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The purpose of this paper is initially to present findings which identify components of the practices of teachers acting as assessors of students' mathematics in the normal course of classroom work. At an informal level such practice is found to be complex and intimately related to every aspect of teaching and learning. It is found that even teachers who have undergone some assessment training may underestimate the role of interpretation of evidence, and questions about equity in the uses of teachers' judgements are raised in relation to awareness and practice. It is suggested that more care needs to be taken over the formation and use of `professional judgements' within systems of assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is methodologically based, addressing the study of mathematics teaching by linking micro- and macro-perspectives. Considering teaching as activity, it uses Activity Theory and, in particular, the Expanded Mediational Triangle (EMT) to consider the role of the broader social frame in which classroom teaching is situated. Theoretical and methodological approaches are illustrated through episodes from a study of the mathematics teaching and learning in a Year-10 class in a UK secondary school where students were considered as “lower achievers” in their year group. We show how a number of questions about mathematics teaching and learning emerging from microanalysis were investigated by the use of the EMT. This framework provided a way to address complexity in the activity of teaching and its development based on recognition of central social factors in mathematics teaching–learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The crisis in UK mathematics education, both in schools and universities, has been widely reported in the national media. A recent study shows that 26% of full-time mathematics teachers in UK schools have no qualification in the subject, and that 31% of all UK schools' mathematics teachers are now over the age of 50. The crisis in school mathematics has impacted on much of the university sector, with some departments under threat of closure and widespread difficulties experienced in student recruitment. The availability of attractive careers for mathematics graduates impacts upon the numbers choosing to enter teaching, thus risking a spiral of decline. Furthermore, studies suggest that UK mathematics graduates often lack confidence in several key skills essential for teaching, such as presenting information effectively, working in teams, and written communication. This paper recounts the development of a unit of study in the Faculty of Mathematical Studies at the University of Southampton, England, in conjunction with a new initiative, the Undergraduate Ambassadors Scheme, which seek to address the crisis in UK mathematics education through the training and placement of final year undergraduates as teaching assistants in local schools. This with a view to promoting mathematics to the broadest possible constituency as a university choice, whilst simultaneously developing those key transferable skills in which undergraduates regularly feel least confident, and allowing undergraduates to experience a flavour of teaching as a career option. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines a theoretical perspective on the ways in which children progress in learning mathematics. It suggests that there is a difficulty in associating teaching discourses with the mathematics they locate. This can result in an incommensurability between alternative perspectives being offered. The paper resists attempts to privilege any particular account but rather demands an analysis of these discourses and their presuppositions. In developing these themes the paper invokes Ricoeur‘s analysis of time and narrative as an analytical approach to treating notions such as transition, development and progression in mathematical learning. His notion of semantic innovation is introduced. This embraces both the introduction of a new metaphor into a sentence or the creation of a new narrative which reorganises events into a new ’plot‘. The notion is utilised in arguing that the shift in the student‘s mathematical development from arithmetic to first order linear equations with unknowns reconfigures the contextual parameters governing the understanding of these mathematical forms. It is also utilised in showing how alternative approaches to accounting for such transitions suit different and perhaps conflicting outcomes. For example, demonstrating awareness of generality or performing well in a diagnostic test featuring the solution of linear equations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Brian Griffiths (1927–2008) was a British mathematician and educator who served as a member of the founding editorial board of Educational Studies in Mathematics. As a mathematician, Griffiths is remembered through his work on what continue to be known as ‘Griffiths-type’ topological spaces. As a mathematics educator, his most profound contribution was, with Geoffrey Howson, in offering a conceptualisation of the relationship between mathematics, society and curricula. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the practices of two math teachers in Great Britain employing theme-based resources in their lessons. Set of activities used by teachers based on the theme of art; Ethnographic study of teacher's ways of implementing these resources.

Teachers in the UK and elsewhere are now expected to foster creativity in young children (NACCCE, ; Ofsted, ; DfES, ; DfES/DCMS, ). Creativity, however, is more often associated with the arts than with mathematics. The aim of the study was to explore and document pre-service (in the UK, pre-service teachers are referred to as ‘trainee’ teachers) primary teachers’ conceptions of creativity in mathematics teaching in the UK. A questionnaire probed their conceptions early in their course, and these were supplemented with data from semi-structured interviews. Analysis of the responses indicated that pre-service teachers’ conceptions were narrow, predominantly associated with the use of resources and technology and bound up with the idea of ‘teaching creatively’ rather than ‘teaching for creativity’. Conceptions became less narrow as pre-service teachers were preparing to enter schools as newly qualified, but they still had difficulty in identifying ways of encouraging and assessing creativity in the classroom. This difficulty suggests that conceptions of creativity need to be addressed and developed directly during pre-service education if teachers are to meet the expectations of government as set out in the above documents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]