The Contribution of Technology to the Implementation of Mathematics Education Reform: Case Studies of Grade 1–3 Teaching

2002 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-104 ◽  
Author(s):  
John A. Ross ◽  
Anne Hogaboam-Gray ◽  
Douglas McDougall ◽  
Cathy Bruce

Previous research suggests that access to technology contributes to the implementation of mathematics education reform. This case study of three primary (grade 1–3) teachers investigated how access to computers and math teaching software influenced nine dimensions of reform. Teachers were selected on the basis of their commitment to math reform and their technological literacy. Interviews and observations over five months found that technology had its greatest impact by helping teachers expand the scope of their programs and by promoting positive attitudes toward math. Teachers adapted computer tasks to fit their off-line activities, heightening or depleting the contribution of technology to reform. The computer promoted equity of access to all forms and strands of mathematics but this did not necessarily ensure that all students had access to higher math. None of the teachers realized the potential of the computer to increase student-student construction of mathematical ideas, in part because of hardware problems but more because of their decision to assign students to individual computer tasks.

2020 ◽  
pp. 0143831X2094368
Author(s):  
Julie Prowse ◽  
Peter Prowse ◽  
Robert Perrett

This article presents the findings of a case study that aimed to understand the specific leadership styles that are valued by women and men lay representatives in the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) and to determine the gendered implications for increasing women’s leadership and representation in trade unions. Survey responses from PCS lay representatives (reps) show the majority of women and men agreed that the leadership style they value, and that makes a good union leader, is post-heroic (communal) leadership. This approach is associated with leadership characteristics such as being helpful, sensitive and kind and are generally practised by women. This contrasts with male union leaders who are associated with a traditional, heroic (agentic) leadership style characterised by confidence, self-reliance and decisiveness. Although some differences exist that highlight gender issues, both women and men lay reps have positive attitudes towards increasing women’s representation and participation in union leadership.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Scott Travanion Connors

Abstract This article explores the emergence of reformist sentiment and political culture in Madras in the mid-nineteenth century. Moreover, it contributes to, and expands upon, the growing body of literature on colonial petitioning through a case-study of a mass petition demanding education reform. Signed in 1839 by 70,000 subjects from across the Madras presidency, the petition demanded the creation of a university that would qualify western-educated Indians to gain employment in the high public offices of the East India Company. Through an analysis of the lifecycle of this education petition, from its creation to its reception and the subsequent adoption of its demands by the Company government at Fort St George, this article charts the process by which an emergent, politicized public engaged with, and critiqued, the colonial state. Finally, it examines the transformative effect that the practice of mass petitioning had on established modes of political activism and communication between an authoritarian colonial state and the society it governed.


2021 ◽  
pp. 001312452110019
Author(s):  
Trevor Tsz-lok Lee

This paper contributes to our understanding of the micro-policy experience of an implemented curriculum from the perspective of students, in addition to teachers, as the key coupling agents in the schools of a Chinese global city. Although the phenomenon of decoupling in educational policy is widely recognized, much less attention has been paid to the micro-dynamics involved in implementing education reform policy from the perspective of students and teachers. It is argued that these local actors’ experiences are best captured by the bi-dimensional framework of loose coupling and pedagogic modalities. This argument is illustrated through a case study of the implementation of the Liberal Studies reform under Senior Secondary Curriculum in Hong Kong since 2009. The study demonstrates how students and teachers interpret and make sense of policy, strategic, and practical needs manifested in the microprocesses of policy coupling and decoupling.


2016 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 118-133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dung Tran ◽  
Barbara J. Reys ◽  
Dawn Teuscher ◽  
Shannon Dingman ◽  
Lisa Kasmer

This commentary highlights the contribution that careful and systematic analyses of curriculum or content standards can make to questions and issues important in the mathematics education field. We note the increased role that curriculum standards have played as part of a standards-based education reform strategy. We also review different methods used by researchers to compare and analyze the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics, each method designed for a particular purpose. Finally, we call upon mathematics education researchers to engage in careful analysis of curriculum standards and to share their findings in ways that can inform public debate as well as support education professionals in improving student learning opportunities.


2017 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 327-340 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fatimah Ahmad ◽  
Heather Greenhalgh-Spencer

This paper argues for a more complex literature around gender and math performance. In order to argue for this complexity, we present a small portion of data from a case study examining the performance of Kuwaiti students on the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study and on Kuwait national math tests. Westernized discourses suggest that girls have a harder time in math classes; these discourses frame and are reified by prominent literature and practices within the field of math education research that suggest that women and girls need help in order to reach their potential in math. These Westernized discourses stand in contrast to the discourses in Kuwait that normalize women and girls as outperforming boys in all subjects – including all science, technology, engineering and mathematics subjects. As our study shows, the reality is more complex. And, while the reality is more complex, we yet lack the discourses to understand this complexity.


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