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Full-Text Articles in Education

Volume 18, Number 01, G. William Hill Editor, Linda M. Noble Editor, Tom Pusateri Editor Oct 2006

Volume 18, Number 01, G. William Hill Editor, Linda M. Noble Editor, Tom Pusateri Editor

Reaching Through Teaching

Full text of Volume 18, Number 01 of Reaching Through Teaching.


Engaging Students To Make Mathematics Interesting, Fun, Intriguing, Puzzling And Personally Satisfying, Dave Tout Aug 2006

Engaging Students To Make Mathematics Interesting, Fun, Intriguing, Puzzling And Personally Satisfying, Dave Tout

David (Dave) Tout

The author asserts that making connections with the real world is the best way to engage most students in the middle years of schooling and to potentially provide a mechanism for making mathematics interesting, fun and personally satisfying. Traditionally, in secondary school mathematics classrooms, teachers start by teaching the abstract mathematics skills and processes and then they find some possible applications afterwards. The author believes this should be the other way around.


Testing The Test: Item Response Curves And Test Quality, Gary A. Morris, Lee Branum-Martin, Nathan Harshman, Stephen D. Baxter, Eric Mazur, Suvendra Dutta, Taha Mzoughi, Veronica Mccauley May 2006

Testing The Test: Item Response Curves And Test Quality, Gary A. Morris, Lee Branum-Martin, Nathan Harshman, Stephen D. Baxter, Eric Mazur, Suvendra Dutta, Taha Mzoughi, Veronica Mccauley

Faculty and Research Publications

We present a simple technique for evaluating multiple-choice questions and their answers beyond the usual measures of difficulty and the effectiveness of distractors. The technique involves the construction and qualitative consideration of item response curves and is based on item response theory from the field of education measurement. To demonstrate the technique, we apply item response curve analysis to three questions from the Force Concept Inventory. Item response curve analysis allows us to characterize qualitatively whether these questions are efficient, where efficient is defined in terms of the construction, performance, and discrimination of a question and its answer choices. This …


Learning About Teaching : Using Video, Hilary Hollingsworth Apr 2006

Learning About Teaching : Using Video, Hilary Hollingsworth

Dr Hilary Hollingsworth

This article describes some Australian research and professional development projects that use classroom video data, and explains some of the positive outcomes, as well as some of the challenges, of these projects. A variety of methodologies have been used to collect, store, retrieve, code, navigate and analyse classroom video data. These include CD-Rom, DVD and web streaming to dedicated software platforms. Video is used to preserve classroom activity so that it can be 'slowed down' to enable detailed examinations of teaching and learning from multiple perspectives, reveal alternatives through comparative analysis, and stimulate discussions about choices related to teaching learning. …


What Does Teaching Look Like Around The World?, Karen Givvin, Jennifer Jacobs, Hilary Hollingsworth Dec 2005

What Does Teaching Look Like Around The World?, Karen Givvin, Jennifer Jacobs, Hilary Hollingsworth

Dr Hilary Hollingsworth

If you could peer into a classroom in a foreign country, what would you see? If you could see multiple lessons from that country, what patterns would emerge? If you could do the same across several countries, how would you further refine your images? The logistics of such an undertaking are formidable and nearly impossible for any single person. However, the authors of this article, as part of the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) 1999 Video Study, were able to participate in the endeavor described above -- albeit via video, rather than in personIf you could peer into …


Does Eighth-Grade Mathematics Teaching In The United States Align With The Nctm Standards? Results From The Timss 1995 And 1999 Video Studies, Jennifer Jacobs, James Hiebert, Karen Givvin, Hilary Hollingsworth, Helen Garner, Diana Wearne Dec 2005

Does Eighth-Grade Mathematics Teaching In The United States Align With The Nctm Standards? Results From The Timss 1995 And 1999 Video Studies, Jennifer Jacobs, James Hiebert, Karen Givvin, Hilary Hollingsworth, Helen Garner, Diana Wearne

Dr Hilary Hollingsworth

Debates about the future of school mathematics in the United States often centre on whether standards-based instruction in improving or undermining students' achievement. Critical for making progress in these debates is information about the actual nature of classroom practice in US classrooms. This article focuses on one key element of classroom practice teaching, and presents the results of two studies of randomly selected, nationally representative US eighth grade mathematics lessons that were videotaped as part of the TIMSS 1995 and 1999 video studies. Analyses compare features of teaching found in these lessons with pedagogical recommendations for middle school teachers in …