Accessing children's feelings and attitudes towards mathematics is a challenging proposition since methods for data collection may be fraught in terms of bias and power relations. This article explores a method of collecting information from young students about their attitudes towards mathematics using iPads, and a video diary technique not dissimilar to the 'Big Brother' room, with which many children are familiar. We describe the development of the tool and process when implemented in a primary school setting. We allude to both the enabling prospects of the technique as well as some of the limitations we found when implementing the method. We then discuss the implications of the largely negative attitudes and emotions that the students recorded and suggest that these negative attitudes are well formed by the end of the early years of schooling.
The investigation monitored the digital game-playing behaviours of 428 primary-aged students (aged 10-12 years). Chi square analysis revealed that boys tend to spend more time playing digital games than girls while boys and girls play quite different game genres. Subsequent analysis revealed statistically significant gender differences in terms of the types of mathematics-rich games students prefer to play. Girls preferred to play games that required problem solving, quantitative computations and the interpretation of graphs. Boys preferred games that required the decoding and encoding of maps. Given the fact that boys outperform girls of spatial tasks and mathematics assessment items that contain graphics, this study has implications for the development of students mathematics sense making.
The poor performance of Australian Indigenous students in mathematics is a complex and enduring issue that needs a range of strategies to enable success in schooling for these students. Importantly, large numbers of teachers in remote Indigenous contexts are new graduates who, although full of enthusiasm, lack experience. Similarly, many of them are unfamiliar with the demands and nuances of teaching in remote and/or Indigenous contexts. This paper explores the nexus between the beliefs and practices of teachers working in a remote, Indigenous region of Australia. In particular, it proposes that the discrepancy between beliefs and practices found in the reconnaissance phase of a design study is due to the teachers realising that they need to implement changed practices to enable students to learn but having little knowledge of what such practices may look like. This finding has implications for pre-service and in-service teacher education.
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