The study is concerned with improving the spelling performance of below average spellers in an upper primary mainstream classroom setting. The main target group is children who do not qualify for learning support resources yet have difficulty thriving in the literacy area of spelling. It was expected that lessons designed to expand students’ knowledge about words and the English language system would generate a greater student facility with learning spellings. A quasi-experimental methodological approach was taken which also has features of a controlled trials study. Four spelling intervention lesson programs were designed and each has a different pedagogic emphasis: 1) Metacognitive and multisensory learning strategies 2) Teacher-Best-Practice 3) Teacher designed inquiry-based group work 4) Learning with a computer-based Team Learning System. The study design is both practical and pragmatic in that only resources already available to the schools were utilised; lesson formats and teaching practices can be easily replicated; and the spelling programs are compatible with NSW curriculum directives. The intervention lesson program took place for one hour per week over a two-term period and involved four schools situated in the outer areas of Sydney, Australia. Students and teachers in nine upper primary classrooms took part in the study, five of which were intervention classes and four were non-intervention classes. The classroom teachers were an important factor in the program presentation and lessons with an explicit focus on words were conducted from a constructivist perspective. Results indicate that when spelling becomes an instructional focus, substantial progress in performance levels can be made in both intervention and non-intervention classrooms. Discussion of the findings examines how pedagogic factors influenced learning outcomes for all ability groups in the literacy area of spelling. Particular attention is given to the progress in spelling age made by below average performers, as determined on pre-testing, and students with lower than normal cognitive ability. It is considered that the more interactive approach to teaching spelling, plus a high level of congruence with the Quality Teaching model (NSW DET, 2003) elements of Engagement, High-order Thinking, and Substantive Communication, assisted these target groups of students in the intervention classes. The principal conclusion that can be drawn from the findings of the study is that minimal modifications to teaching practices can bring about improvement in students’ spelling performance levels. It illustrates the capacity of children to advance their learning outcomes when lessons are designed and delivered in a manner that encourages engagement and interactive support. Such a conclusion directs the responsibility for students’ learning outcomes to their classroom teachers. The study identifies that there are implications for the providers of in-service and pre-service professional development of teachers situated in upper primary mainstream classrooms, and the pedagogic aspirations of the primary school community. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The emergence of constructivist epistemology, as the dominant educational philosophy, has been very influential on the current movement to improve the quality of education. NSW has seen the establishment of the NSW Institute of Teachers (NSW Government, 2004a), the development and publication of a generic set of standards for teaching (NSW Institute of Teachers, 2005a) and the implementation of the NSW Quality Teaching model of pedagogy since 2003. In mathematics education, philosophies of mathematics and mathematics teaching that are consistent with constructivism, are reflected in current and previous NSW syllabus documents as well as the standards document published by the Australian Association for Mathematics Teachers in 2002. Within the context of these documents this research project investigated my efforts, as a novice teacher of primary school mathematics, to implement quality mathematics teaching. This research evolved from a Bachelor of Education honours project, which found that despite recently graduating from university preservice teaching courses which advocate teaching pedagogy based on constructivist learning theories, beginning teachers, along with their more experienced colleagues, use largely traditional methodologies in their mathematics teaching. From the narrative and analysis of my experience, it is my aim to demonstrate ways in which support might be implemented for beginning teachers in the subject area of mathematics. While the research literature has investigated beginning teachers, it has not done so in this unique and evolving context. In this thesis the components of effective mathematics teaching were identified from the mathematics education literature, with a particular focus on the work of Doug and Barbara Clarke (Clarke and Clarke, 2004; Clarke, 1997) and linked to the more generic elements of the NSW model of pedagogy (NSW Department of Education and Training, 2003e). The resulting picture of the quality teaching of mathematics was then used to analyse the data collected in video-taped lessons as well as the issues that emerged from my teaching diaries, daybook and programs, utilising the NVivo 2 (QSR, 2002) computer program. The first year of teaching was undertaken on a part-time basis teaching only mathematics to a Year 2 class. The second year involved teaching a Year 4 class on a full-time basis. The impact of teaching full-time had an immediate impact on the time available to focus on mathematics teaching. Efforts to implement elements of best practice were subjugated by my need to survive the crushing workload associated with undertaking the programming, planning, teaching, assessing and reporting of all KLAs, each involving significant content. In considering the implications of the findings of this self-study project it is important to consider the implications, not only for the support of novice teachers but also for the students they teach. Despite the positive experience of having taught part-time, improving on the skills developed in previous professional placement and casual teaching experiences including classroom organisation, behaviour management and programming, taking on a full-time teaching load with a new grade was overwhelming. Implications regarding the types of support that would have been of benefit in assisting my efforts to do more than survive the early experiences of full-time teaching, and improve the quality of mathematics education experienced by my students are drawn. These include suggestions of how university courses might assist in bridging the gap between the vision of quality and the realities of teaching; reduced workload to allow significant opportunities for lesson preparation; formal mentoring, from someone other than a supervisor, and structures to support the establishment of collegial partnerships; preservice and inservice courses that move the teacher from an image of reform to identifying and developing a specific component in their own teaching; and the provision of innovative mathematics programs to support both beginning and experienced teachers in improving the quality of their mathematics teaching. Recommendations for further research are made. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

This research study has investigated the beliefs that prospective primary school teachers hold about the epistemology of mathematics, and the teaching and learning of mathematics. In particular, it considered the following questions: * What beliefs and attitudes about mathematics and mathematics education do first year primary school student teachers bring into their tertiary education? * Are any of the students' beliefs about mathematics and mathematics education similar to the beliefs of the teacher educators in mathematics education and how do students interact with first year mathematics education subjects in the teacher education course? * How do students' attitudes and beliefs influence their success in learning new mathematics at this stage of their lives? * How do students' beliefs and attitudes affect their ideas on good practice in the teaching of mathematics in the primary school? The research design was qualitative, using a case study investigation of 50 students in their first year of a teacher education course. The students' passage through the first year mathematics education subjects provided valuable insights into their beliefs, principally by means of interviews and open-ended questionnaires. The study was designed to have pedagogical outcomes for the students, by embedding the collection and interpretation of data in the teaching and learning of their course. My personal perspective throughout this research has been that mathematics is a socio¬cultural phenomenon, and that the learning of mathematics is achieved through the mediation of language, social interaction and culture. This perspective of mathematics and the learning of mathematics has influenced the choice of methodology and the research questions asked. Results indicated that students often held two or more philosophies of mathematics and moved between these philosophies, depending on context. Further, students generally considered that the characteristics of a good teacher included being supportive and enthusiastic. Good pedagogy was believed to incorporate practical activities demonstrating relevance, and providing 'fun' for pupils. However, an alarming result was that having higher order knowledge about mathematics was often seen by the students as being a disadvantage for a teacher, principally because students believed such teachers would be less empathetic to struggling pupils. These beliefs affected students' interactions with the first year university mathematics education subjects, as their beliefs about the importance of subject matter knowledge were at variance with the beliefs of the teacher educators. This dissonance led to devaluing of the mathematics education subjects by some of the students. The study has led to the conclusion that a number of the students' beliefs about mathematics, and the teaching and learning of mathematics, should not be left unchallenged. Those beliefs dealing with ideas on good pedagogy should be strengthened, while beliefs about the nature of mathematics and the value of subject matter knowledge should be made more transparent and addressed. On the other side of the coin, teacher educators need to acknowledge the differences in the beliefs that student teachers and teacher educators might hold, and to consider ways of making mathematics education courses more relevant and meaningful for students.

This article presents the findings of a research which concerned with primary level students’ understanding of arithmetic principles. The objectives of this research were to investigate primary students’ understanding of inverse relation between addition and subtraction and find the possible difficulties when students using inverse relation principle. In this research, “Understanding” involved two aspects: 1. Knowing the fact and here, the fact referred to the knowledge of the inverse relation between addition and subtraction; 2. Ability to identify the situation that related to inverse relation and ability to make use of the inverse relation principle properly in related situation. With this definition, our research not just only concerned the students’ knowledge base, but also concerned how the students analyzed different problems and how they used the principle in different situations. The different situations meant the inverse related questions with different complexity and they were categorized into transparent inverse problems and non-transparent inverse problems. According to the result, students partially understood the inverse principle because they obviously underused the inverse principle in the related problems and they preferred calculating step by step with using column form. We also discovered that their understanding varied among different grades because of their arithmetic experience and the type of the inverse related questions. Basically, students did better in transparent inverse questions than non-transparent inverse questions and higher grade of students had higher level of understanding and they could use the inverse principle properly more often. But, the primary 3 students surprisingly did worse in non-transparent five-term inverse problems than primary 2 students. It may because the students experience and the attitude of analyzing the questions. These findings gave us some insight of teaching arithmetic in primary levels. / published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education

With the changing media environment, media literacy education begins to be an emerging field in China. There are many studies showing the significance of media literacy education; however, few studies on school practices are presented. The existing studies are mostly based on the context of western discourse. Even the curriculum framework in this case is influenced by western scholars. There have been a few studies investigating media literacy education in the Asian context. It is still struggling for the foothold in schools in China compared with countries where it has been practiced for a long time. Based on this understanding, this study is to explore the entry and approaches of media literacy education in a Chinese primary school. It aims to shift media literacy education from an international context to its local setting, and offers a point of reference to enrich the theory and practice in the process of localization. The research questions are concentrated on how media literacy education was initiated in the context of the national curriculum reform, and two ways in which it implemented in the HZMHT primary school. It is a qualitative case study, using observation, interviews, focus groups, group meetings and document analysis as the main methods of collecting data in the field. The introduction of media literacy education in the HZMHT primary school is consistent with the national curriculum reform, which provides an opportunity for the development of media literacy education. Through the changes in management structure and curriculum standards, the HZMHT primary school gets officially support to promote its curriculum innovation through media literacy education. The school practice becomes a response to curriculum reform in return. In this study, the curriculum practice is a result of a collaborative effort between a university and a primary school. With the endeavor of teachers in the HZMHT primary school and the team members from BBU, media literacy education was exercised both as a school-based curriculum and as an integrated component of multiple subjects. In the curriculum practice of media literacy education, students’ media culture is brought into the classroom and they are encouraged to interact with a digital society from the perspective of constructivism and critical pedagogy. Students construct new knowledge and fulfill personal growth by interacting with teachers and peers in a student-centered dialogue. In addition, they become aware of media environment and their roles in a world with dominant media. Five conceptual understandings of media literacy education are practised in the school-based curriculum, while priority was given to achieving the objectives of the original subjects in the integrated curriculum, where media literacy education is integrated with moral education, math education, information technology and integrated practical activities in a constructivist approach. Students’ engagement and interactive activities indicate the effectiveness in the curriculum practice. The research gaps on the process of contextual adaption and pedagogical exploration for media literacy education are filled through this school initiative in this case study. First, the changing paradigm of school practice and moral cultivation of the curriculum in China enrich the theory of localization for media literacy education. Second, the school initiative of a curriculum innovation fulfills the pedagogical exploration for the promotion of media literacy education and its legitimacy in Chinese context. / published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

No description available.

Research indicates that conceptual knowledge and abstract thinking was deficient in South African learners (TIMMS, 1999, 2003; Gower 2008). The general poor performance of learners in Reading, Mathematics and Science has spurred the Department of Education to conduct a campaign to boost learner performances in these learning areas. / Thesis (M.Ed.) - University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2009.

The general purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of using cognitive behavior modification (CBM) procedures as developed by Meichenbaum and Goodman (1971) to teach basic addition and subtraction skills to reflective and impulsive second grade students. The specific purpose was to determine if CBM tutoring procedures were generally more effective than conventional tutoring procedures or no tutoring, or if the relative effectiveness of the different types of tutoring depended upon the particular cognitive style of the students receiving the tutoring.There were 96 subjects who participated in this study. Permission slips were sent out to the parents of 223 second graders in the three participating elementary schools in Muncie, Indiana. Permission slips were returned by 167 students, all of whom were then administered the Matching Familiar Figures Test (MFFT). The median split procedure was used to classify 50 children as reflective and 49 as impulsive. From this subject pool 48 reflective and 48 impulsive students were randomly assigned to one of two types of tutoring or to a control group which received no tutoring. A total of six students was lost due to attrition.Ninety students were administered the operations section of the Metropolitan Achievement Test, which served as the dependent measure.A 3 x 2 factorial version of the post-test only, control group, true experimental design was used in this study. The three different levels of tutoring made up the active independent variable, while the two levels of cognitive style constituted the attribute variable.CBM instructional tutoring and conventional instructional tutoring were found to be ineffective in improving the mathematics achievement of second graders regardless of cognitive style when compared to a no-treatment control group which received no tutoring. Students receiving CBM instructions were resistant to modifying their problem solving approach to incorporate CBM procedures. The students were not chosen on the basis of having mathematics difficulty and may not have perceived themselves as needing to change a successful existing strategy. These findings were interpreted within the context of the less than encouraging previous results found with CBM and academics.

This research study has investigated the beliefs that prospective primary school teachers hold about the epistemology of mathematics, and the teaching and learning of mathematics. In particular, it considered the following questions: * What beliefs and attitudes about mathematics and mathematics education do first year primary school student teachers bring into their tertiary education? * Are any of the students' beliefs about mathematics and mathematics education similar to the beliefs of the teacher educators in mathematics education and how do students interact with first year mathematics education subjects in the teacher education course? * How do students' attitudes and beliefs influence their success in learning new mathematics at this stage of their lives? * How do students' beliefs and attitudes affect their ideas on good practice in the teaching of mathematics in the primary school? The research design was qualitative, using a case study investigation of 50 students in their first year of a teacher education course. The students' passage through the first year mathematics education subjects provided valuable insights into their beliefs, principally by means of interviews and open-ended questionnaires. The study was designed to have pedagogical outcomes for the students, by embedding the collection and interpretation of data in the teaching and learning of their course. My personal perspective throughout this research has been that mathematics is a socio¬cultural phenomenon, and that the learning of mathematics is achieved through the mediation of language, social interaction and culture. This perspective of mathematics and the learning of mathematics has influenced the choice of methodology and the research questions asked. Results indicated that students often held two or more philosophies of mathematics and moved between these philosophies, depending on context. Further, students generally considered that the characteristics of a good teacher included being supportive and enthusiastic. Good pedagogy was believed to incorporate practical activities demonstrating relevance, and providing 'fun' for pupils. However, an alarming result was that having higher order knowledge about mathematics was often seen by the students as being a disadvantage for a teacher, principally because students believed such teachers would be less empathetic to struggling pupils. These beliefs affected students' interactions with the first year university mathematics education subjects, as their beliefs about the importance of subject matter knowledge were at variance with the beliefs of the teacher educators. This dissonance led to devaluing of the mathematics education subjects by some of the students. The study has led to the conclusion that a number of the students' beliefs about mathematics, and the teaching and learning of mathematics, should not be left unchallenged. Those beliefs dealing with ideas on good pedagogy should be strengthened, while beliefs about the nature of mathematics and the value of subject matter knowledge should be made more transparent and addressed. On the other side of the coin, teacher educators need to acknowledge the differences in the beliefs that student teachers and teacher educators might hold, and to consider ways of making mathematics education courses more relevant and meaningful for students.

This thesis analyses social studies curriculum prepared by State Education Departments in Australia for use in primary schools. Curriculum statements from Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia, in the period from 1952 to 1984, are examined.