This article addresses issues in equitable and quality STEM education, and comes at a significant time as students, educators, and policymakers strive to meet federal and state standards such as the Mathematics Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). CCSS and NGSS require significantly higher levels of…

This study comes at an opportune moment for Japanese and U.S. educators, policymakers, and researchers given the trends of global policy and equity-based reform. Discussions of academic achievement in both societies allow us to examine accessibility in mathematics education in order to best prepare teachers to serve the needs of students.…

This paper uses a series of models to illustrate one of the fundamental processes of model building--that of enrichment and elaboration. The paper describes how a problem context is given which allows a series of models to be developed from a simple initial model using a queuing theory framework. The process encourages students to think about the…

In this article we examine how secondary school students think about functional relationships. More specifically, we examined seven students' intuitive knowledge in regards to representing two real-world situations with functions. We found students do not tend to represent functional relationships with coordinate graphs even though they are…

This paper explores the relationship between social backgrounds and geographical locations with mathematical achievement. Using the national testing system in Australia, correlations between the variables were explored and it was found that students from rural and low SES backgrounds are still being marginalised in school mathematics--in terms of…

This article examines prospective elementary teachers' conceptions of unitizing with whole numbers and fraction concepts and operations throughout a semester-long mathematics content course. Student work samples and classroom conversations are used to illustrate the types of unitizing understandings that prospective teachers bring to teacher…

This study focuses on students in first year environmental science degree programs, where traditionally mathematical emphasis has been much less than within the strict science or math majors. The importance now placed on applied mathematics, however, means that students need to gain more conceptual and quantitative knowledge of mathematics in not…

Understanding how students translate between mathematical representations is of both practical and theoretical importance. This study examined students' processes in their generation of symbolic and graphic representations of given polynomial functions. The purpose was to investigate how students perform these translations. The result of the…

One aspect of professional development of mathematics teachers relates to the development of assessment skills. The aim of this study is to examine the effects of engaging prospective mathematics teachers in peer assessment, both as assessors and assessees, on the development of their assessment skills in general and assessment of geometrical…

Chinese pre-school children perform well in learning mathematics compared with English-speaking children. This study investigates the scenes behind Chinese preschool children's mathematics performance using teacher questionnaires and interviews. Results indicated that the Chinese number system appeared to afford advantages to Chinese children…

The present study examined the structure of elementary pre-service teachers' mathematics anxiety and mathematics teaching anxiety by asking whether the two systems of anxiety are related. The Turkish Mathematics Anxiety Rating Scale Short Version and the Mathematics Teaching Anxiety Scale were administered to 260 elementary pre-service…

In light of the changing ethnic, racial, and cultural demographics in U.S. schools, there is a growing need by scholars and practitioners for teaching practices that are informed by cultural knowledge possessed by students. This comes at a time when standardized testing of student achievement has been given a central role in efforts to improve…

This qualitative study examined middle school students' performance, solution strategies, difficulties and the underlying reasons for their difficulties in calculating the volume of a rectangular prism. The data was collected from 35 middle school students (6th, 7th and 8th grade students) enrolled in a private school in Istanbul, Turkey. The…

Professional development (PD) programs often evaluate their impact on teachers' learning by assessing teachers either individually or in groups. The goal of this paper is to illustrate the variety of paths teachers might follow as a result of working in groups within online PD settings. Data are drawn from a PD program for grades 5-9…

Students start to memorize arithmetic facts from early elementary school mathematics activities. Their fluency or lack of fluency with these facts could affect their efforts as they carry out mental calculations as adults. This study investigated participants' levels of brain activation and possible reasons for these levels as they solved…