Initial Years of Teaching Mathematics: The Influence on Beliefs

Author(s):

Cigdem Haser

Conference:

ECER 2010

Network:

10. Teacher Education Research

Format:

Paper

Session Information

10 SES 05 A, Research on Teacher Induction and Early Career Teachers

Paper Session

Time:

2010-08-26

08:30-10:00

Room:

AUDITORIUM IX, Päärakennus / Main Building

Chair:

Judith Harford

Contribution

Beginning teachers generally are not aware of the difficulty of dealing with several factors such as students, parents, curriculum, and administrators until they start teaching (Flores & Day, 2006) and they lack the experiences in dealing with these difficulties. They also have certain beliefs about students, teaching, and school contexts that they carry from their pre-college years (Lampert, 1990) and some from teacher education programs. However, the school contexts influence beginning teachers’ beliefs and generally direct them towards the beliefs that teacher education programs do not desire beginning teachers to have (Raymond, 1997; Wilcox, 1992). Beginning teachers are not generally prepared for the reality of the schools and the beliefs that teacher education programs have developed are vulnerable since beginning teachers do not have much classroom experience that would strengthen these beliefs. Therefore, they are likely to depend on more teacher-centered or even pre-college beliefs in handling the complex nature of the school contexts.

The present study investigated how beginning teachers’ mathematics related beliefs have changed after their fourth-year teaching. The impact of the school contexts and the teacher education program on beginning teachers’ mathematics related beliefs were investigated in comparison to their beliefs after first-year teaching. It is hoped that the findings of the study would inform the teacher education programs and the beginning teacher policies.

Method

Six beginning teachers (one male and five female) who completed their fourth year in teaching participated in the study. These teachers have participated in a previous study and their mathematics related beliefs were investigated when they graduated from the same teacher education program and after they completed first-year in teaching. They have taught in several school contexts until their fourth year, mostly as the single mathematics teacher. The participants were interviewed after they completed fourth-year and during their fifth-year in teaching. The data was collected through a semi-structured interview protocol focusing on mathematics related beliefs and the difficulties of teaching. Interviews took about two hours, were transcribed verbatim, and were analyzed by two coders through a combination of belief frameworks by Thompson (1991), Lindgren (1997), and Ernest (1989). Participants’ mathematics related beliefs after the fourth year of teaching were compared by their beliefs after first-year teaching.

Expected Outcomes

Participating teachers stated rather teacher-centered beliefs about mathematics teaching after their fourth-year teaching, similar to their first-year teaching. Although they stated some student-centered beliefs, their reported practice confirmed the limiting influence of school contexts on teachers’ beliefs and practices as before. The school contexts they worked directed the participating teachers towards more teacher-centered beliefs and practices mostly because they did not have a colleague to share and reflect on their experiences. They considered the influence of the school contexts as inevitable and this strengthened their beliefs about the impact of teacher-centered beliefs on students’ learning. The findings indicated that the participants were not adequately prepared for the reality of the school contexts, especially when they were assigned to rural schools by the public school system. The influence of the National Curriculum system was also detected. The implications for the teacher education programs will be discussed.

References

Ernest, P. (1989). The knowledge, beliefs and attitudes of the mathematics teacher: A model. Journal of Education for Teaching, 15(1), 13-33. Flores, M.A. & Day, C. (2006). Contexts which shape and reshape new teachers’ identities: A multiperspective study. Teaching and Teacher Education, 22, 219-232. Lampert, M. (1990). When the problem is not the question and the solution is not the answer: Mathematical knowing and teaching. American Educational Research Journal, 27(1), 29-63. Lindgren, S. (1996). Thompson’s levels and views about mathematics. An analysis of Finnish pre-service teachers’ beliefs. Zentralblatt für Didaktik der Mathematik, 28(4), 113-117. Raymond, A.M. (1997). Inconsistency between a beginning elementary school teacher’s mathematics beliefs and teaching practice. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 28(5), 550-577. Thompson, A.G. (1991). The development of teachers’ conceptions of mathematics teaching. In Proc. 13th Annual Meeting of the North American Chapter of the Int. Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education, (Vol. 2, pp. 8-14). Blacksburg, VA. Wilcox, S. K., Lanier, P., Schram, P., & Lappan, G. (1992). Influencing beginning teachers' practice in mathematics education: Confronting constraints of knowledge, beliefs, and context. Research Report, National Center for Research on Teacher Learning, Michigan State University.

Author Information

Cigdem Haser

Middle East Technical University

Elementary Education

Ankara

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