The prevalence of tablet computer use among young children has risen dramatically, as have educational apps claiming to promote school readiness skills such as mathematical knowledge. Parents can contribute to their preschoolers' math readiness through the math talk they provide during everyday interactions in traditional nonelectronic activities.…

Mathematics is an important subject that plays a crucial role in constructing mental discipline among students. There has been a great focus on investigating students' attitudes toward mathematics in higher education settings. The current study is aiming to explore the factors that affect attitudes toward math among higher education students in…

Hands-on activities help spark student curiosity and deepen understanding for better learning outcomes. This Spotlight will help readers learn more about reducing student ambivalence towards math class; examine proven strategies for reengaging students; examine how coding and social-emotional learning (SEL) can improve engagement and deepen…

The purpose of this multiple case study was to explore affordances for STEM-related skills in a nature preschool in central Texas. Observations were conducted along with the collection of videos and photographs of four preschool-aged participants. Informal interviews were also implemented during data collection and observations. Semi-formal…

Students' use of problem posing is an assessment tool for evaluating mathematical creativity, and it plays a substantial role in creative tasks. Integrating problem-posing tasks into a curriculum is beneficial for teaching and learning mathematics. The Photo-Math Project is an example of problem posing in terms of generating new problems. This…

It is time to reimagine what is possible and celebrate the brilliance that multilingual learners bring to today's classrooms. Innovative teaching strategies can position these learners as leaders in mathematics. Yet, even as the number of multilingual learners in North American schools grows, many teachers have not had opportunities to gain the…

This study explores the relationship between play-based learning and achievement in mathematics in Palestinian elementary school children. Forty teachers from eight schools received training in play-based pedagogies and follow-up support visits from programme staff (intervention group); four matched schools served as the control group.…

When designing professional development for math teachers, teacher confidence, math anxiety, and student performance are factors to consider. St. Lucie Public Schools in Florida has seen a decline in performance in fifth-grade mathematics, where students are first asked to showcase their knowledge on operations for fractions. As a curriculum…

Community colleges have long provided students a gateway to greater economic opportunities, primarily through two pathways: completing two years of college courses while preparing to transfer to earn a four-year degree or career training that can lead to stable, well-paying positions. Eva L. Rivera Lebrón, a professor of mathematics at…

Elementary school teachers' math anxiety has been found to play a role in their students' math achievement. The current study addresses the role of teacher math anxiety on ninth-grade students' math achievement and the mediating factors underlying this relationship. Using data from the National Mindset Study, we find that higher teacher math…

This study examined the intersections of preservice elementary teachers' (PSET) professional noticing (PN) of children's mathematical thinking, two mathematical knowledge for teaching (MKT) domains: mathematics content knowledge (MCK) and mathematics pedagogical content knowledge (MPCK), and two affective domains: attitudes and dispositions toward…

During the junior high and high school years, there is a dramatic decrease in motivation for math studies, which has been found to play a major role in learning processes. Many attempts have been made to mitigate this decrease in motivation and to encourage mathematics studies in higher grades. One way that researchers have proposed to stimulate…

Educators need collaborative opportunities to renew their love of learning, not just to review data and rework lessons. Researcher Ian Parker Renga and coauthors examine the power of Math Teachers' Circles--a group of educators that get together to play math games and solve problems just for the joy of it.

Computational thinking (CT) has the potential to enhance learning when integrated into mathematical classroom activities. Teachers are being asked to include CT concepts in their core disciplines; however, there is an open question as to how best to equip teachers to integrate CT into their practice. Oftentimes teacher candidates enter math and…

This article reports and compares results from an interview study of early childhood teachers in the U.S. and Hong Kong, with a focus on the math outcomes that children may gain from play with unit blocks. Teachers were interviewed to obtain their ideas of the benefits of unit block play in three focal areas: geometry, measurement, and numeracy.…