The aim of this study is to examine the concept images of mathematics educators and pre-service elementary mathematics teachers regarding the relationships between the concepts of slope, rate of change and derivative. Four mathematics educators working in different state universities and responsible for Analysis courses, three pre-service…

Why do people shift their strategies for solving problems? Past work has focused on the roles of contextual and individual factors in explaining whether people adopt new strategies when they are exposed to them. In this study, we examined a factor not considered in prior work: people's evaluations of the strategies themselves. We presented…

The anthropological theory of didactics (ATD) provides a lens to view mathematics education by placing mathematical practices within socio-cultural and historical contexts. The significance of institutions, in what regards with educational establishments, societal structures, cultural norms, and historical contexts, influences the perception and…

Why do people shift their strategies for solving problems? Past work has focused on the roles of contextual and individual factors in explaining whether people adopt new strategies when they are exposed to them. In this study, we examined a factor not considered in prior work: people's evaluations of the strategies themselves. We presented…

The aim of this research was to explore the mathematical connections that pre-university students make when they sketch the graph of a derivative function and an antiderivative function. Also, we tried to explain the origin of the mathematical connections identified. We assume mathematical connections as a cognitive process through which a person…

The article uses dynamic visualizations in Excel to examine a variety of ways in which students can attain a much greater depth of understanding of optimization problems in introductory calculus. The topics discussed include a variety of common optimization problems that appear in virtually every calculus textbook that can all be enhanced…

Prior research showed a gender effect on spatial ability, math anxiety, and math achievement. Lacking, however, is a comprehensive study that tested the mediation effects of spatial ability and math anxiety between gender and math achievement in a sequential mediation model. To fill this gap, this pilot study tested two mediation relationships,…

In the same chapter of his book "Opera Geometrica," Torricelli published two discoveries: 1) initial velocity of a jet from a container increases with the square root of the depth of the hole; 2) he drew the pattern of jets from three openings at the wall of a container filled with water to constant level "H" and determined the…

Bramlett and Drake (2013) suggest that the ability of teachers to teach proof is crucial for students to learn and develop formal and informal proofs. Teachers need to be involved in the process of proving and have a firm understanding of the critical role of proofs in order to effectively engage their students in proving activities. It is…

In this paper the authors described the influence of the computer-based environment on students' learning achievement of the multidimensional calculus, in particular double integrals. The research was conducted with the second year students at the University of Kragujevac, Serbia, with two groups of students: the experimental and the control one.…

Given the challenge of visualizing the main constructs of two-variable functions and their differential and integral calculus, it is essential to consider instructional resources' use and perceived potential to contribute to students' understanding. This case study considers how four instructors selected and used digital and physical resources in…

In this research we investigate how mathematics teachers, as graduate students, estimate the value of [pi] by exploring the problem of "squaring the circle" using digital technology. Initially, we mention some aspects of teaching and learning of calculus in the literature, emphasizing studies that use the notion of humans-with-media to…

This article uses dynamic software in Excel to demonstrate several ways in which graphical and numerical approaches can be introduced both to enhance student understanding of l'Hopital's Rule and to explain why the Rule actually works to give the "right" answers. One of the approaches used is to visualize what is happening by examining…

In this paper we present two simulations designed with GeoGebra that illustrate dynamically a key concept in Vector Calculus: line integrals of vector fields, along with other associated mathematical properties and applications. Students are not required to know the GeoGebra environment: a user-friendly interface with buttons, functionalities and…

This paper develops the ideas of "The Pedagogical Power of Context: Iterative Calculus Methods and the Epidemiology of Eyam" (French "et al." 2018 "J. Phys. Educ."), where we considered the application of the Euler method to solve epidemiological problems. Our purpose was to convey some examples of school level work…