Statement of Honor:

"We, the Meredith Community, are committed to developing and affirming in each student a sense of personal honor and responsibility. Uncompromising honesty and forthrightness are essential elements of this commitment. The Honor System is a method by which individual honors are protected and maintained. Any dishonorable action will be regarded as a violation of this commitment, and corrective action will be taken.

"If I am in violation of the Honor Code, to prevent jeopardizing the Honor System or weakening our system of self-government, I have an obligation to report myself to the proper authorities. If I am aware of a violation of the Honor System by another student, I shall call this matter to the attention of the student as a violation of responsibility to the community.

"In choosing Meredith College, I am accepting the Honor System as a way of life. As a Meredith student, I am responsible for insuring that the Honor System is at all times carried out."

I will expect you to sign and to commit all of your work products to scrutiny of this pledge.

In class, I will clearly identify which types of work products are intended to represent independent work or collaborative work.

Attendance Policy

• The College Policy is that "each student is expected to be regular and prompt in her attendance at all classes."
• In this course, you are expected to attend all classes. The material in the course is cumulative by nature rather than topically discrete. Moreover, in this course, you will be expected to work both independently as well as collaboratively with other course members. That imparts a responsibility to each individual to be present in class and to prepare accordingly.
• If it becomes necessary for you to miss a class, it is your responsibility to be prepared for the next class period. The course website will have reading and homework assignments as well as due dates posted. If you miss a class due to illness, I am willing to work with you to help you with work missed.
• It is your responsibility to contact me prior to any absences. If you need to miss a class to represent the College, you should be able to notify me well in advance. If you need to miss a class due to illness, contact me via phone or email prior to class if at all possible.
• In the case of inclement weather, if the College is open officially, then class will be held. Commuter students should not take any life threatening risks to come to class; such an absence will be excused. In case of class cancellations resulting from inclement weather, the college will run public announcements on the radio station, MIX 101.5 FM and the television station, WRAL Channel 5 (Channel 3 on cable).

I expect that you maintain a "notebook" for this course, but not the traditional hard-copy notebook. On the course website, there will be a folder established for each person enrolled in the course. It is expected that you submit all of your assignments and other coursework by dropping them into this folder. In class, we will cover the submission procedure to do so. Throughout the course, the instructors will peruse the folders periodically to see that you are maintaining its contents regularly--keeping your assignments up-to-date and keeping it well-organized and neat.

In order for ease of reading and opening all such assignments, it is expected that all assignments will be submitted in HTML format. If you are not an HTML-savvy person, do not fret. From the beginning of the course, we will review how to use popular HTML editors such as Netscape Composer and Macromedia Dreamweaver. These editors allow you to create HTML documents in WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) mode and will assist you in learning the "innerworkings" of HTML gradually.

Collaborative Community-wide Course Requirements

15%	Community Participation & Professionalism
	In this course, attendance is not only mandatory; it is a necessity! To learn about and to gain experience in the endeavor of teaching and learning mathematics, one must interact with other students and teachers of mathematics. Helping others learn mathematics is not merely a skill, much less one that can be learned in isolation—it is a culmination of both intellectual and pragmatic understanding of people and of mathematics. This is gained from "fleshing out of ideas and understandings" with other teachers and other students of mathematics. All absences must be excused in advance if at all possible. If illness or emergencies occur, please notify the instructor as soon as possible and follow college guidelines about such situations.
15%	NCTM Standards Project and Textbook Evaluation
	In a group setting, you will work with your colleagues to "unpack" the content and process standards in the NCTM Principles & Standards document. You will each create and present one exemplary lesson for secondary school mathematics that reflects the spirit of the standards recommendation in that content strand. Along with your colleagues, you will examine a section of a chosen textbook for mathematical richness, usefulness, accessibility, ability to stand alone, and relation to Standards. You will then write a 2 to 3 page review of its strengths and weaknesses, and identify supplementary materials that could be used with the text.
20%	Unit Plan
	Along with a colleague(s), you will outline a unit of study for secondary or middle school mathematics that is consistent with the NCTM and statewide standards. The unit will cover approximately 3-4 weeks of mathematics, including overall scope/purpose, general activities, objectives, time line, materials, and assessment. The unit plan will be contained entirely online and accessible to your peers for their future use.

Individual Course Requirements

In addition to your membership in a community of teachers and learners, you will be expected to continue your individual development as a mathematics educator. Besides readings and discussions, there will be several mathematics activities and explorations during the class. You will be expected to complete several mathematics activities during the semester, and you will have the opportunity to develop lesson activities and lesson plans. All of the assignments in this course will contribute to your individual development and will offer you a variety of artifacts to include in your portfolio to demonstrate movement towards professional teacher standards.

15%	Meta-lessons Reflective Journal Online
	"Meta-lesson" is a term I (Tim Hendrix) coined several years ago when trying to describe what would be an appropriate entry for a class reflective journal. Literally, it means "lesson behind the lesson." In this course, I ask that you complete a reflective journal of meta-lessons with an entry for each week. Usually, one healthy paragraph or approximately 1/2 page is sufficient. It is difficult to prescribe someone's reflection! Maybe your day's entry might be directly on the discussion or activities from that day's class. Perhaps, it was something more "behind the scenes." An example? Suppose we were doing a math activity in class one day in groups, and something about the way we formed groups or the dynamic of your group interaction struck you as important information about teaching/learning. That would be an appropriate "meta-lesson"--we probably didn't discuss those issues in class explicitly, but the reflections we have about the "background" issues are often what we remember and employ in our own teaching. We will expect to see that regular attention to maintaining these meta-lessons will be evident in your folders. Name the files transparently, i.e., "metalesson8-21.html" would be the meta-lesson for August 21. Cardinal rule of HTML filenames: Use only lowercase letters, numbers, & dashes or underscores. Do not use blank spaces in filenames.
15%	Individual Written Assignments, Lesson Plans, and Class Presentations
	Throughout the course, there will be a steady stream of mathematics activities assignments, reaction and position papers, lesson activities development, and mini-presentation of activities in class. Due to the nature of the course, many will be assigned on one class day and due the next day. Others will take more than one class session to complete.
20%	Final Unit Plan Project and Presentation
	Your final project in this course will be to develop a short unit of instruction that covers approximately 2 weeks of material. In this unit, you will need to provide a timeline, unit overview, individual lesson plans and all related activity materials, as well as assessment activities and materials. Greater details will be given in class and on the course website by the beginning of October. This unit could (and should) be coordinated with your field placement so that it will be of use to you in student teaching. You will have the opportunity to teach one lesson from the unit to mathematics department peers at the end of the semester or during finals week. The choice of that lesson will be negotiated with the instructor.

Additional information on each of the assignments will be provided throughout the course.

Evaluation and Related Course Policies

A core assumption of this course is that all enrolled participants will bring both an open mind and a critical attitude to their work. Openness in this situation refers to a willingness to consider teaching in settings and grades beyond one's first preferences, as well as to the capacity to find hidden opportunities in assignments, individuals, and settings whose parameters and/or apparent limitations were not expected. A critical attitude refers to the capacity to see both the strengths and weaknesses of practices and situations while still withholding judgment on them. It also refers to the capacity to evaluate and question one's own assumptions and past experiences. Students whose comments, interactions with others, and written work all display evidence of openness and a critical attitude will be favorably evaluated.

Another core assumption of this course is that all participants are responsible adults capable of interacting with each other and with secondary students and school personnel in a professional and responsible manner; of being on time for class and field experiences; of being appropriately dressed; and of being prepared. Be aware that if you do not conduct yourself in a responsible, professional manner, or if you are late for class or field experiences or are absent without notice or excuse, you risk your grade and your standing, not only in this course, but most likely in the program as well.

Late assignments will be accepted only with pre-approved consent of the instructor.

Grades will be based on the following general rubric. These qualitative guidelines are associated with percentage weights, and these parameters are given on the course website.

• Consistent, timely preparation and attendance, thoughtful and substantial contributions to discussions and presentations, and well-written and solidly analytic papers/products will result in an "A."
• Consistent preparation and attendance, occasional contributions to discussions and presentations, and papers/products that "cover" a topic will result in a "B."
• Inconsistencies in preparation and attendance, occasional contributions to discussions and presentations, and "thin" papers/products (in length or substance or both) will result in a "C."
• Failure to attend class regularly or contribute to discussions and presentations, coming to class unprepared, and writing in a manner completely unacceptable for someone with senior standing at this college will result in a "D" or an "F," depending on circumstances and the extent of deficiencies.