HKIER

Abstract

Drawing-based methods are one of well-regarded alternative approaches to the study of teacher beliefs. However, they are seldom used to study mathematics teachers’ beliefs. As such, this study aimed to investigate 90 Taiwanese pre-service primary teachers’ beliefs about mathematics teaching and learning using a drawing task, specifically creating pictures of themselves as mathematics teachers at work and writing explanations of the content of those drawings. Data were analyzed via a scoring scheme and a coding framework revised from previous studies. The study found that: (a) the participants’ drawings mainly represented a mix of traditional and constructivist beliefs, with rare uses of technology and manipulatives; (b) around 30% of the drawings presented teachers or students as having positive emotions or attitudes toward mathematics teaching and learning, while around 15% depicted negative student behaviors; (c) because the participants could have used a few figures to represent more, the number of students drawn per picture (M = 11.1) might not have any specific meaning, but might reflect their ideals about class size; (d) participants with different levels of educational degrees and different attitudes toward mathematics seem to have revealed differing beliefs about mathematics teaching; (e) these results imply that these pre-service teachers held somewhat less traditional beliefs than stereotypes of the younger generation of teachers tend to suggest. Practical implications and suggestions for follow-up studies were also discussed.

Keywords: beliefs; drawing; mathematics; pre-service teachers; teacher education

摘要

繪圖取向的方法被認為是研究教師信念的一種良好另類方式。然而，這種方法較少應用在數學教師上。有鑑於此，本研究目的在於透過繪圖任務，調查90位國小職前教師關於數學教學的信念。本研究的繪圖任務要求受試者想像他們正在學校課堂中教授數學，繪畫當時的情景，並使用文字輔助說明圖片中的內容。研究者參考先前文獻編制本研究的繪圖分析架構，分析資料後呈現五個重要結果：（1）本研究職前教師的信念繪圖以混合傳統和建構的信念為主，其中科技或教具的使用並不常見；（2）大約有30%的繪圖呈現教師或學生的正向情緒或態度，另有約15%的繪圖則呈現學生的負向行為；（3）繪圖中的學生人數平均為11.1人；據事後追問，繪圖裏學生人數的多寡可能是以少喻多、理想值或無意義；（4）職前教師的學歷或對數學的態度似乎影響其繪圖所呈現的信念類型；（5）整體而言，本研究的職前教師多數呈現混合的信念，與文獻中強調職前教師多為傳統信念的結果有別。本研究亦提出對教學的啟示，以及未來研究的建議。

關鍵詞：信念；繪圖；數學；職前教師；師資培育