic Assessment: Linking Assessment and Teaching Frameworks, invited participants to think of math education in a creative and developmental way. Just as students are changing and growing, so should the teaching framework be dynamic.

On Thursday, Dr. Les Steffe, a University of Georgia Distinguished Research Professor of mathematics education, presented an engaging keynote entitled, Children’s Initial Number Sequence: What Precedes and What Follows? His work and words really challenged conference attendees to think outside of the box and analyze the steps in children’s construction of the initial number sequence and ultimately their construction of self.

For the closing plenary, Dr. Bob Wright, Associate Professor in Mathematics Education from Southern Cross University in Australia, wrapped up the conference with his expertise and inspiration. As the developer of Math Recovery, Dr. Wright encouraged participants to investigate The Changing Face of Early Numeracy. Specifically, conference goers were sent home with motivation to investigate emerging topics in early number instruction and to be part of the direction of Math Recovery.

click here for handouts from the 2008 conference presentations

Click here for photos from the 2008 conference

Building bridges to a child's mathematical future

Click here for a PDF version of the 2008 Conference at a glance

Click here for a PDF versoin of the 2008 Pre-conference Seminar Descriptions

Sessions were targeted for a variety of audiences including: Elementary classroom teachers, Math Recovery teachers and leaders, School and district administrators, University teachers and those seeking information about Math Recovery and research-based elementary math programs.