Education Commons^™

Mathematical Mindsets: Fostering Student Engagement And Positive Mindsets Through The Use Of Challenging Tasks, Alison Hall

2021-2030 ACER Research Conferences

This paper explores the planned use of challenging mathematical tasks. These tasks provide the opportunity for students to improve mathematical thinking by working on problems that they do not yet know how to answer. This research involved a heterogeneous class of year 3 students from a Catholic parish primary school in the northern suburbs of Melbourne. A rubric was also developed to use in conjunction with these tasks, to support discussions with students, broaden their strategies in finding solutions and thereby improve their conceptual understanding. These pedagogical approaches were found to support the improvement of both students’ conceptual understanding in …

Karmel Oration: Excellent Progress For All: A Function Of Year-Level Curriculum Or Evidenced-Based Learning Progressions?, Dianne Siemon

2021-2030 ACER Research Conferences

Excellent progress for all students is an ambitious but necessary goal if we are to improve the life choices of all students. At the moment, we are not serving all our students well despite the best efforts of teachers. We need to look further afield to the curriculum and assessment regimes that drive current practice. Grouping students by ability and offering a watered-down curriculum for some is not the answer. Evidenced-based learning progressions that point to what is important in ensuring all students build a deep, well-connected understanding of mathematics over time is what is needed to support reform at …

Mathematics Anxiety: Supplementary Materials, Sarah Buckley

Student learning processes

This publication contains two professional development activities for teachers which focus on mathematics anxiety. One is a team-based activity and the other is an activity for individuals. The activities encourage both mathematics teachers and non-mathematics teachers to reflect on their current practice, their attitudes towards mathematics, their ideas about teaching mathematics and the mathematical beliefs of students.

Mathematics Anxiety, Sarah Buckley

Student learning processes

This Mathematics Monograph is focussed on helping teachers and school leaders gain a better understanding of: How mathematics anxiety negatively impacts learning and teaching; the symptoms, causes and companions of mathematics anxiety; the difference between reducing mathematics anxiety directly and indirectly; and strategies that can identify and address mathematics anxiety in students and teachers. The Monograph is intended to present information for reflecting and planning how mathematics anxiety can be reduced and regulated in classrooms and in the school community.

Critical Connections Between Numeracy And Mathematics: Supplementary Materials, Dave Tout

Student learning processes

This publication contains three professional development activities targeted at teachers of mathematics. The activities for both groups and individuals focus on the challenge of word problems in maths and connecting maths to the real world. Also included are references, materials and resources related to the issue of the connections between numeracy and mathematics.

Tackling Maths Anxiety, Divya Kapoor

Teacher India

Maths anxiety is one of the leading causes of poor performance in maths. Divya Kapoor discusses simple instructional strategies to help teachers support students suffering from maths anxiety.

Learning Context Matters In Maths Performance, Jeny Raphael

Teacher India

PISA collects background information to understand contextual factors that affect the performance of students. Building on the evidence, Jeny Raphael discusses the impact of the learning environment on the character strengths of students, and its connection to their maths performance.

The Gentle Man Who Taught Infinity, Sheshagiri K.M. Rao

Teacher India

Sheshagiri KM Rao describes the non-conventional teaching methods of his high school mathematics teacher Channa who helped students to discover the beauty in mathematics.

Thinking Maths: Learning Impact Fund Evaluation Report: Addendum To The Evaluation Report, Katherine Dix, Hilary Hollingsworth, Toby Carslake

Dr Hilary Hollingsworth

Thinking Maths is a three-term structured professional learning program for Years 6 - 9 mathematics teachers to engage middle school students’ mathematics learning. The Thinking Maths program has been developed by the South Australian Department for Education based on its Teaching for Effective Learning (TfEL) Framework. The program aims to address a significant drop in students’ mathematics performance in NAPLAN from Years 7 to Year 9. Thinking Maths supports teachers to improve students’ learning of mathematical content during the transition between Primary and Secondary school. Years 6 - 9 teachers participate in five professional learning days at 4 - 5 …

Thinking Maths: Learning Impact Fund Evaluation Report: Evaluation Report And Executive Summary, Katherine Dix, Hilary Hollingsworth, Toby Carslake

Dr Hilary Hollingsworth

Thinking Maths is a three-term structured professional learning program for Years 6 - 9 mathematics teachers to engage middle school students’ mathematics learning. The Thinking Maths program has been developed by the South Australian Department for Education based on its Teaching for Effective Learning (TfEL) Framework. The program aims to address a significant drop in students’ mathematics performance in NAPLAN from Years 7 to Year 9. Thinking Maths supports teachers to improve students’ learning of mathematical content during the transition between Primary and Secondary school. Years 6 - 9 teachers participate in five professional learning days at 4 - 5 …

Thinking Maths: Learning Impact Fund Evaluation Report: Addendum To The Evaluation Report, Katherine Dix, Hilary Hollingsworth, Toby Carslake

Dr Katherine Dix

Thinking Maths is a three-term structured professional learning program for Years 6 - 9 mathematics teachers to engage middle school students’ mathematics learning. The Thinking Maths program has been developed by the South Australian Department for Education based on its Teaching for Effective Learning (TfEL) Framework. The program aims to address a significant drop in students’ mathematics performance in NAPLAN from Years 7 to Year 9. Thinking Maths supports teachers to improve students’ learning of mathematical content during the transition between Primary and Secondary school. Years 6 - 9 teachers participate in five professional learning days at 4 - 5 …

Thinking Maths: Learning Impact Fund Evaluation Report: Evaluation Report And Executive Summary, Katherine Dix, Hilary Hollingsworth, Toby Carslake

Dr Katherine Dix

Thinking Maths is a three-term structured professional learning program for Years 6 - 9 mathematics teachers to engage middle school students’ mathematics learning. The Thinking Maths program has been developed by the South Australian Department for Education based on its Teaching for Effective Learning (TfEL) Framework. The program aims to address a significant drop in students’ mathematics performance in NAPLAN from Years 7 to Year 9. Thinking Maths supports teachers to improve students’ learning of mathematical content during the transition between Primary and Secondary school. Years 6 - 9 teachers participate in five professional learning days at 4 - 5 …

Thinking Maths: Learning Impact Fund Evaluation Report: Evaluation Report And Executive Summary, Katherine Dix, Hilary Hollingsworth, Toby Carslake

Literacy and Numeracy

Thinking Maths is a three-term structured professional learning program for Years 6 - 9 mathematics teachers to engage middle school students’ mathematics learning. The Thinking Maths program has been developed by the South Australian Department for Education based on its Teaching for Effective Learning (TfEL) Framework. The program aims to address a significant drop in students’ mathematics performance in NAPLAN from Years 7 to Year 9. Thinking Maths supports teachers to improve students’ learning of mathematical content during the transition between Primary and Secondary school. Years 6 - 9 teachers participate in five professional learning days at 4 - 5 …

Thinking Maths: Learning Impact Fund Evaluation Report: Addendum To The Evaluation Report, Katherine Dix, Hilary Hollingsworth, Toby Carslake

Literacy and Numeracy

Thinking Maths is a three-term structured professional learning program for Years 6 - 9 mathematics teachers to engage middle school students’ mathematics learning. The Thinking Maths program has been developed by the South Australian Department for Education based on its Teaching for Effective Learning (TfEL) Framework. The program aims to address a significant drop in students’ mathematics performance in NAPLAN from Years 7 to Year 9. Thinking Maths supports teachers to improve students’ learning of mathematical content during the transition between Primary and Secondary school. Years 6 - 9 teachers participate in five professional learning days at 4 - 5 …

Learning To Notice Mathematics Instruction: Using Video To Develop Preservice Teachers' Vision Of Ambitious Pedagogy, Elizabeth Van Es, Ana Auger, Tara Barnhart, Mary Cashen

Education Faculty Articles and Research

Video is used extensively in teacher preparation, raising questions about what and how preservice teachers learn through video observation and analysis. We investigate the development of candidates' noticing of ambitious mathematics pedagogy in the context of a video-based course designed to cultivate ways of seeing and interpreting classroom interactions. Qualitative analysis of candidates' observations of teaching at the beginning and end of the course generated a framework of practices and associated approaches for noticing instructional interactions. The 3 practices include attending to features of instruction, elaborating on observations, and integrating observations to reason about instruction. Findings reveal …

The Design And Enactment Of Modeling Tasks: A Study On The Development Of Modeling Abilities In A Secondary Mathematics Course, Danielle Buhrman

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This study uses components of action and self-study research to examine the design and enactment of modeling tasks with the goal of developing student modeling abilities. The author, a secondary mathematics teacher, first closely examined the curriculum design and instructional decisions she made as she prepared for a unit on mathematical modeling in her precalculus course. Detailed descriptions of the timeline of events as this unit was enacted is then presented, providing insight into student and teacher interactions that occurred during an intense five weeks of modeling instruction. An analysis of these events identified ways in which students relearned how …

"Returning To The Root" Of The Problem: Improving The Social Condition Of African Americans Through Science And Mathematics Education, Vanessa R. Pitts Bannister, Julius Davis, Jomo Mutegi, Latasha Thompson, Deborah Lewis

Catalyst: A Social Justice Forum

The underachievement and underrepresentation of African Americans in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) disciplines have been well documented. Efforts to improve the STEM education of African Americans continue to focus on relationships between teaching and learning and factors such as culture, race, power, class, learning preferences, cultural styles and language. Although this body of literature is deemed valuable, it fails to help STEM teacher educators and teachers critically assess other important factors such as pedagogy and curriculum. In this article, the authors argue that both pedagogy and curriculum should be centered on the social condition of African Americans – …

Acer Research Conference Proceedings (2016), Australian Council For Educational Research (Acer)

2009 - 2019 ACER Research Conferences

The focus of ACER’s Research Conference 2016 will be on what we are learning from research about ways of improving levels of STEM learning. Australia faces significant challenges in promoting improved science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) learning in our schools. Research Conference 2016 will showcase research into what it will take to address these challenges, which include: the decline in Australian students’ mathematical and scientific ‘literacy’; the decline in STEM study in senior school; a shortage of highly qualified STEM subject teachers, and curriculum challenges. You will hear from researchers who work with teachers to engage students in studying …

Is The Flipped Classroom Pedagogy Effective For All Students?, Stephanie Quarato

EDL Sixth Year Theses

In my experience as a mathematics teacher, I have learned that mathematics is a subject that is commonly paired with negative feelings. Many individuals lack confidence in their ability to perform mathematics. As a mathematics teacher, I am always looking for different ways to reach the needs of all of my students. The flipped classroom was one initiative that I implemented into my classroom to understand the benefits of learning in this unique way. In a flipped lesson, the students learn the lesson from a textbook or video as the homework, while the practice is completed in the classroom. The …

Numeracy Education Through Mobile Apps, Boris Handal, Iona Novak, Kevin Watson, Marguerite Maher, Jean Macnish, Katrina Eddles-Hirsch

Kevin Watson

Numeracy achievement of Australian school children is a national priority according to the Australian Curriculum. There is increasingly compelling evidence that numeracy needs to be a focus in all curriculum areas, not solely in mathematics (Human Capital Working Group, 2008). At the same time, there is an ever-increasing scope for the use of mobile technologies to enhance learning and teaching. This article examines how numeracy and mobile learning work together as teachers in the Middle Years are mentored to use iPad applications (apps) effectively within their own curriculum area to enhance the learning of numeracy for children in their classes.

Numeracy Education Through Mobile Apps, Boris Handal, Iona Novak, Kevin Watson, Marguerite Maher, Jean Macnish, Katrina Eddles-Hirsch

Boris Handal

Numeracy achievement of Australian school children is a national priority according to the Australian Curriculum. There is increasingly compelling evidence that numeracy needs to be a focus in all curriculum areas, not solely in mathematics (Human Capital Working Group, 2008). At the same time, there is an ever-increasing scope for the use of mobile technologies to enhance learning and teaching. This article examines how numeracy and mobile learning work together as teachers in the Middle Years are mentored to use iPad applications (apps) effectively within their own curriculum area to enhance the learning of numeracy for children in their classes.

Numeracy Education Through Mobile Apps, Boris Handal, Iona Novak, Kevin Watson, Marguerite Maher, Jean Macnish, Katrina Eddles-Hirsch

Katrina Eddles-Hirsch

Numeracy achievement of Australian school children is a national priority according to the Australian Curriculum. There is increasingly compelling evidence that numeracy needs to be a focus in all curriculum areas, not solely in mathematics (Human Capital Working Group, 2008). At the same time, there is an ever-increasing scope for the use of mobile technologies to enhance learning and teaching. This article examines how numeracy and mobile learning work together as teachers in the Middle Years are mentored to use iPad applications (apps) effectively within their own curriculum area to enhance the learning of numeracy for children in their classes.

Numeracy Education Through Mobile Apps, Boris Handal, Iona Novak, Kevin Watson, Marguerite Maher, Jean Macnish, Katrina Eddles-Hirsch

Marguerite Maher

Numeracy achievement of Australian school children is a national priority according to the Australian Curriculum. There is increasingly compelling evidence that numeracy needs to be a focus in all curriculum areas, not solely in mathematics (Human Capital Working Group, 2008). At the same time, there is an ever-increasing scope for the use of mobile technologies to enhance learning and teaching. This article examines how numeracy and mobile learning work together as teachers in the Middle Years are mentored to use iPad applications (apps) effectively within their own curriculum area to enhance the learning of numeracy for children in their classes.

Numeracy Education Through Mobile Apps, Boris Handal, Iona Novak, Kevin Watson, Marguerite Maher, Jean Macnish, Katrina Eddles-Hirsch

Jean MacNish

Numeracy achievement of Australian school children is a national priority according to the Australian Curriculum. There is increasingly compelling evidence that numeracy needs to be a focus in all curriculum areas, not solely in mathematics (Human Capital Working Group, 2008). At the same time, there is an ever-increasing scope for the use of mobile technologies to enhance learning and teaching. This article examines how numeracy and mobile learning work together as teachers in the Middle Years are mentored to use iPad applications (apps) effectively within their own curriculum area to enhance the learning of numeracy for children in their classes.

Conceptualising Changes To Pre-Service Teachers’ Knowledge Of How To Best Facilitate Learning In Mathematics: A Tpack Inspired Initiative, Frank G. Bate, Lorraine Day, Jean Macnish

Jean MacNish

In 2010, the Australian Commonwealth government initiated an $8m project called Teaching Teachers for the Future. The aim of the project was to engage teacher educators in a professional learning network which focused on optimising exemplary use of information and communications technologies in teacher education. By taking part in this network, participants were afforded opportunities to transform their practice through a range of localised initiatives that applied information and communications technologies to the art and science of teaching and learning. One of these initiatives involved re-engineering a university mathematics unit targeted at pre-service teachers. Information and communications technologies were purposefully …

Conceptualising Changes To Pre-Service Teachers’ Knowledge Of How To Best Facilitate Learning In Mathematics: A Tpack Inspired Initiative, Frank G. Bate, Lorraine Day, Jean Macnish

Lorraine Day

In 2010, the Australian Commonwealth government initiated an $8m project called Teaching Teachers for the Future. The aim of the project was to engage teacher educators in a professional learning network which focused on optimising exemplary use of information and communications technologies in teacher education. By taking part in this network, participants were afforded opportunities to transform their practice through a range of localised initiatives that applied information and communications technologies to the art and science of teaching and learning. One of these initiatives involved re-engineering a university mathematics unit targeted at pre-service teachers. Information and communications technologies were purposefully …

The Role Of Perception, Interpretation, And Decision Making In The Development Of Beginning Teachers’ Competence, Rossella Santagata, Cathery Yeh

Education Faculty Articles and Research

This study investigates beginning US elementary teachers’ competence for teaching mathematics and its development during teacher preparation and into the first 2 years of full-time teaching. Data are drawn from three longitudinal case studies and include the classroom video analysis survey, classroom observations and interviews about teachers’ instructional decisions, and whole-day shadowing. A multi-case study design was used to examine the processes of perception, interpretation, and decision making in participants’ comments on video clips of teaching episodes and in reflections about their own teaching. Findings support the central role of these processes in teacher competence and the generative power of …

Research Digest: Big Ideas In Mathematics Teaching, Dave Tout, Jim Spithill, Jenny Trevitt, Pat Knight, Marion Meiers

Research Digest

The idea of Big Ideas in mathematics education has now been around for a while, but what does it mean for the teaching and learning of mathematics in schools? This Digest attempts to address this issue by describing two views about Big Ideas, and aims to give some insights into how the Big Ideas concept can be used by mathematics teachers.

Turning The Tide: A Thoughtful And Developmentally Appropriate Approach To Teaching Mathematics, Sally Borduin

Progressive Education in Context

Describes the Bank Street School for Children program and approach to teaching mathematics, including the importance of undoing "math phobia," a phenomenon in our society in which math is often viewed as unappealing, mysterious, and inaccessible.

Ucsmp Teachers’ Perspectives When Using Graphing Calculators In Advanced Mathematics, Ilyas Karadeniz

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Nowadays, technology plays a fundamental role in education, in general, and in mathematics education in particular. The graphing calculator has been an important technological tool in mathematics classrooms since its invention and introduction in 1985 by Casio. As graphing calculators provided so many uses, their contribution to the teaching and learning process has been investigated by many researchers who have shown the use of such technology can have a significant effect on improving mathematics teaching and learning.

Investigating the impact of graphing calculators on student learning is important. It is also essential to research teachers’ perspectives on how using graphing …