The aim of this research was to explore 11 to 12-year-old children's understanding of the mass of objects made from different materials, and the measurement of this attribute. In depth task-based interviews were conducted with six children attending six different schools; five were in Year 6 and one in Year 7. The children were found to hold…

This paper introduces the Affording Understanding Conceptual Framework as a way for mathematics teacher educators to analyze student 's perceptions of a digital math tool 's helpfulness (e.g., GeoGebra) versus the instructor's perceptions when seeking insights into how a lesson design could be improved. An example of this action research process…

The study was carried out with prospective teachers (PTs) in Primary School Teaching Program in a private university (n=43) and Middle School Mathematics Teaching program in a public university (n=46). In this paper, multiple-case study was adopted to explore PTs' opinions and to reveal the differences between two universities in terms of taking a…

The extent to which the targeted outcomes in education are achieved can be determined by the educational assessment process. Although various alternative ways of assessment have arisen in recent decades, written examinations are still widely used by teachers. This study aims to determine the quality of the questions used by middle school…

The aim of this article is to inspire more teachers to explore the use of codable robots for teaching mathematics. The authors begin by discussing four benefits experienced by incorporating robots into middle school mathematics classes: (1) reasonable time frames; (2) authentic purposes for mathematics; (3) visual and nonevaluative feedback; and…

How should schools assign students to more rigorous math courses so as best to help their academic outcomes? We identify several hundred California middle schools that used 7th-grade test scores to place students into 8th-grade algebra courses and use a regression discontinuity design to estimate average impacts and heterogeneity across schools.…

To address the problem of low achieving math students, a cross-age math tutoring intervention paired middle school tutors with kindergarten and first grade students with low math skills. This instrumental group case study explored the effects of the intervention on the math skills of the students through teacher interviews and the testing program…

This paper reports on the characterization of the inductive reasoning used by middle school mathematics teachers to solve a task of generalization of a quadratic pattern. The data was collected from individual interviews and the written answers to the generalization task. The analysis was based on the representations and justifications used to…

Teachers put a great deal of energy into searching for ways to engage each and every student. Some of these efforts fail. Others look promising one day, only to become less effective as the novelty wears off. Teachers want their students to feel ownership of their learning. They also believes that students engage more when learning mathematics…

This article explores facilitating meaningful mathematics discourse, one of the research-based practices described in "Principles to Actions: Ensuring Mathematical Success for All." Two tools that can support teachers in strengthening their classroom discourse are discussed in this, another installment in the series.

Middle school is a critical time when students begin formal study of functional relationships in algebra. However, many students struggle in understanding functions as relationships between quantities that change according to a dependency relationship. We report on the influence of Scaling Continuous Covariation in fostering productive ideas about…

African American students in K-12 classrooms have struggled to achieve at the same level as their Caucasian peers in the mathematics classroom. The achievement gap between African American students and their Caucasian, Hispanic and Asian peers is a concern for administrators, teachers, and parents. Educators are being tasked to examine their…

An indicator of college readiness is the participation in advanced courses in junior high school. The purpose of this mixed methods study is to examine the social capital of 7th and 8th grade students enrolled in advanced mathematics courses. This study examined junior high student perspectives in the areas of attitude toward college, teacher…

This study aimed to explore how prospective middle school mathematics teachers think critically about a newspaper article that reported the findings of a statistical research. Participants of the study were four fourth-year students enrolled at the mathematics teacher education program of a public university. To investigate the research question…

In this paper, we discuss the utilization of an innovative learning tool, the Sphero BOLT robot, in a 10-day algebra-based mathematics education course for graduate students. Students created routes for their BOLTs to travel and determined ways to measure the distance, rate, and time of their robots' movements. The student prompt, sample student…