Teachers’ Beliefs about Teaching Practices in the Context of Lesson Study and Open Approach

Abstract

This study aimed to explore teachers’ beliefs about teaching practices in the context of lesson study and Open Approach. Lesson Study and Open Approach have been introduced as innovations in 2 project schools in 2006, 1 project school in 2007, and 18 project schools in 2009. The target group consisted of 132 teachers from 21 project schools that had implemented lesson study and Open Approach to the teaching mathematics in their schools. The data were collected by 5-likert scale and open-ended questionnaire administered in 2011 academic year. The findings showed that there were 3 categories of beliefs about teaching practices related to lesson study and Open Approach which the teachers responded to the questionnaires. Those three categories were beliefs about teaching mathematics, beliefs about learning mathematics, and beliefs about social context, which are different from those of beliefs teachers had before entering the project. Teachers’ long-held beliefs such as the role of a teacher is to give lectures, to explain some examples, laws or formulas as prescribed in the textbooks hoping that would help their students to understand subject content and to memorize the laws or formulas, has been questioned by themselves. This allows teachers a space to provide their students to encounter problem solving and will accumulate new kind of teachers’ beliefs about teaching practices.