With the increasing demand for improved student achievement in mathematics, few studies have been conducted examining teacher efficacy when continuously supported through a collaborative professional learning community (PLC) structure. This study examined teacher efficacy within PLC activities in a middle school. Both the belief that mathematics…

We often evaluate student thinking and their work from a deficit point of view, particularly in mathematics, where many teachers have been taught that their role is to diagnose and eradicate students' misconceptions. But what if instead of focusing on what students don't know or haven't mastered, we identify their mathematical strengths and build…

Formative assessment practices for secondary mathematics have been advocated as valuable for students, but difficult for teachers to learn. There have been calls in the literature to increase the emphasis on formative assessment in mathematics teacher preparation courses. This study explored the use of peer-assessment strategies for helping…

This article describes the synthesis of the research on mastery grading, growth mindsets, and testing for learning to produce a new grading system -- Second Chance Grading. The system and the research it is based on are described in detail. Reflections of the system's effectiveness, impact, and reception are also discussed. Finally, the appendix…

Students' ability to reason for themselves is a crucial step in developing conceptual understandings of mathematics, especially if those students are preservice teachers. Even if classroom environments are structured to promote students' reasoning and sense-making, students may rely on prior procedural knowledge to justify their mathematical…

Purpose: In this study, it was aimed to examine the relationship between the visual mathematics literacy perceptions and its sub-dimension for geometry success levels of prospective teachers. It was also aimed to examine to what extent visual mathematics literacy perception and its sub-dimensions predicted geometry success. Research Methods: This…

Mathematics is often perceived as a difficult subject by many students, parents and teachers alike. Difficulties with the subject are most often attributed to cognitive factors (lack of ability, preparedness, practice and knowledge). Emotional factors are often overlooked and are easily written off as potential persistent and serious causes of…

Research has shown that students with learning disabilities who have experienced consistent failures display low academic self-efficacy. Research has also demonstrated that self-efficacy is a key component in academic performance and motivation. Academic interventions are often used to target skill deficits for students with learning disabilities.…

This chapter presents a review of what is known from evaluation studies about the impacts of professional development programs in mathematics and science education, and their role in systemic reform. Following comparisons of program focus, structure, target population, and geographic scope, an overview of program goals is presented in terms of the…

Using data from the Prospects study ("Prospects: The Congressionally Mandated Study of Educational Growth and Opportunity"), the individual characteristics that distinguish academically successful, or resilient, elementary school students of minority and low-socioecononmic status (SES) backgrounds from their less successful, nonresilient…

The present study evaluated the effects of a program designed to promote a growth mindset in maths teachers (i.e., the belief that maths ability can improve through experience and learning) to enhance teaching and learning outcomes in their maths classes. The sample was composed of 155 Israeli high-school maths teachers who were randomly assigned…

The fourth volume of this proceedings contains 29 full research reports continuing on from Volume 3, 84 short oral communications (abstracts only) and 34 poster presentations (abstracts only). The full papers include: (1) "Beliefs, Teacher Education and the History of Mathematics" (George N. Philippou and Constantinos Christou); (2)…

This study explores effects of teaching experience and specialized mathematics education on mathematics anxiety and mathematics teaching anxiety. Fifty-nine female pre-service and in-service mathematics primary school teachers with varied specialized mathematics education and teaching experience responded to a questionnaire measuring mathematics…

Middle school mathematics teachers often do not emphasise statistics and geometry in their lesson plans for a variety of reasons. However, these are integral topics in mathematics, and using direct lecture or hands-on activities may have different effects on teacher confidence when approaching these subjects. Using qualitative and quantitative…

Pre-service teachers' beliefs, attitudes, and values about mathematics have a significant influence on their self-concept about mathematics as a subject and determine how confident they are to teach it. The purpose of this study was to examine Zambian pre-service secondary mathematics teachers' pedagogical content knowledge self-concept about the…