Integrated Mathematics Interfaced With Science

This study is a description of a high school mathematical curriculum designed to implement the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics Standards. The curriculum is teacher written, application based, uses technology where appropriate, has students working in groups, and incorporates open‐ended problem solving. For one year, twenty‐two classrooms of mainly ninth‐grade students studied this new curriculum. Students took a pre‐ and post‐treatment attitude questionnaire, PSAT examination, and an authors written open‐ended end‐of‐the‐year assessment. A control group of six classes of ninth‐grade students also took the PSAT and the open‐ended End‐of‐Year Tasks. Paired t ‐tests found significant attitude improvement in experimental students' mathematical confidence. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) found no significant differences between experimental and control classes on the PSAT. Multivariate ANOVA found significant differences on the end‐of‐the‐year test favoring experimental classes. These results suggest that a Standards‐based curriculum can improve students' mathematics attitude and problem‐solving skills.