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This paper surveys various theories and models that have been used in the implementation of mathematics professional development programs in different countries for the past thirty years. The paper also reflects on the ongoing Mathematics Continuous Professional Development (MCPD) project's pilot study findings (reported in another paper of this special issue) that sought for an appropriate MCPD framework for South Africa. The South African study examined the status of existing MCPD practice and the challenges practitioners experienced in the implementation of MCPD programmes. The paper concludes that MCPD models can be categorized into two frameworks that should be considered for effective MCPD programs. These are the Mathematical Knowledge for Teaching (MKT) framework and the Organizational Framework of the MCPD that should also involve evaluation aspects in these frameworks. It is recommended that a framework that develops mathematics teachers and subject specialists in MKT combined with effective organizational structure at district level involving school principals, district officials, service providers and school based professional development activities could suit the current operational structure in the South African education system for effective MCPD.

In this article, the knowledge of traditional artifacts used by the Tchokwe tribe in Angola is explored and then related to the mathematical content learned in the classroom. Examples of artifacts provided in this article illustrate how knowledge extracted from the traditional artifact structures can be used to generate knowledge of concepts for the school mathematics curriculum. These illustrations show the advantage of the use of artifacts to develop ideas that lead to the determination of mathematical rules and principles. The process illustrated is contrary to the teaching of mathematics that involved remembering or following of the rules to obtain solutions. It is concluded that through illustrated processes, learners can learn and develop mathematical interest through reflecting and appreciating on what exists in their traditions. It is recommended that curriculum designs processes should include indigenous knowledge in school curricula for clear understanding of concepts and for long-term retention of knowledge.

In this paper, as a case study, the researcher looks at the performance of one mathematics module offered through Open distance learning (ODL) to student-teachers. The student-teachers' examination results for the past four years were analyzed and the set examination as well as performance for the year 2011 were analyzed in the six levels of the Bloom's taxonomy of the cognitive domain. The findings showed that the set paper reflected lower levels of the cognitive domain and the average performance in the past years was generally good. The findings also indicated that most students performed well in the lower levels indicating that they had not achieved adequate knowledge in higher levels important for critical thinking and problem solving. It was concluded that lower levels in the set examination and the poor performance in higher levels did not reflect quality in the module offered.

In this paper, we report the findings of a study on the impact of school category and parental assistance with homework on the mathematics attitude and achievement of senior secondary school students in Botswana. We adopted a quantile regression (QReg) method to analyse the relationship between attitudes and achievement, and also adopted a chi-square and independent sample t-test analyses. The advantage of the quantile regression (QReg) is that it establishes the relationship at the quantile (percentile) levels and does not require the parametric assumptions usually used in the Ordinary Least Square Regression (OReg). The findings showed that positive attitude significantly influenced the mathematics achievement of students across all the achievement quantiles of the QReg. The QReg also indicated that the school category had an effect across all quantiles except at the 5th percentile. Furthermore, the QReg indicated that at the 95th percentile, parental assistance with homework was very crucial in mathematics achievement. These findings implied that the OLS did not sufficiently capture the extreme tail characteristics of the mathematics achievement-attitude relationship. In particular, we observed that at the uppermost tail of mathematics achievements, parental assistance with homework explained better mathematics achievements than attitude. The authors concluded that the QReg method was an innovation to bridge the methodological gaps in previous similar studies. DOI: 10.5901/jesr.2014.v4n6p221

The mathematics student-teacher portfolio is used to document information about mathematics teaching, student-teacher progress through stages of experimentation and achievements during the teacher preparation period. Generally, portfolios have been considered to be reflective tools where student- teachers reflect on why, what and how they teach to meet set objectives. This theoretical paper provides a background on the use of a portfolio in student-teacher teaching practice and its significance in teacher preparation by referring to the mathematics subject. The portfolio assessment procedures are outlined and the portfolio assessment instruments developed and discussed. At the end, the portfolio assessment manual is presented. The author recommends the use of a portfolio in assessing mathematics student-teachers to form a greater part of teaching practice assessment. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2014.v5n15p267

This paper reports on the findings of the study that assessed the capacity of the School Governing Body (SGB) and School Management team - SMT ( school principal, deputy principal and HODs) to support the teaching and learning of mathematics and science subjects at one school in Mpumalanga Province in South Africa. In this paper, only findings of the mathematical literacy component are reported and findings on the other subjects are reported in other papers. A case study was conducted in one FET school and used a mixed- methods research design whereby qualitative and quantitative data was collected. The learners were from Grades 10 to 12. The data was collected in the year 2012 from the SGB, SMT, school learners, teachers, and general assistants at the school. The findings showed that though the students were enthusiastic to learn mathematical literacy subject, the SGB and School Management comprised of a weak team to support the students in pertinent areas needed to master the subject. It was concluded that lack of communication between the school administration, SGB, teachers, students and parents on issues pertaining to the execution of school policies, activities and security, could have contributed to lack of students’ engagement and assistance to master the subject. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2014.v5n1p579

The introduction of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) into the school curricula raised some hopes that it could minimize gender differences in learning. The interactive nature of ICT materials was believed to provide a favorable environment especially for girls to learn. This article reports the findings of the study that analyzed students’ gender differences in learning using computers in Botswana junior secondary schools in the year 2006. Variables considered were usefulness and enjoyment of using computers in learning, anxiety in learning when using computers and interaction among students of both sexes. Data were collected using structured interviews with closed and open-ended questions, and analyzed using qualitative and quantitative techniques. The findings of the study indicated that while gender differences existed in anxiety and usefulness variables, some positive aspects in learning were visible when computers were used. At the end, suggestions on the way forward are outlined.