ZDM, No 5, 2008

For some reason, ZDM has published two December issues this year. I have already covered one of them, which is actually No 6, but I have not covered No 5 (both are December issues). ZDM, No 5 has a focus on Empirical Research on Mathematics Teachers and their Education, and it is a very interesting issue (for me at least), with 14 articles:

• Introduction to the issue on Empirical research on mathematics teachers and their education, by Sigrid Blömeke, Gabriele Kaiser, Rainer Lehmann and William H. Schmidt
• Effectiveness of teacher education - State of research, measurement issues and consequences for future studies, by Sigrid Blömeke, Anja Felbrich, Christiane Müller, Gabriele Kaiser and Rainer Lehmann
• Opportunity to learn in the preparation of mathematics teachers: its structure and how it varies across six countries, by William H. Schmidt, Richard T. Houang, Leland Cogan, Sigrid Blömeke, Maria Teresa Tatto, Feng Jui Hsieh, Marcella Santillan, Kiril Bankov, Shin Il Han, Tenoch Cedillo, John Schwille and Lynn Paine
• Future teachers’ competence to plan a lesson: first results of a six-country study on the efficiency of teacher education, by Sigrid Blömeke, Lynn Paine, Richard T. Houang, Feng-Jui Hsieh, William H. Schmidt, M. Teresa Tatto, Kiril Bankov, Tenoch Cedilllo, Leland Cogan, Shin Il Han, Marcella Santillan and John Schwille
• Epistemological beliefs concerning the nature of mathematics among teacher educators and teacher education students in mathematics, by Anja Felbrich, Christiane Müller and Sigrid Blömeke
• “Last curves not quite correct”: diagnostic competences of future teachers with regard to modelling and graphical representations, by Björn Schwarz, Björn Wissmach and Gabriele Kaiser
• Future teachers’ professional knowledge on argumentation and proof: a case study from universities in three countries, by Björn Schwarz, Issic K. C. Leung, Nils Buchholtz, Gabriele Kaiser, Gloria Stillman, Jill Brown and Colleen Vale
• Content and pedagogical content knowledge in argumentation and proof of future teachers: a comparative case study in Germany and Hong Kong, by Alexandra Corleis, Björn Schwarz, Gabriele Kaiser and Issic K. C. Leung
• Knowledge and confidence of pre-service mathematics teachers: the case of fraction division, by Yeping Li and Gerald Kulm
• Chinese elementary mathematics teachers’ knowledge in mathematics and pedagogy for teaching: the case of fraction division, by Yeping Li and Rongjin Huang
• Combining theories in research in mathematics teacher education, by Pessia Tsamir and Dina Tirosh
• Secondary mathematics teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge and content knowledge: validation of the COACTIV constructs, by Stefan Krauss, Jürgen Baumert and Werner Blum
• A DNR perspective on mathematics curriculum and instruction. Part II: with reference to teacher’s knowledge base, by Guershon Harel
• Theories, context and values to understand learning with digital media: book review of ‘humans-with-media and the reorganization of mathematical thinking’, by M. Borba and M. Villareal, by Chronis Kynigos

So, if you (like me) you are interested in research related to mathematics teachers and/or mathematics teacher education, this would certainly be an issue to take a closer look at!

A large part of the articles in this issue are related to the international comparative study: "Mathematics Teaching in the 21st Century (MT21)". This study, according to the editorial, is the first study that has a focus on "how teachers are trained and how they perform at the end of their education".