“Mathematics is my favorite subject!”: Variation in instructional practices boosting students’attitudes towards mathematics

Abstract

Attitudes toward mathematics is a construct that has attracted a lot of interest in educational research, both in small-scale qualitative studies (Boaler 1998) and in large-scale international studies (Mullis et al. 2008; OECD 2010), as well as in comprehensive meta-analyses (Ma and Kishor 1997; Marzano 2003; Hattie 2009), and as a basis for theoretical discussions of mathematical belief structures (Goldin 2002). This interest is triggered by the assumption that there is a close relationship between affective factors, motivational factors and student proficiency in mathematics (Nardi and Steward 2003; Op’t Eynde et al. 2001). Support for this supposition has been provided in national studies (Hensel and Stevens 1997), and also in large-scale international studies like PISA and TIMSS (Mullis et al. 2008; OECD 2010). An urgent challenge in educational research is therefore to discover and examine key factors that support the development in students of positive attitudes towards mathematics.