Reshaping The "Glass Slipper": The Development of Reflective Practice by Mathematics Teachers Through Action Research

This article describes a professional development program designed to encourage middle and high school mathematics teachers to incorporate new classroom practices and to reflect on the effects of those practices. Two cohorts of mathematics teachers were guided to experiment with the practice of reflective inquiry through an action research (AR) process. In this article, we describe lessons we learned from teaching the AR process to Cohort 1. We then show how we altered the process for Cohort 2 by creating five predefined and required "mini-investigations" done through a "Cycle of Teaching and Inquiry Model" (CTIM). This model led to more frequent, more focused, and richer reflections by teachers, and to the development of better structured assessments. This process had transformative effects on teachers, students, and on our own learning.