Inspiring Mathematics and Science in Australian Teacher Education

Merrilyn Goos, Judy Anderson, Kim Beswick, Judy-Anne Osborn, Caz Sandison, James Dalitz, Kathryn Holmes, & Elena Prieto-Rodriguez

In Australia, pre-service teacher education programs are structured so that future teachers of secondary school mathematics and science learn the content they will teach by taking courses in the university’s schools of mathematics and science, while they learn how to teach this content by taking content-specific pedagogy courses in the school of education. Such program structures provide few opportunities to interweave content and pedagogy in ways that help develop professional knowledge for teaching. This round table session will invite feedback on the early stages of a national project that is developing interdisciplinary approaches to mathematics and science pre-service teacher education. The project aims to foster collaborations between academics from different communities of practice – mathematics, science, education – in order to design and implement new teacher education approaches. It is hoped that these approaches will institutionalise new ways of integrating the content and pedagogical expertise of STEM academics and mathematics and science educators to enrich three key stages in teacher preparationâ€“ recruitment into teaching careers, participation in the pre-service program, and continuing professional learning following graduation. The goal of this Round Table session is to engage participants as critics, interpreters, and potential adopters of the products and processes of our project. Topics for discussion could include: the structures and cultures of STEM teacher education programs in different institutional, socio-economic and geographical contexts; examples of innovative teacher education approaches being implemented in other universities; barriers to and enablers of interdisciplinary collaboration.

Reviewing of research papers

Research papers will be blind reviewed by a panel of peers approved by the conference committee. The main purpose of the refereeing process is to contribute to the growth and development of quality practice in mathematics education research. Thus reviewers are asked to assist authors by providing helpful feedback and to comment on the suitability of papers for presentation at the conference. Accordingly, it will not be assumed that published papers presented at the conference will be as polished as articles in scholarly journals. Referees will be asked to assess papers being reviewed against the accepted norms for scholarly works presented at MERGA conferences, as set out above.

Each conference proceedings’ Editorial Team will exercise discretion over the reviewing process.

Reviewers’ comments will be returned to the authors. Authors whose papers are not accepted for publication may be invited by the editorial panel to present their paper at the conference, with an abstract (only) being published in the proceedings. Papers may be rejected outright, with no opportunity for presentation at the conference in an alternative form.

The MERGA website has detailed advice about criteria for reviewing of MERGA papers, review forms, and examples of strong and poor reviews of different types.

Inspiring Mathematics and Science in Australian Teacher Education

Inspiring Mathematics and Science in Australian Teacher Education

Short Communications

Presentation of short communications

Beth Southwell Practical Implications Award

Recent Winners

Applying for entry into the BSPIA

Judging of the BSPIA

History of the Award

Research Papers

Research papers can take two major forms:

i. Empirical investigations

ii. Theoretical or position papers

Originality

Reviewing of research papers

Presentation of research papers

Research Symposia

Early Career Research Award

Recent Winners

Applying for the Award

Early Bird Review Process