Debra Coggins

Debra Coggins is a mathematics education consultant and author specializing in strategies to support English learners in mathematics classrooms. She has advised school districts, coached teachers, and designed and delivered professional development focused on standards-based math instruction and language development for multilingual learners. Her work includes helping develop professional development programs such as CORE Math: Building Strong Foundations, contributing to the Math Case Methods Project and Math Pathways & Pitfalls at WestEd, and coordinating the writing of A Mathematics Source Book for Elementary and Middle School Teachers: Key Concepts, Teaching Tips, and Learning Pitfalls.

Coggins is the author of English Learners in the Mathematics Classroom (originally published as English Language Learners in the Mathematics Classroom), a research-based resource offering strategies to build mathematical understanding and academic vocabulary for English learners, and aligning math instruction with standards such as the Common Core. She has 17 years of K–12 teaching experience and has presented at local, state, and national conferences, with particular interests in supporting English learners and in the use of diagrams to teach operations and proportional reasoning.