Abstract
Most of the research examining the relation between instructional quality (INQUA) and mathematics teachers’ competence was restricted to a limited set of competence facets. Furthermore, mostly variable-oriented approaches were applied that assume homogeneity of teacher competence. In our study, teacher competence is conceptualized as a comprehensive multi-dimensional construct including a broad range of subject-specific and generic facets regarding mathematics teachers’ knowledge, skills and beliefs, all assessed in a standardized way with well-established instruments. In our person-oriented approach, applying latent profile analysis, we examined whether it was possible to identify subgroups of teachers with different competence profiles. These profiles were then related to the generic and subject-specific INQUA implemented. The exploratory study was carried out with 77 secondary mathematics teachers from Germany as part of the projects TEDS Instruct and TEDS Validate. The data revealed four competence profiles that differed quantitatively and qualitatively. The profiles were related to different types of INQUA, and the relations indicate a need of strong levels of knowledge and skills for high INQUA but a lesser relevance of learning beliefs related to the dynamic nature of mathematics. In addition, our results indicate a need of a stronger subject-specific operationalization of INQUA in contrast to previously dominating generic conceptualizations.
Highlights
The number of studies examining the relation between instructional quality (INQUA) implemented by mathematics teachers’ and these teachers’ competence has grown substantially over the course of the past decade
The means revealed that the 77 teachers included in this study had a slightly higher mean on the subject-specific competence facets MCK (M = 507) and M_PID (M = 507) than the full sample, and at the same time a lower mean on the two generic competence facets general pedagogical knowledge (GPK) (M = 485) and classroom management expertise (CME) (M = 494), and on the subject-specific facet MSpeed (M = 489)
Correlations between teachers’ cognitive competence facets were all positive and of moderate to medium size (r = 0.19–0.58*). Teachers in this sample agreed with learning beliefs related to a dynamic view on mathematics (M = 534) and rejected strongly learning beliefs related to a static view on mathematics (M = 374)
Summary
The number of studies examining the relation between instructional quality (INQUA) implemented by mathematics teachers’ and these teachers’ competence has grown substantially over the course of the past decade (see e.g., Hill et al 2008; Kaiser et al 2015; Kunter et al 2013). The study presented in this paper, which belongs to follow-up-studies of the international ‘Teacher Education and Development Study in Mathematics (TEDS-M)’, intends to fill parts of these research gaps. To this end, we gathered a broad range of standardized data about lower-secondary mathematics teachers’ competencies, observed several mathematics lessons of these teachers with a standardized observation protocol and applied an exploratory person-oriented analysis approach to these data.
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