• School Mathematics
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.617-636
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• 1999

This study was executed with the intention of guiding ‘open education’ toward a desirable school innovation. The basic two directions of curriculum reconstruction essential for implementing ‘open education’ are one toward intra-subject (within a subject) and inter-subject (among subjects). This study showed an example of intra-subject curriculum reconstruction with a problem solving area included in elementary mathematics curriculum. In the curriculum, diverse strategies to enhance ability to solve problems are included at each grade level. In every elementary math textbook, those strategies are suggested in two chapters called ‘diverse problem solving’, in which problems only dealing with several strategies are introduced. Through this method, students begin to learn problem solving strategies not as something related to mathematical knowledge or contents but only as a skill or method for solving problems. Therefore, problems of ‘diverse problem solving’ chapter should not be dealt with separatedly but while students are learning the mathematical contents connected to those problems. Namely, students must have a chance to solve those problems while learning the contents related to the problem content(subject). By this reasoning, in the name of curriculum reconstruction toward intra-subject, this study showed such case with two ‘diverse problem solving’ chapters of the 4th grade second semester's math textbook.

• Journal of Elementary Mathematics Education in Korea
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.141-161
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• 2009

Mathematical Communication ability can be more developed through sharing thoughts with others. Therefore when we instruct students in math, it is very important for teachers to provide them with opportunity to communicate mathematically. So this study provided open-ended problems in small-group collaborative learning. And we analyzed students' mathematical communication focused on the student's level of understanding. Furthermore, to improve students' mathematical communication ability, this study tries to attract the factors that we should consider the exact date for inserting the open-ended problems into a course of math and the student's level of understanding for selecting suitable open-ended problems.

• Research in Mathematical Education
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.137-173
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• 2021

Research and national standards, such as the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) in the United States, promote the development and implementation of K-12 interdisciplinary curricula integrating the disciplines of science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and computer science (STEM+CS). However, little research has explored how teachers provide epistemic support in interdisciplinary contexts or the factors that inform teachers' epistemic support in STEM+CS activities. The goal of this paper is to articulate how interdisciplinary instruction complicates epistemic knowledge and resources needed for teachers' instructional decision-making. Toward these ends, this paper builds upon existing models of teachers' instructional decision-making in individual STEM+CS disciplines to highlight specific challenges and opportunities of interdisciplinary approaches on classroom epistemic supports. First, we offer considerations as to how teachers can provide epistemic support for students to engage in disciplinary practices across mathematics, science, engineering, and computer science. We then support these considerations using examples from our studies in elementary classrooms using integrated STEM+CS curriculum materials. We focus on an elementary school context, as elementary teachers necessarily integrate disciplines as part of their teaching practice when enacting NGSS-aligned curricula. Further, we argue that as STEM+CS interdisciplinary curricula in the form of NGSS-aligned, project-based units become more prevalent in elementary settings, careful attention and support needs to be given to help teachers not only engage their students in disciplinary practices across STEM+CS disciplines, but also to understand why and how these disciplinary practices should be used. Implications include recommendations for the design of professional learning experiences and curriculum materials.

• School Mathematics
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.691-712
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• 2017

It is an important to develop teachers' statistical reasoning or thinking by teacher education. In this study, the "comparing two data sets" tasks is focused as a way to develop pre-service elementary teachers' reasoning about core ideas of statistics such as distribution, variability, center, and spread. 6 teams of each 4 pre-service elementary teachers participated on the tasks and their presentations are analyzed based on Pfannkuch's (2006) teachers' inference model in comparing two data sets. As a result, they paid attention to the distribution and variability in the statistical problem solving by the "comparing two data sets" tasks, and used their contextual knowledge to make a statistical decision. In addition, they used some statistics and graphs as the reference for statistical communication, which is expected to provide implications for improving statistical education. The finding implies that the "comparing two data sets" tasks can be used to develop statistical reasoning of pre-service elementary teachers. Some recommendations are suggested for teacher education by these tasks.

• Education of Primary School Mathematics
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• v.8 no.2 s.16
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• pp.69-96
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• 2004

The purpose of this study is to understand teaching and learning mathematics in elementary school classroom by considering mathematics as a kind of social practices and mathematics classroom as a kind of community of practice. The research questions of this study are as followings: 1) Which kinds of lesson organization reveal? 2) Which kinds of social participation structure reveal? 3) Which processes of making meaning reveal? This study was based on ethnomethodology. It was executed participation observations, interviews and surveys with teacher and 5 graders to collect the data related to the social practices formed their classroom. The social practices of mathematics classroom was analyzed from three aspects such as lesson organization, social participation structure and making meaning. The results from which we analyzed the social practices of the mathematics classroom are as followings. From the aspect of lessons organization, the teacher had a lot of power and authorities in the classroom and used them to elicitate students' responses. From the aspect of social participation structure, five SPSs(social participation structures) which revealed in Jo(1997)'s economics classrooms, were shown in this mathematics classroom, but there were a difference to the situations or frequencies which the SPSs appeared. From the aspect of making meaning, it was common that meanings are formed by the explanation of the teacher, but the teacher didn't deliver the mathematical meanings directly. She tried to interact with students to arrive shared meanings.

• Journal of Engineering Education Research
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.45-56
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• 2015

The goal of this study was to analyze the research trends of engineering education in elementary and secondary education. To accomplish this goal, this study analyzed the journal papers by 'published year', 'research topic', 'research subject', 'research method' and 'related school subject'. Followings are the results of this study. First, regarding the published year, the studies related to the elementary and secondary school level engineering education had been conducted 1 to 3 pieces intermittently from 1995 to 2009. And the number of studies are more than 5 pieces after 2010. Second, regarding the research topic, the number of study followed by 'investigation for current status', 'tendency analysis', 'development of teaching method or model', 'verification of teaching method/models' effect'. Third, regarding the research subject, the number of study followed by 'student', 'literature', 'professor', 'teacher'. Fourth, regarding the research method, the number of study followed by 'survey research' and 'literature research', 'qualitative research', 'experimental research' and 'integrated research'. Fifth, regarding the related subject, the number of study followed by 'science', 'technology', 'mathematics', 'practical arts'. Based on the results of this study, there are the needs for further studies to establish theoretical foundation on the engineering content elements in elementary and secondary school level, analyze on related variables and effects, develop engineering assessment instrument, use a variety of research methods, and conduct study on the applications of engineering in math subject.

• The Journal of Korean Association of Computer Education
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.71-80
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• 2010

A lot of studies in and outside the country says that robots can become an effective tool in developing creativity, problem solving skills and positive learning motivation in the knowledge and information era. This study aims to verify the educational effect of robots in mathematics education by applying robots to mathematics education as a learning tool in an effort to improve the teaching/learning environment. For this study, the mathematics curriculum of elementary school and robot programming were analyzed and then a robot integrated mathematics program was developed. The developed program was applied to the mathematics education of an elementary school year 5 over 16 times. The result of the study showed that the experimental group which used the robot integrated program has better learning attitude and problem solving skills than the group which used the traditional method. The result also showed that the mathematics activities that used robot programming contributed to developing problem solving skills and provided positive mathematics learning experience.

• Journal of Elementary Mathematics Education in Korea
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.301-316
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• 2011

In this study, some discordance between curriculum and textbooks in usage of mathematics terms, dual meaning of some terms in the usage of those terms in textbooks, and inconsistency of defining methods of terms are discussed through some examples. Generally it can not be expected that there are any discordance between curriculum and textbooks, because textbooks are developed in the basis of curriculum. But actually, some discordance between curriculum and textbooks can be found out. Some terms are used with two different meaning, geometric figure and measure. It can be causative of troubles in teaching and learning mathematics. Terms of same kind can be expected to be consistent in the way of defining, but some examples defined inconsistently can be found out. The following four suggestions are offered as conclusions. First, textbooks must be consistent with curriculum. Second, The meaning of terms used in textbooks must be stipulated obviously. Third, terms of same kind must be defined consistently. Fourth, it is necessary to supplement a system for developing elementary mathematics textbooks. The result of this study can help develop new textbooks, and revise curriculum, and develop new curriculum.

• Journal of Elementary Mathematics Education in Korea
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.161-194
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• 2017

The aim of this study is to look into sub-factors of spatial sense that can be contained in spatial sense of solid figure of mathematics curriculum and offer suggestions to improve teaching spatial sense of solid figures in the future. In order to attain these purposes, this study examined the meaning and sub-factors of spatial sense and the relations between spatial sense of solid figure and sub-factors of spatial sense through a theoretical consideration regarding various studies on spatial sense. Based on such examination, this study compared and analyzed textbooks used in South Korea, Finland and the Netherlands with respect to contents of mathematics curriculum and textbooks in grades, sub-factors of spatial sense, and realistic contexts for spatial sense of solid figure. In the light of such theoretical consideration and analytical results, this study provided suggestions for improving teaching spatial sense of solid figures in elementary schools in Korea as follows: extending contents regarding spatial sense of solid figures in mathematics curriculum and considering continuity between grades in textbooks, emphasizing spatial orientation as well as spatial visualization, underlining not only construction with blocks but also mental activities in mental rotation and mental transformation, comparing strength and weakness of diverse plane representations of three dimensional objects, and utilizing various realistic situations and objects in space.

• Journal of Elementary Mathematics Education in Korea
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.39-61
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• 2012

Mathematical creativity is essential in school mathematics and mathematics curriculum and ensures the growth of mathematical ability. Therefore mathematics educators try to develop students' creativity via mathematics education for a long time. In special, 2011 revised mathematics curriculum emphasizes mathematical creativity. Yet, it may seem like a vague characterization of mathematical creativity. Furthermore, it is needed to develop the methods for developing the mathematical creativity. So, the goal of this paper is to search for teaching and learning models for developing the mathematical creativity. For this, I discuss about issues of mathematical creativity and extract the factors of mathematical creativity. The factors of mathematical creativity are divided into cognitive factors, affective factors and attitude factors that become the factors of development of mathematical creativity in the mathematical instruction. And I develop 8-teaching and learning models for development of mathematical creativity based on the characters of mathematics and the most recent theories of mathematics education. These models make it crucial for students to develop the mathematical creativity and create the new mathematics in the future.