This article reports on a study that investigated the extent to which 57 Grade 6 students at a particular school have misconceptions regarding equality, with the equal sign as focus. It also investigated this school's three Grade 5 and 6 teachers' mathematical knowledge for teaching regarding equality, again focusing on the equal sign. The…

Students' graph comprehension may be affected by the background of the students who are the readers or interpreters of the graph, their knowledge of the context in which the graph is set, and the inferential processes required by the graph operation. This research study investigated these aspects of graph comprehension for 152 first year…

The study is part of a larger project concerned with addressing the problem that Eritrean science teachers face in their attempt to implement a new learner-centred science curriculum. Specifically, the study attempted to determine the effects of the use of an Argumentation-Based Instructional Model (ABIM) on 25 pre-service science teachers'…

This paper explores teachers' perceptions of their learners' proficiency in statistical literacy, reasoning and thinking. Research in Statistics education has prompted a move away from the teaching of statistical skills, towards focusing on the development of statistical literacy, reasoning and thinking. The recent South African Grade 10-12…

Identifying an instructional tool for merging scientific and indigenous knowledge (IK) is problematic as there is no clear guidance on how this can be achieved. Argumentation is recommended as a possible integrative instructional theoretical methodology as it imbues notions of dialogue and persuasion, while at the same time embracing the…

This study employed regression analysis to investigate the relationship between primary school teachers' pedagogical practices and their knowledge of mathematics. The sample composed of 606 Grade 6 mathematics teachers in Namibia, i.e. 304 (50.2%) males and 302 (49.8%) females. The study utilized existing questionnaire data collected by the…

This study is concerned with teacher knowledge of learners' help-seeking behaviour. Teacher estimates of expected help-seeking behaviours of learners were compared with actual help-seeking of the learners. An in-depth study was deployed with one mathematics teacher and her grade 8 class of 20 learners solving mathematical word problems. Data were…

This study focuses on the effects of the exposure of pre-service education students (n=87) to a variety of toys used as educative curriculum material in an attempt to develop their understanding of energy. Changes in their knowledge, their confidence in terms of this knowledge, and the reasons they attributed for any changes in both their…

More than a thousand Grade 10 Physical Science learners from four South African provinces participated in a study that probed their conceptions of energy. The purpose was to determine the learners' conceptual resources, i.e. their initial conceptions, and identify the potentially productive resources from which they may construct physics concepts.…

In pursuance of one of the goals of the new South African curriculum to integrate science with Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS), this study, which forms part of a larger study, is concerned with determining teachers' and learners' conceptions of a number of familiar natural phenomena. Several recent studies have indicated that: (1) learners do…

This study investigated the influence of a short explicit-reflective Nature of Science Course (NOSC) on access students' ideas about the Nature of Science (NOS). Eighty five students registered for a Bachelor of Science degree at the University of the Western Cape in South Africa went through a seven week course that deliberately sought to develop…