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A new issue of International Journal of Mathematical Education in Science and Technology has been released, and it contains a whole host of interesting articles and classroom notes. This issue appears to have a particular focus on the use of technology in mathematics teaching, and here is a list of the original articles that are contained in the issue: Sustainable student retention and gender issues in mathematics for ICT study , by Blazenka Divjak, Mirela Ostroski and Violeta Vidacek Hains A proposal for a variation on the axioms of classical geometry , by Bjorn Schellenberg Trends in performance of science and technology students (1997–2008) in Ireland , by Olivia Gill, John O’Donoghue, Fiona Faulkner and Ailish Hannigan Relational understanding and paths of reasoning through a Boolean lattice classification of quadrilaterals , by J. Karakonstantis and T. Patronis Using dynamic geometry to explore non-traditional theorems , by Arsalan Wares A new approach for proving or generating ...

After a slow month (on the blog - not at work!), it is great to see someone writing a nice review of this blog. This time it is Jerry Johnson from MathNEXUS who has written a very kind review . MathNEXUS is a web site particularly geared towards teachers of mathematics, and it presents itself as a mathematics portal with "news and ideas for teachers and learners of mathematics. So, if you're into teaching and/or learning of mathematics it might be worthwhile to check it out! Thanks for the kind words, Jerry :-)

A couple of new articles have been published online in Educational Studies in Mathematics lately, amongst those a very interesting one by my good colleague Martin Carlsen from the University of Agder, Norway. His article is entitled: Appropriating geometric series as a cultural tool: a study of student collaborative learning . Carlsen, along with other colleagues in Agder, have been influenced by the focus on small-group problem solving that was advocated by Neil Davidson and others some years ago. The Agder group is also strongly influenced by theories related to sociocultural perspectives of teaching and learning mathematics, and this article provides a nice overview of some of these theoretical foundations. The research reported in this article can be placed within a qualitative, naturalistic paradigm, and the data were analyzed using a dialogical approach (Carlsen here makes use of a framework developed by two other colleagues: Maria-Luiza Cestari and Raymond Bjuland). So, if you ...

Last week, an interesting article was published online in the International Journal of Early Childhood . The article is entitled Exploring Kindergarten Teachers’ Pedagogical Content Knowledge of Mathematics , and it has been written by Joohl Lee. The combination of teachers knowledge of mathematics and kindergarten is very interesting, and while a lot of research has been done to learn more about the type of knowledge mathematics  teachers need in school, little has been done to learn more about this in kindergarten. This is also mentioned by Lee in the article. As the title of the article reveals, Lee builds upon Shulman's traditional framework of teachers' professional knowledge. What I don't understand, however, is how it is possible to write an article about teachers' pedagogical content knowledge of mathematics without making any reference to the MKT (Mathematical Knowledge for Teaching) framework, or any of the work done by Deborah Ball and her colleagues at the U...

John M. Francisco and Carolyn A. Maher have written an article about Teachers attending to students’ mathematical reasoning: lessons from an after-school research program . This article was published online in Journal of Mathematics Teacher Education last Thursday. This article is interesting in several respects, amongst others because awareness of and knowledge about students' mathematical reasoning is something teachers need, and it should be part of every mathematics teacher's professional knowledge. Theoretically, it builds upon Shulman's classic framework, but they also make interesting links to a focus on practitioner-researcher collaboration. The article reports on a study that was made of "elementary and middle school teachers who participated as interns in the 1-year NSF-funded Informal Mathematical Learning Project (IML)". Here is a copy of the abstract of their article: There is a documented need for more opportunities for teachers to learn about stude...

The last couple of weeks have been extremely busy - for many reasons - and I haven't been able to follow up on all the latest articles and news in the field. I apologize for this, and I hope that all the readers of the blog have patience with me! I promise that I will catch up :-) In the meantime, you always have a couple of good options in order to stay really up-to-date: Pay attention to my Google Reader blog (shared items) Follow me on twitter These two sites are a bit easier for me to update, and when I don't manage to update my blog as often as I would, I will probably continue to push new updates to these two other services. Still, as soon as I get my head above water again, I will keep providing you with information here as well :-)

Esther Levenson, Pessia Tsamir and Dina Tirosh have written an interesting article about Mathematically based and practically based explanations in the elementary school: teachers’ preferences . Their article was published online in Journal of Mathematics Teacher Education on Friday. In this article, the authors make interesting connnections between research on teachers' knowledge and beliefs. Although their focus is on knowledge and beliefs in relation to the use of explanations (and they distinguish between mathematically and practically based explanations) in the classroom, the article makes a nice contribution to extending our understanding of the way these concepts are related. The part of teachers' knowledge (and beliefs) that the authors discuss is related to students' thinking, or even a sub-category of that. In this respect, they make valuable contributions to what Deborah Ball and her colleagues refer to as Knowledge of Content and Students, but their focus is al...