Understanding young children's attitudes towards mathematics provides insights into their lived mathematical experiences. It has long been recognized that attitudes towards mathematics have a profound influence on mathematical achievement. Despite the considerable amount of research into students' attitudes toward mathematics, limited research has…

Background: Students often harbour negative attitudes towards research methods and statistics courses, and such attitudes may be associated with harmful cognitive and behavioural responses. Research on these effects has been restricted to the investigation of direct links between attitudes towards statistics, statistics anxiety, academic…

In this study, we examined whether generalised mathematics anxiety, application of mathematics in science anxiety, and positive attitudes towards mathematics influenced adolescents' intentions to study biology, chemistry, and physics in Grades 11 and 12. Participants were 477 students in Grades 8-10 from two schools in Western Sydney. Girls…

Mathematics anxiety is common among pre-service primary teachers and many experience higher levels of maths anxiety than other university students. This study asks: What are maths anxious preservice teachers' perspectives of "doing" mathematics in a whiteboard room? The Abbreviated Mathematics Anxiety Rating Scale (A-MARS) was used to…

Past research has revealed that, relative to primary-school students, high-school students have less-positive attitudes to mathematics and perceive their classroom environments and teacher--student relationships less favourably. This study involved the transition experience of 541 students in 47 classes in 15 primary (year 7) and secondary (year…

Self-regulated learning has been shown to have a positive and long-lasting impact on students' academic development, employability and career progression. Emotions, motivation and metacognition play an important role in students' ability to monitor and regulate their learning, particularly when studying and engaging with Science, Technology,…

This paper presents an analysis of pre-service teachers' reflections on the consequences of their perceived public humiliation in school mathematics classrooms, based on Torres and Bergner's (2010) model of the stages of humiliation. It analyses two examples of preservice teachers' critical incident reflections from studies at two Australian…

Preservice teachers graduate from an education system that shapes their mathematical understandings, beliefs and attitudes, and then re-enter that system to shape their own students' mathematical understandings, beliefs, and attitudes. Unfortunately, many of our future teachers have developed negative attitudes symptomatic of a self-perpetuating…

The recent introduction of a personal literacy and numeracy test (LANTITE) has been part of tighter accreditation of Initial Teacher Education programs across Australia. This article focuses on pre-service teachers' experiences, beliefs and feelings about the new high-stakes testing regime. The data are drawn from a six-month project intended to…

Studies, such as Programme for International Student Assessment 2012, indicate that there are gender based differences in measures of mathematics anxiety, self-concept and self-efficacy among students. In this study we explore self-efficacy, self-concept and mathematics anxiety in a sample of Year 7 and 8 South Australian students to examine if…

The push to ensure pre-service teachers are numerate, on face value, is appropriate. However, the way in which numeracy is described is of great importance as it will determine what is assessed and how it is assessed. The way numeracy is described will also impact on how teacher educators assist pre-service teachers to develop their numeracy. This…

This study aimed to develop a survey instrument to measure student attitudes towards mathematics teaching-learning processes that is appropriate for the Indonesian context. This study consisted of two phases: Phase 1 (n = 320) was a pilot study to assess the suitability of the instrument items for Indonesian students. Phase 2 (n = 1001) was…

The ability of primary (elementary) pre-service teachers to engage effectively in mathematics units in a rigorous program is vital to producing citizens who are able to use mathematics effectively in their lives. Mathematics anxiety affects pre-service primary teachers' engagement with and future teaching of mathematics. The study measured the…

Today's scientist is faced with complex problems that require interdisciplinary solutions. Consequently, tertiary science educators have had to develop and deliver interdisciplinary science courses to equip students with the skills required to solve the evolving real-world challenges of today and tomorrow. There are few reported studies of the…

Student primary teachers tend to have pervasive and frequently severe negative attitudes, low mathematics self-efficacy beliefs, and anxiety of mathematics that are more extreme than those of any other undergraduate student group. If unaddressed, such mathematics aversion will be carried into primary school classrooms, presenting a tangible and…