A relevant aim of research in education is to find and study the reasoning lines that students deploy when dealing with problematic situations. This can be done through an analysis of the answers students give to a questionnaire. In this paper, we discuss some methodological aspects involved in the quantitative analysis of a questionnaire by means…

In recent years the use of expert judgement to set and maintain examination standards has been increasingly criticised in favour of approaches based on statistical modelling. This paper reviews existing research on this controversy and attempts to unify the evidence within a framework where expertise is utilised in the form of comparative…

Instead of reserving the study of probability and statistics for special fourth-year high school courses, the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (CCSSM) takes a "statistics for all" approach. The standards recommend that students in grades 6-8 learn to summarize and describe data distributions, understand probability, draw…

Modeling and argumentation are two important scientific practices students need to develop throughout school years. In this paper, we investigated how middle and high school students (N = 512) construct a scientific argument based on evidence from computational models with which they simulated climate change. We designed scientific argumentation…

A diverse group of 20 high school students from four states in the US were individually provided with an engineering design challenge. Students chosen were in capstone engineering courses and had taken multiple engineering courses. As students considered the problem and developed a solution, observational data were recorded and artifacts…

In the study presented in this paper, we examined the possibility to scaffold mathematical modelling with strategies. The strategies were prompted using an instrument called "solution plan" as a scaffold. The effects of this step by step instrument on mathematical modelling competency and on self-reported strategies were tested using…

This study explores the attitudes of mathematics pre-service teachers, based on their initial exposure to a model-eliciting challenge. The new Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement determines that mathematics students should be able to identify, investigate and solve problems via modelling. The unpreparedness of mathematics teachers in…

This study aims to examine the effect of multiple problem-solving skills on the problem-posing abilities of gifted and non-gifted students and to assess whether the possession of such skills can predict giftedness or affect problem-posing abilities. Participants' metaphorical images of problem posing were also explored. Participants were 20 gifted…

This paper describes the ideas that mathematics teachers (grades 5-9) have regarding mathematical models of real-world phenomena, and explores how teachers' ideas differ depending on their educational background. Participants were 56 United States in-service mathematics teachers. We analyzed teachers' written responses to three open-ended…

The purpose of this study is implementation of a structured inquiry learning model in instruction of geometry. The model used is a model with a quasi-experimental study amounted to two classes of samples selected from the population of the ten classes with cluster random sampling technique. Data collection tool consists of a test item…

This paper presents an intervention study whose aim was to promote teacher beliefs about mathematics and learning mathematics and student competences in mathematical modeling. In the intervention, teachers received written curriculum materials about mathematical modeling. The concept underlying the materials was based on constructivist ideas and…

Contemporary teaching and learning approaches expect students--at any level of education--to be active producers of knowledge. This leads to the need for creation of instructional strategies, learning environments and tasks that can offer students opportunities for active learning. Research argues that one of the most meaningful and engaging forms…

Educational reform is most likely to be successful when teachers are knowledgeable about the intended reform, and when their concerns about the reform are understood and addressed. The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) is an effort to establish a set of nationwide expectations for students and teachers. This study examined teacher understanding…

In this study, we test an information-processing model (IPM) of problem solving in science education, namely the working memory overload model, by applying catastrophe theory. Changes in students' achievement were modeled as discontinuities within a cusp catastrophe model, where working memory capacity was implemented as asymmetry and the degree…

There is substantial variability in the degree to which the SAT and high school grade point average (HSGPA) predict first-year college performance at different institutions. This paper demonstrates the usefulness of multilevel modeling as a tool to uncover institutional characteristics that are associated with this variability. In a model that…