The design and implementation of the professional development model of the New Zealand Numeracy Development Project has been successful in improving teacher knowledge and practice as well as raising student outcomes. Since 2000, more than 25,000 teachers in English-medium settings have participated in the project. In New Zealand the terms English-medium and Māori-medium are used to distinguish the language of instruction. settings have participated in the project. A content analysis across a large data set from evaluations conducted during the first four years of the project, identified three pedagogical tools that participants describe as improving their mathematics knowledge and practice: the number framework; the diagnostic interview; and the strategy teaching model. The article argues that the power of the professional development model lies in the integration of the three pedagogical tools ensuring that professional learning focuses on the core ideas of the project within the context of the teacher's classroom. This focus has enabled teachers to deepen their professional knowledge, change their instructional practice and improve their responsiveness to students' diverse learning needs.

The Numeracy Development Project has been heralded as an example of successful transformation of policy to practice. Evidence of raised student achievement and improved teacher knowledge has been reported for three consecutive years for the Early and Advanced Numeracy Projects (see Thomas & Ward, 2001, 2002; Thomas, Tagg, & Ward, 2003; Higgins, 2001, 2002a, 2003a for a full account). Major factors in the success of the implementation of this policy include on-going evaluation, a developing research base from the findings, and the promotion of the concept of a learning community. This article is a descriptive analysis of the Numeracy Development Project using Rist’s (1998) framing of the policy process and Patton’s theory of utilisation-focused evaluation. It discusses the different interdependent and interrelated aspects of policy formulation, implementation and evaluation that comprise a dynamic approach to the policy process.

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PurposeInstructional coaches are pivotal to articulating the agenda of system-wide reform, yet their role remains largely unexamined. Their approach with educators is contextually situated within the schooling system in which they work to reflect the historical and sociocultural system influences. Given the downward trend in New Zealand's international test scores for mathematics, it is timely to review the role of instructional coaches.Design/methodology/approachIn this paper, the authors draw on qualitative data derived from interviews with experienced coaches to investigate how they brokered the vision and pedagogy of a system-level reform in mathematics. Using a sensemaking lens we specifically examined the collective stories they employed as explanatory tools.FindingsThe analysis revealed that coaches drew on factors from school and classroom contexts of professional development practice and from collective beliefs about effective practice, alongside the project materials incorporated in the design of the project. System-level stories of reading reform influenced coaches' leadership of professional practice in implementing the New Zealand Numeracy Development Project, a progressively scaled-up professional learning and development initiative designed to improve teacher knowledge and pedagogy.Originality/valueThis paper highlights the critical importance of coaches' knowledge and expertise, the complexity of the implementation process and the coherence of the infrastructure that supports them in instructional reform.