ABSTRACT
Curriculum materials typically provide tasks and activities that constitute the instructional core for teachers and students in mathematics classrooms, especially in the United States. Curriculum materials also affect the sequencing of mathematics topics and influence the way that mathematical ideas and processes are made available to students. Because of their centrality to mathematics teaching and learning, curriculum materials have long been viewed as critical leveraging tools for instructional reform. The adoption of new curriculum materials, especially those designed to embody innovative ideas and practices, can catalyze changes in teachers’ instructional practice and enhance students’ opportunities to learn mathematics. A view of curriculum materials as levers for innovation led to ambitious curriculum development efforts during both the “new math” era of the 1960s (see Begle, 1973) and the so-called Standards-based curriculum development of the 1990s in response to the publication of Curriculum and Evaluation Standards for School Mathematics (National Council of Teachers of Mathematics [NCTM], 1989; see Senk & Thompson, 2003).
