This book presents an international perspective on environmental educational and specifically the influence that context has on this aspect of curriculum. The focus is on environmental education both formal and non formal and the factors that impact upon its effectiveness, particularly in non-Western and non-English-speaking contexts (i.e., outside the UK, USA, Australia, NZ, etc. ).

The Learner's Perspective Study ascribes to the premise that the investigation of social practice within the mathematics classrooms must attend to the learners’ practice with at least the same priority as that accorded to the teachers’ practice. In focusing on student voice within this partnership, as enacted in many different guises across different cultures and socio-political learning environments, we hope that we will be better informed to understand the relationship between pedagogy and learning mathematics, and between pedagogy and the empowerment of diverse learners. Research findings from the Learner's Perspective Study reported in this book and its companion volumes affirm just how culturally-situated are the practices of classrooms around the world and the extent to which students are collaborators with the teacher, complicit in the development and enactment of patterns of participation that reflect individual, societal and cultural priorities and associated value systems. In this book, we attend closely to this collaboration with our focus on the voice of the student. Collectively, the authors consider how the deliberate inclusion of student voice can be used to enhance our understandings of mathematics classrooms, of mathematics learning, and of mathematics outcomes for students in classrooms around the world. The Learner’s Perspective Study aims to juxtapose the observable practices of the classroom and the meanings attributed to those practices by classroom participants. The LPS research design documents sequences of at least ten lessons, using three video cameras, supplemented by the reconstructive accounts of classroom participants obtained in post-lesson video-stimulated interviews, and by test and questionnaire data, and copies of student written material. In each participating country, data generation focuses on the classrooms of three teachers, identified by the local mathematics education community as competent, and situated in demographically different school communities within the one major city. The large body of complex data supports both the characterization of practice in the classrooms of competent teachers and the development of theory.

Utilizing the LPS dataset, Algebra Teaching around the World documents eighth grade algebra teaching across a variety of countries that differ geographically and culturally. Different issues in algebra teaching are reported, and different theories are used to characterize algebra lessons or to compare algebra teaching in different countries. Many commonalities in algebra teaching around the world are identified, but there are also striking and deep-rooted differences. The different ways algebra was taught in different countries point to how algebra teaching may be embedded in the culture and the general traditions of mathematics education of the countries concerned. In particular, a comparison is made between algebra lessons in the Confucian-Heritage Culture (CHC) countries and ‘Western’ countries. It seems that a common emphasis of algebra teaching in CHC countries is the ‘linkage’ or ‘coherence’ of mathematics concepts, both within an algebraic topic and between topics. On the other hand, contemporary algebra teaching in many Western school systems places increasing emphasis on the use of algebra in mathematical modeling in ‘real world’ contexts and in the instructional use of metaphors, where meaning construction is assisted by invoking contexts outside the domain of algebraic manipulation, with the intention to helping students to form connections between algebra and other aspects of their experience. Algebra Teaching around the World should be of value to researchers with a focus on algebra, pedagogy or international comparisons of education. Because of the pedagogical variations noted here, there is a great deal of material that will be of interest to both teachers and teacher educators.

For most people, the word mathematics is a noun. But for many people in different cultures, mathematics is not simply something they learn in school but something they do as an intrinsic part of their everyday lives. This book is a guide for teachers who would like to enhance their mathematics instruction by integrating it with examples and activities from cultures throughout the world. It provides culturally situated examples, each linked to Common Core objectives that show how mathematics can be so much more than a story problem or an exercise in a worksheet with little or no context. The eleven chapters provide a range of activities from around the world that teach students key math concepts while introducing them to a diversity of cultures. For example: In a Mayan village in Guatemala, students use math as a means to increase the traditional corn harvest Traditional symbols stamped on cloth in Ghana spark an exploration of geometry, measurement, and data analysis Embroidery patterns from Bulgaria can help younger students learn about patterns, and introduce older students to fractal geometry Klappenspiel, a popular classroom game in Germany, provides a fun application of probability analysis Each chapter has activities for specific grade bands (K–3, 4–8, and 9–12), and all activities are designed to encourage students to discover connections among math concepts, world cultures, and their own daily lives and communities.

“Teaching through problem-solving” is a commonly used phrase for mathematics educators. This book shows how to use worthwhile and interesting mathematics tasks and problems to build a classroom culture based on students’ reasoning and thinking. It develops a set of axioms about problem-solving classrooms to show teachers that mathematics is playful and engaging. It presents an aspirational vision for school mathematics, one which all teachers can bring into being in their classrooms.

This book comprises the full selected Regular Lectures from the Proceedings of the 12th International Congress on Mathematical Education (ICME-12), which was held at COEX in Seoul, Korea, from July 8th to 15th, 2012. ICME-12 brought together 4700 experts from 100 countries, working to understand all of the intellectual and attitudinal challenges in the subject of mathematics education as a multidisciplinary research and practice. These selected Regular Lectures present the work of fifty-one prominent mathematics educators from all over the globe. The Lectures cover a wide spectrum of topics, themes and issues and aim to give direction to future research towards educational improvement in the teaching and learning of mathematics education. This book is of particular interest to researchers, teachers and curriculum developers in mathematics education.

The book, the tenth volume in the series of yearbooks by the Association of Mathematics Educators in Singapore, comprises 14 chapters written by renowned researchers in mathematics education. The chapters offer mathematics teachers a cache of teaching ideas and resources for classroom instruction. Readers will find various task design principles, examples of mathematical tasks used in classrooms and teaching approaches to implement the tasks. Through these discussions, readers are invited to reflect and rethink their beliefs about mathematics teaching and learning in the 21st century, and reexamine the tasks and activities that they use in the classroom, in order to bring about positive impact on students' learning of mathematics. This book contributes towards literature in the field of mathematics education, specifically on mathematics instruction and the design of mathematical tasks and activities. Contents: Tasks and Activities in the Mathematics Classroom (Boon Liang CHUA and Pee Choon TOH) From Task to Activity: Noticing Affordances, Design, and Orchestration (CHOY Ban Heng) Affordances of Typical Problems (Jaguthsing DINDYAL) Mathematical Tasks Enacted by Two Competent Teachers to Facilitate the Learning of Vectors by Grade Ten Students (Berinderjeet KAUR, Lai Fong WONG and Chong Kiat CHEW) Use of Comics and Its Adaptation in the Mathematics Classroom (TOH Tin Lam, CHAN Chun Ming Eric, CHENG Lu Pien, LIM Kam Ming and LIM Lee Hean) Designing and Implementing Scientific Calculator Tasks and Activities (Barry KISSANE) Engaging the Hearts of Mathematics Learners (Joseph B W YEO) Developing Interaction Toward the Goal of the Lesson in a Primary Mathematics Classroom (Keiko HINO) Designing and Implementing Activities in the Flipped Classroom in the Singapore Primary Mathematics Classroom (CHENG Lu Pien, NG Swee Fong, TAN Bee Kian Jasmine Susie and NG Ee Noch) Designing Mathematical Modelling Activities for the Primary Mathematics Classroom (Chun Ming Eric CHAN, Rashidah VAPUMARICAN and Huanjia Tracy LIU) Extending d104book Exercises into Short Open-Ended Tasks for Primary Mathematics Classroom Instruction (YEO Kai Kow Joseph) Integrating Problem Posing into Mathematical Problem Solving: An Experimental Study (JIANG Chunlian and CHUA Boon Liang) A Vicennial Walk Through 'A' Level Mathematics in Singapore: Reflecting on the Curriculum Leadership Role of the JC Mathematics Teacher (Weng Kin HO and Christina RATNAM-LIM) Probability: Theory and Teaching (YAP Von Bing) Readership: Graduate students, researchers, practitioners and teachers in mathematics. Keywords: Mathematics;Instruction;Task Design;Singapore;Teachers;InstructionReview: Key Features: Firstly it has a focused theme: Mathematics instruction and task design, which is of prime concern to mathematics educators Secondly it is written by university scholars who work closely with classroom mathematics teachers thereby drawing on their research knowledge and classroom experiences Lastly, the book is rich resource, of tried and tested practical know-how of approaches that promote mathematics learning, for mathematics educators in Singapore schools and elsewhere