The goal of this study was to examine the three components of a laboratory class cycle that empowered teachers to change their teaching practices. Six teachers and their administrator in an elementary school in the southeastern United States participated in the study. All the teachers were interviewed, and their mathematics lessons were observed at the end of each cycle of laboratory classes. The study revealed how planning, observing, and critiquing mathematics lessons as a team assisted the teachers' learning and teaching. We identified opportunities for the teachers to experiment with different teaching approaches, and we found that support from the team and from the school were key factors for the laboratory class cycle to function effectively.

Mathematical creativity, an important goal in mathematics education, can be promoted through an integrated learning environment where students explore mathematics with other subject areas such as science, technology, engineering and art. Establishing such learning environments is not a trivial task. Therefore, this creates a need for the development of instructional resources promoting meaningful integration. This paper focuses on integration of the fields of mathematics and music. Beginning with some of the historical discoveries and views of the connections between mathematics and music, this paper attends to several musical concepts correlating to middle school mathematical content and then provides ideas for teaching.