Riding the Third Wave: Negotiating Teacher and Students’ Value Preferences Relating to Effective Mathematics Lesson

Abstract

The “Third Wave” is an ongoing international collaborative mathematics education research project, involving 10 countries conducted over the years 2009– 2011. Adopting the theoretical framework of social cultural perspective, the project aimed to explore the contextually-bound understanding and meaning of what counts as effective mathematics lesson from both the teachers and pupils’ per- spectives. This paper will begin with a brief description of the Third Wave Study Project, the research framework and the general methodology used. Thereafter, it will concentrate on the main focus of the paper featuring a detailed discussion of the related findings from the Malaysian data. The data involved six mathematics teachers and 36 pupils from three types of primary schools. Multiple data sources were collected through classroom observations, photo-elicited focus group inter- views with pupils and in-depth interviews with teachers. During each class lesson observation, the six selected pupils (as predetermined by their teacher) were given a digital camera to capture the moments or situations in the observed lesson that they perceived as effective. Pupils were then asked to elaborate what they meant by effective mathematics lesson based on the photographs that they have taken. Teachers were also interviewed individually immediately after each lesson obser- vation and pupil’s focus group interview. Findings of the study show that both teachers and pupils shared two co-values and two negotiated values in what they valued as an effective mathematics lesson. The two co-values are “board work” and “drill and practices” while the two negotiated values are “learning through mis- takes” and “active student involvement”. However, there are minor differences in teachers’ and pupils’ value preferences, for instance, pupils valued more of “clear explanation” from their teachers and active participation in classroom activities whereas teachers put emphasis on using different approaches to accommodate different types of pupils. More importantly, it was observed that an effective mathematics lesson is very much shaped by the continuous negotiation between teachers’ and pupils’ values and valuing. This paper will end with reflections on some possible implications and significant contributions of the study in mathe- matics education.