There is a consensus on the fact that attitude toward mathematics, as an affective domain, is essentially defined or identified with interest, enjoyment, and confidence in learning mathematics. Other domains associated with attitude towards mathematics are perseverance, belief about mathematics, and appreciation of the usefulness of mathematics. Clearly, attitudes and the affective domain are essential in the learning and achievement in mathematics for students which can lead to desirable experiences in the subject. Investigating how the students perceive mathematics may guide the mathematics teachers in preparing for their learning activities. Indeed, teachers play an important role in influencing students’ attitudes, and consequently, improving students’ achievement.
The existing literature also depict that through the years, researches continue to focus on the importance of attitudes toward mathematics. The earliest was Mager (1968), who enumerated the sources of influence on subject matter tendencies which include the conditions that surround a subject, the consequences of coming into contact with a subject, and the way that others react toward a subject. This author considered that, indeed, teachers play an important role in cultivating attitude toward the
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They decided to focus only on four (4) categories, namely: confidence, value, enjoyment, and motivation. They believed that these categories can be addressed in school or within the ambit of teachers’ interventions. The modified scale consisted of 40-item distributed as 10 items for value category, 10 items for enjoyment category, 15 items for confidence category, and 5 items for motivation category. The number of items represents the weight of the category such that the category with the most number of items is considered as the highly prioritized aspect of the attitude and
These values and attitudes are instilled in the school- pupil agreements that are usually sent home when a child first begins their journey at a new school. They will be also shown continuously all around the school and children will be rewarded based on their demonstration of the values in class or around the school. The values and attitudes tend to be different for each school but usually try to encourage pupils to be and act in a respectful and responsible manner. Perseverance and determination, motivation, honesty, understanding and showing democracy are all examples of the kinds of values that a school will want to imbue in pupils. When pupils show good understanding or demonstrate one of the school values and a good attitude towards learning, they will be rewarded.
Mathematics has become a very large part of society today. From the moment children learn the basic principles of math to the day those children become working members of society, everyone has used mathematics at one point in their life. The crucial time for learning mathematics is during the childhood years when the concepts and principles of mathematics can be processed more easily. However, this time in life is also when the point in a person’s life where information has to be broken down to the very basics, as children don’t have an advanced capacity to understand as adults do. Mathematics, an essential subject, must be taught in such a way that children can understand and remember.
The adjustments include multiple choice to eliminate choices; discussion and essays give the students a chance to label or draw pictures; matching helps to eliminate unfamiliar language matches; short answers consist of one-word answers; true/false clarify the unfamiliar words and fill in the blank provides two to three choices. In addition, accommodating grading can be easy to focus on and allow the student to feel relief, which includes grading completed items and only half of the number of items, while accepting pictures as answers rather than word use; grade and count the process not the product and homework and labs should be included in their final assessment (Fregeau & Leier,
Mathematics education has undergone many changes over the last several years. Some of these changes include the key concepts all students must master and how they are taught. According to Jacob Vigdor, the concerns about students’ math achievements have always been apparent. A few reasons that are negatively impacting the productivity of students’ math achievements are historical events that influenced mathematics, how math is being taught, and differentiation of curriculum.
My students we be able to do math confidently and enjoy the subject. Every student is going to be strong in different areas of math and that’s okay. I need to express to students that we are all different and think different in other subjects. I believe students struggle with math because they feel discouraged math has this reputation for being disliked.
Grading Scales? Students frequently stress over the grade that is to portray whether a student does or does not understand the content. These grades are most often portrayed by the standard A, B, C, or D letter grades which define student success. Students often take a less abrasive route when given the option of choosing a topic for a challenging assignment. Receiving a grade seen in the students eyes as good is more important to the student then learning.
The way we think and feel about anything in general always has a reason behind it. In this paper, I will be discussing what factors influenced my beliefs and attitude towards mathematics. Implementation of Mathematics in Education Since math is one of the core subjects in school, we have been exposed to numbers since our first years in elementary.
I want to teach because I want to help my students create the foundation of their lives in mathematics and as individuals. As a future teacher of mathematics, I fear that students are becoming more and more hostile towards math. It bothers me because math is very important to learn conceptually and is a skill that will teach you multiple life skills. Mathematics is a life lesson when taught correctly. It teaches students good work ethic, integrity, humility, and discipline. These are all qualities that will help my students grow as individuals and as learners throughout their entire lives. I want to teach my students to love math because it is a skill that will help them grow. I think Rafe Esquith said it
Sherley, B., Clark, M. & Higgins, J. (2008) School readiness: what do teachers expect of children in mathematics on school entry?, in Goos, M., Brown, R. & Makar, K. (eds.) Mathematics education research: navigating: proceedings of the 31st annual conference of the Mathematics Education Research Group of Australia, Brisbane, Qld: MERGA INC., pp.461-465.
Kirova, A., & Bhargava, A. (2002). Learning to guide preschool children's mathematical understanding: A teacher's professional growth. 4 (1), Retrieved from http://ecrp.uiuc.edu/v4n1/kirova.html
As a secondary subject, society often views mathematics a critical subject for students to learn in order to be successful. Often times, mathematics serves as a gatekeeper for higher learning and certain specific careers. Since the times of Plato, “mathematics was virtually the first thing everyone has to learn…common to all arts, science, and forms of thought” (Stinson, 2004). Plato argued that all students should learn arithmetic; the advanced mathematics was reserved for those that would serve as the “philosopher guardians” of the city (Stinson, 2004). By the 1900s in the United States, mathematics found itself as a cornerstone of curriculum for students. National reports throughout the 20th Century solidified the importance of mathematics in the success of our nation and its students (Stinson, 2004). As a mathematics teacher, my role to educate all students in mathematics is an important one. My personal philosophy of mathematics education – including the optimal learning environment and best practices teaching strategies – motivates my teaching strategies in my personal classroom.
One very important factor in every life is the education received as we mature. Education in all subjects is necessary to become a well-rounded individual. Even so, I feel that my subject area has more significance in one’s future because every person uses mathematics every day. Students need to understand why mathematics is important and why they will need it in the future. The way to do that is integrated into the views of the role of the teacher. Teachers need to be encouraging role models that provide students with safety, nurturing, and support in the classroom, along with providing excellent instruction by allowing students to explore and expand their minds in the content of mathematics. Teachers should set high expectations for all students and persuade the students to live up to those expectations. Along the same lines, teaching and learning are complementary concepts. Students need for the teacher to provide them with the knowledge that will be used not only in that class but also in their future endeavors. ...
Devlin believes that mathematics has four faces 1) Mathematics is a way to improve thinking as problem solving. 2) Mathematics is a way of knowing. 3) Mathematics is a way to improve creative medium. 4) Mathematics is applications. (Mann, 2005). Because mathematics has very important role in our life, teaching math in basic education is as important as any other subjects. Students should study math to help them how to solve problems and meet the practical needs such as collect, count, and process the data. Mathematics, moreover, is required students to be capable of following and understanding the future. It also helps students to be able to think creativity, logically, and critically (Happy & Listyani, 2011,
When I graduated from high school, forty years ago, I had no idea that mathematics would play such a large role in my future. Like most people learning mathematics, I continue to learn until it became too hard, which made me lose interest. Failure or near failure is one way to put a stop to learning a subject, and leave a lasting impression not worth repeating. Mathematics courses, being compulsory, are designed to cover topics. One by one, the topics need not be important or of immediate use, but altogether or cumulatively, the topics provide or point to a skill, a mastery of mathematics.
Being a person that started off loving mathematics and experiencing different things I can say my beliefs have changed, but are back to where they began. I believe when it is time to teach mathematics this specific subject is going to have students on their toes ready to learn. As stated in my previous autobiography, “mathematics serves as a good subject for people to understand because it is something that follows you after school”, this particular statement serves as true because numbers and operations are real world things that humans