Elementary School Mathematics Teachers Research Articles

By Way of Introduction: Extend an invitation

Share news about happenings in the field of elementary school mathematics education, views on matters pertaining to teaching and learning mathematics in the early childhood or elementary school years, and reactions to previously published opinion pieces or articles.

Matematik Öğretmen Adaylarının FATİH Projesi ve Matematik Eğitiminde Teknoloji Kullanımına Yönelik Görüşleri

FATİH Project is one of the most extensive movements on the way of integrating technology into schools. One crucial factor for FATİH Project to be successful is teachers who are the first degree practitioners of the Project. At this point, pre-service teachers who are the near future’s teachers need to know the requirements of the Project. Therefore, the necessity of providing trainings intending FATİH Project during undergraduate education is heated-debate to discuss. Another point under discussion is to provide domain specific (mathematics domain in this study) training for teachers. With this respect, the purpose of this study was to investigate pre-service mathematics teachers’ opinions about technology use and FATİH Project before and after given preparatory training towards it. The participants of this study with qualitative paradigm were composed of 15 pre-service elementary school mathematics teachers who were enrolled in the fourth grade in a public university. FATİH Project preparatory training was prepared according to the in-service training provided by Ministry of National Education for teachers and was designed in line with mathematics lessons specifically. This training lasted 10 weeks with practical applications. An open-ended opinion questionnaire was subjected to pre-service teachers before and after the training. In addition, each participant was interviewed. The findings gathered before and after training were compared. According to the results of the study, it was observed that the definitions of pre-service teachers for FATİH Project were deepened and they used concepts specific to mathematics lesson. In addition, they reported opinions about the positive, negative aspects of and applicability for the Project. Lastly, it was observed that pre-service teachers’ awareness towards technologies such as software, hardware and educational portals that were used specifically to mathematics increased in mathematics lessons.

Educational problems of mathematics education in elementary school in the teacher's eyes of junior high school

Educational problems of mathematics education in elementary school in the teacher's eyes of junior high school

The Evaluation of the Problem Solving in Mathematics Course According to Student Views

This study was conducted to determine the problem solving skills of the third grade students studying at the department of elementary school mathematics teaching. The study was conducted in the second semester of the academic year of 2015-2016. The study group consists of 47 third year student who study at Ondokuz Mayis University, Faculty of Education Elementary School Mathematics Teaching ad take the selective course of Problem Solving in Mathematics. Within the scope of this course, the researchers explained subjects related to problem and problem solving, problem solving skills and solved problems during the first 4 weeks of the course. For the rest of the weeks, the students were divided into groups. They have solved two non-routine problems each week for 8 weeks. The method of study is the interview method, which is one of the qualitative research methods. In light of the retrieved findings, the answers given by the students have been thematized as the stages of problem solving, understanding the problem, implementing the problem, evaluation of the problem, reasons for taking the courses, association problems, ways of finding different solutions, development of procedural skills, creating formulas, mathematical thinking, use of mathematical language, suitability of the course, views on problem solving, and the contribution of the course.

Common Core confusion about modeling

Share news about happenings in the field of elementary school mathematics education, views on matters pertaining to teaching and learning mathematics in the early childhood or elementary school years, and reactions to previously published opinion pieces or articles. Find detailed department submission guidelines at http://www.nctm.org/WriteForTCM.

Elementary Mathematics Teachers' Perceptions and Lived Experiences on Mathematical Communication

Mathematical thinking skills and meaningful mathematical understanding are among the goals of current mathematics education. There is a wide consensus among scholars about the purpose of developing mathematical understanding and higher order thinking skills in students. However, how to develop those skills in classroom settings is an area that still needs attention. Fostering mathematical communication in classroom settings is a strategy to develop students thinking skills by mathematical talk, discussion and activities. The purpose of the study is to explore teachers’ perceptions and lived experiences about using mathematical communication in their classrooms. The study is qualitative and employed a phenomenological approach to gain in-depth insight about the nature of mathematical communication in the classroom setting. Participants were experienced elementary school mathematics teachers. They discussed about the concepts associated with, strategies to enhance, purposes and benefits and application of mathematical communication as well as impact of mathematical communication on thinking skills, during the interviews. The findings are expected to provide a basis for discussion about using mathematical communication to foster students’ higher order thinking skills and mathematical understanding.

Evaluating Mathematics Curricular Resources

Readers share news about happenings in the field of elementary school mathematics education, views on matters pertaining to teaching and learning mathematics in the early childhood or elementary school years, and reactions to previously published opinion pieces or articles.

Teacher Performance Trajectories in High- and Lower-Poverty Schools

This study explores whether teacher performance trajectory over time differs by school-poverty settings. Focusing on elementary school mathematics teachers in North Carolina and Florida, we find no systematic relationship between school student poverty rates and teacher performance trajectories. In both high- (≥60% free/reduced-price lunch [FRPL]) and lower-poverty (<60% FRPL) schools, teacher performance improves the fastest in the first 5 years and then flattens out in years 5 to 10. Teacher performance growth resumes between year 10 and 15 in North Carolina but remains flat in Florida. In both school-poverty settings, there is a significant variation in teacher performance trajectories. Among novice and early-career teachers, the fastest-growing teachers (75th percentile) improve by 0.04 standard deviations more in student gain scores annually than slower teachers (25th percentile). In both school settings, novice teachers who started with low effectiveness also grew at a slower rate in the next 5 years than novice teachers with higher initial effectiveness. Our findings suggest that the lack of productivity “return” to experience in high-poverty schools reported in the literature is unlikely to be the result of differential teacher learning in high- and lower-poverty schools.

The Right Time to Start Writing

Readers share information on hot topics and current issues in the early childhood and elementary school mathematics education community. The journal community contributes perspectives on previously published TCM articles and editorials, and authors and other readers respond.

Öğrencilerin Çok Çözümlü Problemler ile İmtihanı: Çözümlerde Kullanılan Stratejilerin Belirlenmesi

Multiple solution tasks are defined as mathematical situations which can be proved in more than one way or as mathematical tasks that can be solved in more than one way so that students can reach the same result by using different methods. Multiple solution tasks, which support the development of students’ skills related to interrogation, reasoning, research and making comments, have a close relationship with the processes of mathematical thinking and creativity. The purpose of this study, which focuses on multiple solution tasks, was to determine different solution strategies used by students for multiple solution tasks. The participants of the study were 76 freshman students attending the department of Elementary School Mathematics Teaching. As the data collection tool, an open-ended test made up of two multiple solution tasks was used. The students were asked to solve each task in thirty minutes in as many ways as they could. Following this, clinical interviews were held with six students selected among all the participants. The data collected were analyzed qualitatively. The results revealed that most of the students found more ways of solution to the geometry task than the pattern-related task and that they did not find many/different ways for individual solutions for the tasks, though.

Promoting Exploratory Teaching in Mathematics: A Design Experiment on a CPD course for Teachers

In this paper we present a design experiment on a continued professional development (CPD) course for mathematics teachers. It consisted of three teaching cycles. Between them we analyzed the collected data in order to discover the factors affecting the course’s effectiveness and improve the next implementation. The general themes of the course, Introduction to Exploratory Learning in Mathematics, are teaching methods that promote active learning and exploratory learning environments. The course consists of one-day, on-site training and is aimed at elementary, middle and high school mathematics teachers. It is the first part of a larger CPD unit. We were especially motivated by the recent study of Stylianides & Stylianides (The Journal of Mathematical Behavior, 33 (1), 8–29) who proposed that even a very short intervention can impact positively on mathematical problem solving (attitudes) in initial elementary teacher training. Our main research question is thus to replicate and expand on their study: Can we impact positively on in-service teachers’ mathematical thinking over the course of a one-day seminar? In this article we describe the goals and implementation of our one-day course, some observations made during the implementations and conclusions. We replicate the findings of Stylianides and Stylianides (2014) that their “blond hair problem” makes a great impression on the participants. However, we found that the intervention did not have a substantial effect, at least in the short term, on what were considered good problems to use in an exploratory setting.

교사의 수업반성이 수학 수업에 주는 영향 - 수학적 과제의 인지적 수준을 중심으로 -

본 연구의 목적은 수학적 과제의 인지적 수준에 대한 교사의 수업반성이 수학 수업에 어떠한 영향을 주는지 분석하여 초등 교사의 수학 수업에 시사점을 제공하는 것이다. 이를 위해 수학 수업에서 과제 설정과 과제 실행단계 동안, 수학적 과제의 인지적 수준의 변화와 변화에 영향을 준 교실 요인을 분석하고, 이에 대한 수업반성을 거쳐 실시한 수학 수업에서 과제 설정과 과제 실행 단계동안, 수학적 과제의 인지적 수준의 변화 양상 및 변화에 영향을 준 교실 요인을 분석하였다. 그 결과, 수학적 과제의 인지적 수준이 쇠퇴했던 수학 수업이 수업반성을 통해 수학적 과제의 인지적 수준이 높게 유지하는 수학 수업으로 변화하였다. The purpose of this study is to offer the implication for elementary school mathematics teaching by analyzing teachers' reflection on the cognitive demands of mathematical tasks they give in class. During the setup phase and the implementation phase in math class, the researchers analyzed the change of cognitive demands on mathematical tasks and the factors which had influence on such changes. After teachers' reflection on teaching, the researchers analyzed the change of cognitive demands on mathematical tasks and the factors which had influence on such changes in math classes. As a result, before teachers' reflection on the cognitive demands of mathematical tasks, the higher-level demands of mathematical tasks had a tendency to decline. However, after teachers' reflection on the cognitive demands of mathematical tasks, higher-level demands of mathematical tasks were maintained.

TCM—Your Go-to Resource for Rich Tasks

Readers share news about happenings in the field of elementary school mathematics education, views on matters pertaining to teaching and learning mathematics in the early childhood or elementary school years, and reactions to previously published opinion pieces or articles.

Different modes in teachers' discussions of students' mathematical texts

The study aims to examine elementary school mathematics teachers' ways of discussing students' mathematical texts. Nineteen teachers were interviewed in groups and asked to discuss 15 texts. The object of study is the teachers' collective discussions, analyzed using a discourse analytic approach. Findings indicate that two different modes are visible in the discussions: a pedagogical mode, connected to the teachers' position as pedagogues and where identification of students' strategies is foregrounded, and an assessment mode, connected to the teachers' position as examiners, in which a deficiency perspective is adopted that views particular features as ‘missing’ from the texts.

An Analysis of Educational Faculty Students’ Research Self-efficacy in Terms of a Number of Variables

Enabling students to acquire the research abilities is an educational issue. The target of education is to raise individuals with research-oriented attitudes and behaviours. Sustaining the research activities requires that, in addition to the compatibility of research environments, individuals and institutions to conduct the research have the competence facilitating them to do the research. Therefore, the need was felt to determine educational faculty students’ levels of research self-efficacy. This research examines whether or not educational faculty students’ research self-efficacy differs on the basis of gender, university, department, and taking or not taking the Scientific Research Methods course. The research sample was composed of 532 volunteering students attending the Psychological Counseling and Guidance, Elementary School Mathematics Teaching, Science Teaching, and Computer and Teaching Technologies departments of the educational faculties of Amasya and Eskişehir Osmangazi Universities. The research data were obtained through a 43-item, 5-pointed Likert scale of Research Competence (Büyüköztürk, 1997), with a reliability coefficient of α=0,89. In the analysis of the data, the frequencies and the percentages for the variables were calculated, the one-way variance analysis (ANOVA) and the significance test for the difference between two averages (the t-test) were employed. When differences were found between the groups in consequence of the variance analysis, between which groups the differences were available was found via the Scheffe test. Consequently, it was found that educational faculty students’ research self-efficacy differed according to department, and to whether they took the Scientific Research Methods course; but that it did not differ according to gender or university.

Investigating Elementary School Mathematics Teachers’ Knowledge of Students about some Numbers

The study investigated the competence of elementary mathematics teachers’ knowledge of students about some numbers. Studies have shown that there are common misconceptions that students exhibit in dealing with numbers. This study wanted to determine how competent elementary teachers are in identifying and dealing with such students’ misconceptions. A sample of 30 teachers was randomly selected as participants in this study. The instrument for data collection was questionnaire designed for teachers to respond to through detail explanations in writing. Participants were presented with the problem situations and were expected to respond to the questions or tasks. The problem situations were a given problem and the hypothetical students’ solutions of the given problem. The study revealed that while some teachers were competent in addressing students’ misconceptions in the topic area, others had difficulties themselves in understanding the problem situations and the hypothetical students’ solutions.

A study on Teacher’s Perception of Humanity Education through Mathematics Education in Elementary School

A study on Teacher’s Perception of Humanity Education through Mathematics Education in Elementary School

Knowledge concerning the mathematical horizon: a close view

The main objective of this study is to identify components of teachers’ mathematical knowledge for teaching, associated with the knowledge of mathematical horizon (KMH) in order to describe this type of knowledge from the viewpoint of elementary school mathematics teachers. The research population of this study consisted of 118 elementary school mathematics teachers who responded to an open-ended questionnaire. Findings of this study illustrate that KMH can be considered as a separate category according to teachers’ voice. An analysis of teachers’ utterances resulted in three KMH characteristics: insight of subject matter, mathematical connections, and understanding of meta-mathematics.

English

The purpose of this study was to investigate the quantifier structuring processes of teacher candidates doing the Abstract Mathematics course of the Elementary School Mathematics Teaching program. Educational activities assisting the students’ structuring of quantifiers were provided through transitions between verbal (written) expressions and symbolic expression in open statements that contained first, second, and third order quantifiers. The data of this study, based on an APOS (Action, Process, Object, and Schema) theoretical framework, were obtained by using a problem form. This form consists of four questions on quantization prepared by the researcher to investigate the cognitive development of the students; clinical interviews were performed at the end of the study period with five students. At the end of the study, it was determined that the students were unable to fully understand expressions regarding first and high order quantifier structures, and that they developed opinions according to their own perceptions. Furthermore, important results were obtained during the study that demonstrated the level of comprehension of students regarding first, second, and third order quantifier structures. Key words: The quantifier concept, universal quantifier, existential quantifier, genetic decompositions, APOS.

Building a math Village: Developing Partnerships among School, Home, and Community

Share news about happenings in the field of elementary school mathematics education, views on matters pertaining to teaching and learning mathematics in the early childhood or elementary school years, and reactions to previously published opinion pieces or articles. Find detailed department submission guidelines at www.nctm.org/tcmdepartments.