This mixed-methods study examined 220 teachers' responses from a new instrument, the Imagination, Creativity, and Innovation (ICI) Index. ICI Index scores represented teachers' predictions of how students would rate their school's support for student creativity, which was assumed to represent the teachers' perspective of the actual support for…

One way to recognize how mathematical lessons can be stimulating for children is to interpret them as stories. If mathematical lessons follow a structure similar to that of a story, they can build anticipation, create surprise, and even generate intrigue (Egan 1988). To support the design of mathematical lessons with these types of aesthetic…

Various curriculum resources have emerged over the last decades, but the textbook still remains the most used teaching and learning resource in mathematics classrooms. In this paper, we use a case study to analyse the teaching practice of one mathematics teacher. The aim of the study is to examine how the mathematics teacher interacts with the…

In this article, Sarah Currier, a math specialist at Elizabeth Hall International School in Minnesota, describes how she used origami in a deliberate manner to teach content. She shares how she uses paper folding to teach mathematical concepts, reinforce vocabulary, and as a problem-solving model. She also offers ideas for using origami in other…

In this article we intend to analyze the effectiveness of an educational program of mathematical creativity, designed for learners aged 10 to 12 years, which has been implemented in an urban school of Iasi, Romania. This analysis has both a psycho-educational dimension and a statistical analysis one. The psycho-educational dimension refers to the…

Words are the foundation of knowledge. They are powerful tools used to express ideas, communicate with others, access knowledge, and learn about new concepts. Research shows a strong relationship between student word knowledge and academic achievement. As a result, building academic content vocabulary is an important part of science instruction.…

Many students experience great difficulty understanding the meaning of fractions. For many students who have spent their early mathematics lessons focusing on counting (whole) numbers, recognising that there are many numbers between those whole numbers called fractional numbers, is quite revolutionary. The foundation of understanding fractions is…

Do manufacturers' claims about water projectile toys measure up? It is one thing to assert that a Super Soaker[R] shoots thirty linear feet, but can it really shoot that far? This lesson gives students an opportunity to test the claims, experience measurement in a meaningful context, and analyze data within that context. Although measurement can…

The author's teaching goal is always to make certain that his students, children and adults alike, have some reason for joining him on his mathematical journeys. The lesson he describes in this article provides him with the unusual opportunity to call attention to strategies that have had a long history and remarkable results. With careful…

This piece describes how a 5th grade language arts teacher employed technology to create and sustain a metaphorical, virtual, and physical figured world in her class by means of a web site called "The Hive Society." This world positioned students as intellectuals and scholars, and explored how Ms. Smith integrated 21st Century…

We describe several service-learning initiatives implemented by the mathematics and education departments. College students with majors and minors in math and math education have helped to design and implement math events for elementary and middle school students. Formal and informal reflections on these service-related experiences have…

This article features Sweet play math, a "math by the month" activity that involves decorating and making sugar cubes. Teachers may want to substitute straws, paper squares, alphabet blocks, or such commercially made manipulatives as Unifix[R] cubes for the real sweets. Given no allergy concerns, teachers and students alike would enjoy some sweet…

It is enchanting when over twenty students' quilt squares make a quilt. The common, yet diverse techniques for making a quilt transform the students' quilt squares into a shared quilting experience. A quilt made by students in one classroom can demonstrate a unique characteristic of each student by combining their squares into a quilt about a…

This study investigated the approaches to teaching by three fifth-grade teachers' of creative and non-creative mathematical problems for fractions. The teachers' personal constructs of the two kinds of problems were elicited by interviews through the use of the repertory grid technique. All the teaching was observed and video-recorded. Results…

During this five-day unit, students will enter the world of a Japanese classroom. They will talk about school uniforms, "fill" their backpacks with school items, and learn how to do a simple self-introduction in front of their peers. Students will participate in the cultural customs of a Japanese classroom and view pictures, videos, and…