Young students’ views on problem solving versus problem posing

For decades, problem solving has been of interest to researchers, and several studies have tried to capture the influence of students’ beliefs, attitudes and emotions towards mathematics and problem solving. However, problem posing as part of problem solving has not been investigated to the same extent. This article focuses on six-year-olds’ views on solving and posing problems. How do the students themselves describe their views on solving and posing problem-solving tasks, and what similarities and differences can be found? An educational design research study was conducted in three classes where the students first solved and then posed problem-solving tasks. Afterwards, the students were interviewed. In these interviews the students expressed positive views towards both solving and posing problem-solving tasks. The students expressed autonomy and challenge as positive when both solving and posing tasks. However, a posed task needed to be solved before being finished. Further, not all students considered problem posing to be a mathematical activity, and a plausible explanation for this is the students’ limited experience of problem posing

Practicalities of language data collection and management in and around Indonesia

Source at http://wacana.ui.ac.id/index.php/wjhiResearchers use different approaches when collecting and managing primary language materials during fieldwork. Yet it is important that this work is done in a transparent way, so that it can be used by other researchers, who might have other aims, as well as by the speaker community who might want to use or take note of the collected materials. In this article we use our research experience in language data collection in and around Indonesia in fieldwork projects of three kinds: descriptive fieldwork, linguistic surveys, and projects investigating language contact. Our aim is to provide an introductory and practical guide for students and professionals who are embarking on fieldwork in or around Indonesia. Describing practical methods of language data collection, processing, and management, our aim is to provide a guide for any research which involves the collection of language materials, including linguistic research, oral history or literature, and ethnography

Play-Responsive Teaching in Early Childhood Education

This open access book develops a theoretical concept of teaching that is relevant to early childhood education, and based on children’s learning and development through play. It discusses theoretical premises and research on playing and learning, and proposes the development of play-responsive didaktik. It examines the processes and products of learning and development, teaching and its phylogenetic and ontogenetic development, as well as the ‘what’ of learning and didaktik. Next, it explores the actions, objects and meaning of play and provides insight into the diversity of beliefs about the practices of play. The book presents ideas on how combined research and development projects can be carried out, providing incentive and a model for practice development and research. The second part of the book consists of empirical studies on teacher’s playing skills and examples of play with very young as well as older children

When Students’ and Teachers’ Views on Good Mathematics Teaching Limit Co-teaching in Mathematics

The empirical material in this paper is from a Swedish upper secondary school where the mathematics lessons over the last two years have been co-taught. Co-teaching implies that two teachers are most often present in the classrooms during the mathematics lessons. Despite this additional support, students’ performance in mathematics remained low and this is why a professional development program was initiated. The aim of the professional development program was to find new ways to increase the number of approved students. At the start of this professional development program, classroom observations and a questionnaire were conducted with teachers and students. The results indicate that teachers’ and students’ views on good mathematics teaching became a limitation for the design of the co-taught lessons. Thus, to increase the number of approved students, teachers’ and students’ views on good mathematics teaching ought to be the focus of the professional development program

To become, or not to become, a primary school mathematics teacher. : A study of novice teachers’ professional identity development.

This thesis is about the process of becoming, or not becoming, a primary school mathematics teacher. The aim is to understand and describe the professional identity development of novice primary school mathematics teachers from the perspective of the novice teachers themselves. The study is a case study with an ethnographic direction where seven novice teachers have been followed from their graduation and two years onwards. The ethnographic direction has been used to make visible the whole process of identity development, both the individual and the social part. The empirical material in the study consists of self-recordings made by the respondents, observations and interviews. The empirical material is analysed in two different but co-operating ways. First a conceptual framework was developed and used as a lens. Second, methods inspired by grounded theory are used. The purpose of using them both is to retain the perspective of the respondents as far as possible. At the time of graduation the respondents are members in a community of reform mathematics teaching and they want to reform mathematics teaching in schools. In their visions they strive away from their own experiences of mathematics in school and practice periods. Four cases are presented closely in the thesis as they show four various routes into, and out of, the teaching profession. These four cases make visible that the respondents’ patterns of participation regarding teaching mathematics changes when they become members in new communities of practice with mathematics teaching as part of the shared repertoire. But, the four cases also make visible that the existence of such communities of practice seems to be rare and that the respondents’ different working conditions limit their possibilities of becoming members in those that exist. During the time span of this study, the respondents hardly receive any feedback for their performance as mathematics teachers. Even if they teach mathematics they don´t teach it as they would like to and they don´t think of themselves as mathematics teachers. Two years after graduation none of the respondents has developed a professional identity as primary school mathematics teacher. A primary school teacher in Sweden is a teacher of many subjects but they are the first teachers to teach our school children mathematics. For the respondents to develop a sense of themselves as a kind of primary school mathematics teacher, mathematics teaching has to become part of their teacher identities. For this to become possible, mathematics must become a part of their image of a primary school teacher as an image of a primary school mathematics teacher. Furthermore memberships in communities of practice with mathematics in the shared repertoire must be accessible, both during teacher education and after graduation. Then professional identity development as a primary school teacher would include becoming and being a teacher of mathematics.

Connecting Theories in a Case Study of Primary School Mathematics Teachers' Professional Identity Development

This paper focuses on a connection between two theories used in a case study of the professional identity development of primary school mathematics teachers. The two theories connected are communities of practice and patterns of participation. The reason for the connection was the need for a framework that would make it possible to analyse both the individual and the social parts of professional identity development. In this paper, the connection is presented, illustrated briefly using empirical examples and evaluated