Describing a teacher's pedagogical mathematical knowledge in STEM teaching
Describing and analyzing teaching practice has been a focus of researchers interested in the interaction and connections between teachers’ content knowledge and their pedagogical knowledge. This study described the role of a teacher’s mathematical content and pedagogical content knowledge in involving students in learning and solving Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) problems in an Australian primary school context. The Knowledge Quartet (KQ) is a widely recognised framework originally developed to observe classroom mathematics teaching and analyze mathematics teaching practices. We use the KQ as a theoretical/organizational framework against which to thematically analyze one teacher’s classroom pedagogy to investigate 1) the utility of the KQ framework for describing and analyzing a teacher’s mathematical lesson within an integrated STEM inquiry context and 2) how a teacher’s pedagogical mathematical knowledge supports a focus on inquiry-based STEM integrated teaching. The study involved a teacher and 26 Year 5 students in an Australian classroom. Data included classroom video recordings, researcher observation notes, and students’ artefacts. The video recordings were transcribed and analyzed using the KQ framework. The observation notes and artefacts were used to validate and support this analysis. The paper identifies and provides examples of different aspects of the KQ in the teaching sequence and provides examples of how integrated STEM content can be effectively incorporated into the primary school classroom. The relevance and significance of the KQ framework and the teaching of integrated STEM content in primary school are reviewed and discussed within the paper.
The Inter-relationship Across Achievement, Self-handicapping, Self-concept, and Self-efficacy for School Students
Within the student motivation and self-system literature there is general agreement that students' self-concept and self-efficacy levels are both an outcome and an influence on students' behaviour and actions, there is, however, significant debate pertaining to five questions: 1. Can instruments be designed to measure students' self-efficacy and effort in the domains of mathematics and reading? 2. What is the effect of gender on students' levels of self-concept, self-efficacy/effort, self-handicapping and academic achievement? 3. What is the inter-relationship between academic achievement and the self-variables of self-concept, self-efficacy/effort and self- handicapping for students? 4. Is there an interaction between students' self-handicapping levels and their behaviours and motivations? Self-handicapping refers to actions that individuals engage in which are against the students' best interest. 5. Do structural self-concept program (such as, Exploring Self- Concept) alter students' self-concept scores on self-concept measures? This research has focussed on these five questions by exploring five issues: (1) the design of two academic self-efficacy/effort measures; (2) a semi-longitudinal investigation of the relationship of gender to self-concept, self-efficacy/effort, self-handicapping and academic achievement; (3) a semi-longitudinal investigation of the inter-relationship between academic achievement and the self-variables of self-concept, self-efficacy/effort and self-handicapping for students; (4) a semi-longitudinal investigation of students' level of self-handicapping in relationship to academic achievement; and (5) an examination of the effectiveness of a program called Exploring Self-Concept on students' self-concept formation. What is unique about this study is that this procedure was enacted on two populations of participating students, one in the primary school settings (n = 264) and the second in the high school setting (n = 133). Participation was voluntary with the study given ethical approval from the relevant university and school authorities and as well from the parents of the students involved.