Textbooks are essential learning resources for both teachers and students, but they often contain misconceptions that can affect students' understanding of key concepts, particularly in biology. Misconceptions can arise from inaccurate or incomplete information, and they may lead to incorrect conceptual understanding. The clarity and accuracy of…

This paper combines recent developments in theories of knowledge (complex dynamic systems), technologies (embodied interactions), and research tools (multimodal data collection and analysis) to offer new insights into how conceptual mathematical understanding can emerge. A complex dynamic system view models mathematics learning in terms of a…

The ability to relate physical concepts and phenomena to multiple mathematical representations--and to move fluidly between these representations--is a critical outcome expected of physics instruction. In upper-division quantum mechanics, students must work with multiple symbolic notations, including some that they have not previously encountered.…

A 12-episode constructivist teaching experiment with two pairs of elementary preservice teachers was conducted to examine how they reason distributively and proportionally. Specifically, I studied how prospective teachers reason with ratios as multiplicative comparisons. Prospective teachers solved different problems in one specific context (Step…

Students' difficulties in differentiating the direct proportion and inverse proportion problems cause interference. Proactive interference is the error that occurs when old information (concept of direct proportion) interferes with new information (concept of inverse proportion). In solving the problem of inverse proportion, students often use the…

We present a detailed description of a Cryptography and Computer Security course that has been offered at Knox College for the last 15 years. While the course is roughly divided into two sections, Cryptology and Computer Security, our emphasis here is on the Cryptology section. The course puts the cryptologic material into its historical context…

Higher numeracy is associated with better comprehension and use of numeric information as well as reduced susceptibility to some decision biases. We extended this line of work by showing that increased numeracy predicted probability maximizing (versus matching) as well as a better appreciation of large sample sizes. At the same time, we replicated…

We offer a new angle to explain the comprehension of mathematical infinity. We use Action-Process-Object-Schema (APOS) theory to explore the construction of different aspects of the cognitive Object related to this notion. We focus our attention on different ways of interacting with infinity, and how to act on infinite entities. Our aim is to shed…

This study contributes to the literature on linear algebra instruction by designing and researching a teaching sequence based on APOS Theory to introduce engineering students to vector spaces. The sequence offers students multiple opportunities to understand the concept. Another contribution is the evidence that introducing prerequisite…

The understanding mathematical concept is an error that often occurs in classroom learning among students when solving mathematical problems. The most difficult part for students is solving problems, because it requires numeracy skills, high concept mastery, as well as the ability to use good language, and so on so that students don't make any…

The paper presents findings from a study that examined, through the lens of the Image Having layer of the Pirie-Kieren model, the qualitative characteristics of the images that different children formed when engaging with eight, novel partitive quotient tasks. The Image Having layer is the first point of abstraction within the Pirie-Kieren model.…

This work is the result of a master's investigation in Brazil, which discusses the teaching of the parabola in the initial training of mathematics teachers. Our theoretical framework addresses the relationship between intuition and the dialectics of the theory of didactic situations, which supports the analysis of the results of this study Its…

This paper is part of broader research being conducted in the area of algebraic thinking in primary education. Our general research objective was to identify and describe generalization of a 2nd grade student (aged 7-8). Specifically, we focused on the transition from arithmetic to algebraic generalization. The notion of structure and its…

This study examines the solutions of 34 kindergarten children as they create equal groups from n bottle caps, where n was equal to 8, 9, 22, and 23. For each n, children were asked to find as many different solutions as possible. The number of solutions they found, i.e., children's fluency, as well as the strategies used to create equal groups,…

Similarity is a crucial concept introduced in the 8th grade, and it is further developed and reinforced through associations during high school. This research aims to investigate how 8th grade students construct the concept of similarity using concrete manipulative support within the framework of APOS theory. The research was conducted as a…