Meet Bridges Author Pia Hansen!

Dear Readers and Mathematicians!

As a Montessori trained preschool teacher, I delighted in the inquiry approach to learning and celebrated the diversity in my multi-age preschoolers. When I started teaching in the public school, much of the inquiry vanished and in its place were workbooks, standards and assessments. I was using Math Their Way and soon discovered Box It! After a busy summer making 138 boxes, I was ready to meet the challenge of my multi-grade K-3 students. I appreciated the organization and systematic approach to learning key concepts and skills with a variety of materials in an engaging way. I became an instructor for Box It workshops and loved making new friends in faraway places. When Bridges was first available, I was reluctant to change. (I hate to admit this.)

In my first year with Bridges I implemented second grade. My teaching partners were very interested in adopting a new program and the following fall my K-2 team was all on board. We aligned each lesson to the standards and were confident that this was a comprehensive program that would meet the needs of all our students. I taught multi-grades for most of my public school career and helped teachers in my district write journal prompts and Performance Tasks with Rubrics (with Charlotte Danielson, published by Eye on Education) to meet our standards. I took a year out of the classroom to be a standards specialist and wrote another book about cross grade mentoring, Buddies. In 2002, I completed my National Board Certification as an Early Childhood Generalist. After several years of teaching workshops for Bridges, an email came, requesting authors for the grade three program materials. I remember the day as if it were yesterday. I thought to myself, "Hmmmm...I wonder who I know that would be good for this job?" DUH, my family replied...the Math Learning Center is asking YOU to apply!

The following year, I wrote from my home computer (sometimes in my pajamas), piloted lessons in third grade classrooms, and traveled to Portland bi-monthly to meet with field testers and editors, to glean their feedback and address the needs of their students. With substantial editing to do, I took another year out of the classroom to complete the program writing. I am forever indebted to Martha Ruttle, Sue Rawls, Allyn Fisher, and our field test cadre, for their collaborative work. It was for me, a treasured experience. Bridges is a unique curriculum because of the way it's developed, written and field tested by teachers, for their students.

Nowadays, I provide extensive preschool-grade 8 professional development in modeling lessons, assessing student work and content coaching. (Eye on Education published Mathematics Coaching Handbook in 2009.) My best days are spent on the floor with students at Number Corner and watching children share strategies for solving problems at the document camera.

I believe the Math Learning Center continues to be on the cutting edge, with their quick response to aligning the curriculum units and supplements to the new Common Core State Standards. Meeting the needs of students, using visual models and best practice continues to be MLC's mission. Many programs will tout they are aligned to the CCSS; Bridges is aligned to the content AND the Eight Mathematical Practices.

When I am not talking math, I enjoy spending time with my grand babies (one pictured above), hiking, traveling, and quilting.

Pia