Knowledge of preservice elementary teachers on fractions

Abstract

Conocimiento sobre fracciones de docentes de primaria en formación Pre-service primary teachers' knowledge on fractions Conhecimento sobre frações de docentes do ensino fundamental em formação

Analyzing Second-Year University Students’ Rational Number Understanding: A Case on Interpreting and Representing Fraction

“…However, studies also address the prospective teachers' limited grasp of mathematics content knowledge and their teaching competence (Castro-Rodríguez & Rico, 2021;Depaepe et al, 2015;Klemer et al, 2019). Related to rational numbers, some researchers discovered that pre-service and in-service teachers lacked sufficient mathematics content knowledge and struggled to teach it (Lazić et al, 2017;Ni & Zhou, 2005;Osana & Royea, 2011); limited knowledge of proper procedures to solve rational number problems and were not able to describe reasons for their answers (Leung & Carbone, 2013;Putra, 2016); or preferred to solve rational number problems using the procedural approach over the conceptual approach (Vula & Kingji-Kastrati, 2016).…”

“…Related to fractions, some previous studies have highlighted final-year university students' or preservice teachers' knowledge of the concepts and procedures on rational numbers (Osana & Royea, 2011;Vula & Kingji-Kastrati, 2016). The trend of research focuses on revealing how mathematical content knowledge affects preservice pedagogy (Castro-Rodríguez & Rico, 2021;Depaepe et al, 2015) and noticing skill in responding to reactions/errors made by students (Ivars et al, 2018), or how mathematical concept knowledge affects preservice teachers' performance in doing number operations (Leung & Carbone, 2013;Putra, 2016;Webster, 2020). A common important assumption generated by them all is that there were still barriers to acquiring rational numbers, especially fractional content and concepts, caused by a lack of understanding.…”