Still reflecting on students' beliefs and attitudes about mathematics

During my teaching career I spent a great deal of time reflecting on the attitudes that students developed toward mathematics. That hasn't changed in retirement.

So now I am studying students' beliefs and attitudes and teachers' reflective practice in my Master's thesis with Dr. Christine Suurtamm as my academic supervisor.

During the Ontario-based Math 4 the Nines project, I, and two other teachers of grade 9 applied mathematics worked with a graduate student to developed and administered a before-and-after student survey on beliefs and attitudes about mathematics. A change-analysis of the survey revealed some interesting results that gave us pause to think and reflect.

In my research study, entitled Informing mathematics teachers’ reflectivity with student surveys on affective domain, I am inviting secondary math teachers to talk about their reflective practices, with a focus on the information gathered through a before-and-after student survey on beliefs and attitudes about mathematics (see below).

Participation in this study will involve a 30 to 40-minute Zoom interview at the beginning of the semester on reflective practices. Participants will then be invited to offer their students an online survey on belief and attitudes about mathematics. I will provide a Google Form for you to copy*. The survey will take about 10 minutes at the beginning of the semester and again at the end of the semester. A before-and-after change-analysis will be automatically generated. At the end of the semester, participating teachers will be invited to a second 30 to 40-minute Zoom interview and a 45-minute online Zoom focus group.

*NOTE: By making a copy of the Google Form, you and you alone will have access to the student data. Neither my supervisor nor I will have any access to student data or student information.

I appreciate that there are added time pressures on classroom teachers these days but if you are interested in participating or would like more information, please send me a DM @BDMcLaurin or an email to bmcla077@uottawa.ca or bruce.mclaurin@gmail.com

Thank you for your interest.

~Bruce

Sample items from the student survey on Beliefs and Attitudes about Mathematics

1.     The math that I learn in school is mostly facts and procedures that have to be memorized.

2.     In math you can discover things on your own.

3.     Making mistakes in math helps me learn.

Sample results from the Google Form survey

Sample results from the automated change-analysis

 

You can take the teacher out of the classroom but . . .

 

We all leave the classroom eventually. The question is when? How do we know when it's time? For some it is simply the 85-factor (age plus years of teaching). Or maybe a retiring spouse. Perhaps a change in curriculum which demands a reinvention of classroom materials or a mandated assessment practice that provides a push. Conflicts with colleagues or administration. Health issues. Maybe when you have been in automatic mode for a while and find the whole thing is getting tedious.

I was looking for a sign. I never really got one. My 85-factor came and went as did my 60th birthday. I was still in good health. I had only had a handful of sick days in 10 years. I loved the work and my colleagues. My career felt like it was still on an upward trajectory. I was excited by the changes I saw in mathematics education and was ready for new challenges. When I tried to explore the idea of retirement with my spouse, she would just look at me blankly. Later she explained her lack of support by telling me that the concept was totally foreign to her. Her parents were approaching 90 and still working. So retirement was a decision that I made on my own. It was not easy. It was probably the toughest decision that I ever made. I decided on a Saturday and broke out in shingles on Sunday. But many of my younger contemporaries had already retired. I was a grandfather. So I suppose it came down to how finite this life is. There is a big world out there and maybe there was another role for me to play, another adventure to explore and the only way I would know was to quit teaching.

My spouse once heard that it is important to retire not from something but to something. I didn’t really have anything to retire to. I had been so focused on teaching that my life outside of the classroom was limited. The only way that I could begin to visualize other life possibilities was to walk away, cold turkey. I quit. No supply teaching. No Twitter. No socializing with teachers. The first summer was like any other. A cycling trip in September was a distraction. October and November were tougher. I was embarrassed to be seen on the street. I had no job. I had lost my identity. An exchange at a dinner party reemphasized why I had set myself adrift. I was relaying the statistic that teachers in Ontario work an average of 25 years and collect pension for 30. Our guest contrasted that with the civil service where the average pension life is measured in months! Life is short.

I had made a vow to myself to stay completely away from teaching for one year. And I did. One year became two. I cycled in Quebec, California and Spain. I skied in BC and Austria. Did trail runs in Virginia, Washington State and Mexico, reconnecting with friends on my travels. I worked on rebuilding our cottage which was destroyed in a forest fire. We welcomed our second grandchild, born the day after we got back from a trip to Europe. 

Despite my best efforts I still wasn’t able to turn my mind off teaching. I continued to be drawn to news stories about education. It is where my mind drifted to on 20K runs. I had to admit that even in retirement, I am still a teacher. It didn’t take much to get me to apply for my Master’s. A colleague mentioned it and my spouse thought that it was an excellent idea if I did it. After all, it was something that I planned to do even as I was completing my B. Ed. so many years ago. When Chris Suurtamm agreed to be my academic supervisor, it tipped the scales. The chance to work with her was too good to miss. 

I enjoyed the graduate coursework and discussing education again. The work hasn’t been terribly onerous. I was able to squeeze in a trip to Baja, Mexico between classes and collaborate on a paper while poolside in Palm Springs. I just received the okay from the Ethics to go ahead with my thesis proposal. As a former department head, a workshop leader and a frequent participant in lesson studies, I once got paid to talk with teachers about their practice. Now I am paying for it.