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Place value is a foundational competency for primary school mathematics and for this reason we have sought to investigate what the recent and current academic conversations are around this important concept. In this paper we present a survey of literature presented in the Australasian, European and Southern African contexts through a review of purposively selected conference proceedings and journals to establish what the conversations have been about the teaching and learning of place value in these research communities from 2013 to 2022.

In this paper we report on an aspect of the findings of a larger three-phase study exploring the factors that influence teachers implementing pedagogies that cultivate students' STEM capabilities and 21st century skills. Data were collected through an online questionnaire, semi-structured interviews, focus groups and case studies. This paper will focus on the findings from the first phase of this study and initial analysis of focus groups and semi-structured interviews data. Preliminary findings show that participants hold mixed beliefs concerning student proficiency in mathematics and there are common factors that influence decisions concerning the use of pedagogical practices that support students' mathematical proficiency and the development of students' 21st century skills. These factors include teachers' personal beliefs and attitudes, perceived time and curriculum constraints, student behaviour and students' academic ability.

This paper explores use of a set of diagrammatic tools for representation and analysis of the moves a teacher makes implementing a mathematical modelling task. The focus here is on identifying what the teacher did so we can subsequently interrogate this, as to the why. Data include pre and post lesson teacher interviews and transcripts of a video and audio-recorded task implementation. The analytical tools developed, with one teacher and one task early in a three-year project were particularly useful in ascertaining what the teacher moves were as we subsequently sought to determine reasons for these.

Place value is one of the 'big ideas' in number and plays a critical role in helping students develop their number sense, problem solving and computation skills. Yet, the elegant simplicity of our place value system belies the abstract nature of the construct. This paper presents data from 606 Year 3-6 students (ages 8-12) from two metropolitan Melbourne primary schools who completed the Place Value Assessment Tool (PVAT). Each student's place value knowledge was categorised according to the Place Value Developmental Progression (PVDP). The results highlight the wide range of understanding in each year level and challenge the efficacy of a number magnitude-based progression in place value.

This paper reports on students' experiences of describing and representing variation in hypothetical data. Fifty-six students (8-9 years-old) experienced collecting and working with quantitative data for two years as part of a STEM education project. The task described here was an end-of-year survey question, with three parts about a hypothetical context for surveying students in two different Australian cities: recording the data, describing the potential variation in the data, and creating a representation of what the data might look like when only a descriptive account of the context and variables were provided. The data analysis framework utilised provides a means of determining students' readiness for further development of statistical ideas.

There has been a lot of media attention about 'out-of-field' teaching, but much of it does not capture the complexities of the term or account for the range of knowledge, experience, and attitudes relevant for teaching mathematics in the middle years. In this paper we report on a survey conducted to better understand the diversity of the profession teaching middle school mathematics (Years 7-10) in South Australia. A preliminary analysis indicates that self-identification as a teacher of mathematics is a key contributing factor to confidence in teaching mathematics. We suggest that looking through an identity lens will better inform planning and support for out-of-field teaching in mathematics.

This paper reports on 73 Grades 3 to 6 students' written responses to equal groups, arrays, multiplicative comparison and Cartesian product word problems. It is part of a larger study relating to students' development of multiplicative thinking (MT). The potential of using multiplicative word problems as a diagnostic assessment to reveal students' transition barriers from additive thinking to MT was explored. The development of the assessment and some of the research findings are described here. Findings show that students experience different types of barriers during their transition from additive to MT. Some recommendations are given on how these barriers might be overcome during primary school years.

In this paper we compare the early years mathematics curricula of Germany, South Africa, and Australia in relation to the place value concept. Place value is an important topic as it underpins much of the number work completed by learners in the early years of schooling. We found that there were differences between the three curricula that could be summarised using five themes: namely, number range, place value structure, role of the zero, influence of language, and use of materials. We argue that how the different curricula deal with these five themes influences the quality of learning provided and we highlight key areas of concern. In concluding we identify three important implications for our future research project.

Providing opportunities for students to demonstrate their mathematical thinking can be challenging. This paper reports on a case study conducted with a teacher and her class of Grade 3/4 students which investigated this phenomenon. Following collection of baseline data that showed her students were not demonstrating evidence of mathematical thinking, the teacher implemented teaching approaches designed to address this. The findings indicated the teaching approaches were effective and led to changes in the teacher's practice and professional growth. The study has implications for teachers who are looking to make changes to their practice based on evidence-informed teaching approaches.

This paper reports on early years teachers and how often they should devote planning time to anticipating student responses in advance of the lesson. Sixty-five Foundation to Year 2 teachers (students 5-8 years of age) completed questionnaires at the beginning and end of a year-long research-based professional development program. Participants were learning to teach with sequences of challenging tasks. Post-program data showed a shift in the frequency of time participants believed teachers should devote to anticipating student responses prior to teaching. Supporting teachers' mathematical knowledge for teaching with an emphasis on how they plan and anticipate student responses has implications for improving practice and student outcomes.

There is an educational expectation that children's natural drawing will develop into proficient mathematical representations and formal diagrams, yet there is little research available to guide the assessment and development of children's mathematical drawing skills. The aim of this paper is to explore how Year 2 children (approx. 7 years) chose to represent their interpretations of a simple story that is suggestive of the take-away subtraction process, and what changes occurred when the drawing task was repeated 6 months later. Analysis of 13 pairs of drawings revealed changes in what the children drew (categories of number representations) and how they drew it (style). The findings suggest that substantial change in children's representational ability can occur in within 6 months.

It is well accepted and understood amongst the mathematics education community that numeracy is the responsibility of all teachers, across all levels of schooling. However, the way numeracy is understood and actioned across the Early Childhood, Primary and Secondary contexts is different. This paper reports on a case study of secondary school teachers seeking to be more intentional in embedding numeracy across the curriculum. The findings indicate that dialogue and support to see, and make, numeracy connections result in greater cohesion in terms of understanding numeracy and making numeracy more visible for students.

Teachers often perceive barriers to integrating technology with Mathematics. In the study, teachers participated in professional development about considerations for and examples of integrating Digital Technologies into Mathematics learning in primary schools meeting the "Australian Curriculum: Mathematics and Digital Technologies" requirements. This exploratory multiple case study included preand post-surveys, mentoring conversations and interviews to explore their beliefs and perceived barriers to integrating mathematics and digital technologies. This paper provides insights into their perceived barriers to integrating digital technologies.

South Australia's PISA performance has been in constant decline since 2003 with the proportion of PISA participants meeting the Australian national proficient standard dropping from 73% (in 2003) to 50% (in 2018). In contrast, Singapore is a consistently strong performer. To better understand student readiness in answering PISA questions, this paper reports a curriculum comparison between Australia and Singapore for Years 9 and 10 in Measurement and Geometry. The findings highlight the similarities and differences in the topics covered in both countries' curricula and raise questions about potential implications for student outcomes in PISA.

This study aimed to reveal general landscape of research on teacher resilience, employing descriptive and bibliometric analyses. Descriptive analyses were performed utilizing Web of Science's internal system, while bibliometric analyses were executed through the VOSviewer program. Web of Science Core Collection was used as a data source. Citation analyses of publications, authors, and journals, as well as co-authorship, co-citation, and common word analyses were conducted. The research reveals a timeline of publications, indicating a notable surge in 2006, and a substantial increase in 2021. The countries with the highest number of publications on teacher resilience, in descending order, are the United States of America (USA), Australia, the United Kingdom (UK), and the People's Republic of China (PRC), according to the research findings. Authors such as Gu, C. Day, S. Beltman, C. Mansfield, and A. Price emerged from the citation analysis. Based on the results from the co-citation analysis, C. Day and Q. Gu were identified as the most frequently co-cited authors. The co-occurrence analysis of keywords highlighted key terms like resilience, teacher education, early career teachers, teacher candidates, professional learning, school leadership, and COVID-19. The findings were contextualized within the existing literature, leading to recommendations for future research. [This paper was published in: "EJER Congress 2023 International Eurasian Educational Research Congress Conference Proceedings," Ani Publishing, 2023, pp. 591-611.]

Augmented reality (AR), a cutting-edge technology, has the potential to change the way students learn by superimposing virtual items and information onto the real environment. Through more immersive and interesting interactions with digital content, AR might help students better understand difficult concepts and boost their drive to learn. As a result of its contribution to student learning, AR has become increasingly appealing to educational researchers. This study aimed to descriptively explore the characteristics of AR studies in education and to qualitatively analyze the most influential ones indexed in the Web of Science (WoS) between 2000 and 2022. A scoping review was conducted to determine the sample of the AR studies in education based on the inclusion criteria. Accordingly, descriptive analyses were conducted to identify the characteristics of the AR studies in education between 2000 and 2022 in terms of publication year, country, affiliations, journals, funding agencies, and citation trends. Then, the research methodologies and implications were found among the most influential AR studies in education between 2000 and 2022 by synthesizing qualitatively. The overall results indicated that AR studies in education have been conducted since 2008, with an increasing number of studies over time. Based on the implications of the most influential studies identified in terms of citation numbers, it was detected that AR has the potential to enhance education and training by providing interactive and engaging environments, linking real-world contexts with digital resources, and promoting efficiency and effectiveness in learning. [This paper was published in: "EJER Congress 2023 International Eurasian Educational Research Congress Conference Proceedings," Ani Publishing, 2023, pp. 273-291.]

For learners to be individuals equipped with the 21st-century skills when they start business life after graduation, they must be able to gain these skills during their education. However, due to their nature, it's not possible for students to acquire these skills under a specific course. For these skills to be achieved, they must be integrated across all curricula. In this study, an evaluation was conducted to see whether various countries incorporate the 21st-century skills in their curricula, how these skills are applied, and how these skills should be handled in their curricula. Within the scope of this research, the curricula applied in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, England, Ireland, and Turkey were examined. When the 12 skills defined by the P21 platform are considered, it can be seen that all skills are interconnected and that one cannot fully exist without the other. It can be said that starting to gain these skills, which are required by the 21st-century professions and which employers expect from graduates, from an early age it is important for individuals to be properly and fully prepared for the future. In accordance with the 21st-century expectations, evaluations, educational materials, teaching methods, professional growth opportunities, and learning environments should all be synchronized to create a supportive framework that generates the 21st-century results for contemporary students. [This paper was published in: "EJER Congress 2023 International Eurasian Educational Research Congress Conference Proceedings," Ani Publishing, 2023, pp. 97-126.]

In this paper we reflect on our combined work in some of the most marginalised educational contexts in the Southern Hemisphere. We draw on the work of Bourdieu to frame the paper. We propose the working in marginalised education settings requires a particular habitus or way of being to be able to play the research game. Underpinning our approach is the South African construct of Ubuntu, which is very much about collaboration--I am because we are--so that there is a move away from doing research "on" participants and contexts to one which is very much about doing research "with" participants and contexts. We find Bourdieu's notion of game as a powerful construct to theorise ways of thinking about the field of educational research.

School Mathematics Leaders seek to improve the mathematical learning outcomes of the students in their schools. Recognising that improved learning is dependent on high quality teaching, leaders are often keen to support teachers' knowledge of mathematics content and pedagogy. This paper reports ways in which School Mathematics Leaders support and lead the professional development of teachers in team meetings. Results from survey data and case study research are reported in this paper to describe and highlight the supportive actions undertaken by School Mathematics Leaders as they provide professional learning opportunities for teachers.

This paper examines the types of teacher questions that assist young students to interpret and explain their critical mathematical thinking (CMT). Focusing on students who enter their first year of formal schooling (aged 5-6 years), this paper draws on data from a one-on-one task based clinical interview conducted with 16 students. Teacher questioning data were analysed for question type (probing, factual, guiding) and further analysed against the conceptualized critical mathematical thinking framework for young students. Findings indicated that when teachers used clarifying, noting relationships, and offering opinions style probing questions, young students were supported to interpret and explain their critical mathematical thinking.

In Australia, all teachers are expected to explicitly attend to numeracy in the subjects they teach. Pre-service teachers, therefore, need to begin to develop effective numeracy teaching strategies but there is a limited research base to inform the design of courses that address this need. This paper reports on findings from a study investigating the impact of one such course. The paper draws on data from two pre-service teachers: two course tasks completed at the beginning of the course and interviews conducted at the end of the course. Data were analysed using the 21st Century Numeracy Model. Findings suggest there were changes to the pre-service teachers' understanding of numeracy and their capacity to embed numeracy in the subjects they will teach.

Engagement in mathematics education is an important factor in a successful student experience. This paper reports findings from a study of Year 5 student perceptions of engagement during a two-week, inquiry-based learning (IBL), problem-posing investigation. The study triangulated data from semistructured interviews, video observations and student work samples to understand the student's perspectives of IBL; however, this paper reports the interview data. The findings indicate that most of the students were behaviourally, emotionally, and cognitively engaged during the IBL investigation, and that the investigation provided an opportunity for students to experience levels of competence, relatedness, and autonomy need satisfaction.

Mathematics self-efficacy is considered an important variable in mathematics education because of its links to mathematics achievement. This paper reports on the development of the "Self-efficacy-effort in Mathematics Scale" (SEEMS), an instrument that has strong theoretical and psychometric properties. Based on a sample of n = 224 Australian primary students and n =133 secondary students, the instrument demonstrated positive correlations with related measures of mathematics achievement and mathematics self-concept. Girls had higher mathematics achievement within the primary and secondary school data. There were no significant gender difference in mathematic self-concept scores for the primary and the secondary school students. For mathematics self-efficacy, a gender difference was only identified in the high school data. The implications of this research to mathematics education practices are reviewed in the paper.

Mathematical self-concept refers to the perceived ability that one has in being able to do mathematics. While it has been shown to be a significant predictor for how students learn and apply mathematics, little research has been conducted into the relationship between the mathematical self-concept of teachers and their pedagogical practices in the mathematics classroom. This paper reports on a section of the findings from a small mixed methods study that sought to ascertain the nature of primary teachers' mathematical self-concept and how it is related to their teaching practices. Findings suggest that a teachers' mathematical self-concept does not necessarily reflect the mathematics practices evident in their classroom.

The description "primary mathematics specialist" has become more frequently used in Australia in the past 10 years, suggesting sustained interest in deepening teacher expertise. Despite this, there is limited contextual research about how to prepare in-service teachers for such roles, and the organising structures needed to facilitate their progress. This paper describes background and emerging insights from a project offering sustained and supported learning experiences for in-service teachers to become primary mathematics specialist teachers in and across their school. Curriculum and contextual experiences designed around a theoretical framework of leadership development implemented over 2 years are described. Early insights include the "priming" influence of an extended focus on mathematical content and pedagogical knowledge on participants' confidence to lead others, and the benefits of being explicit about enabling structures that promote sustainable growth and change.

Primary mathematics leadership has become a focus for improving the teaching of mathematics within Australian primary schools. Much of the training and support for those in the role have concentrated on content knowledge, rather than leadership training. There are currently no guidelines or standards in place to support the complex and multi-faceted roles and responsibilities of primary mathematics leaders. This paper reports on the initial stage of a research project examining how primary mathematics leadership is conceptualised and experienced. It reports on survey findings regarding teachers and leaders' understanding of primary mathematics leadership.