This paper shares a flexible activity for engaging people in mathematical inquiry that does not depend on fixed prior knowledge built on a famous property of Möbius strips. The discussion includes the implementation of the activity and its extensions, facilitator moves and common participant thinking, suggestions for adaptation and integration…

The short activity presented in this article continues a discussion related to the value of golden ratio explorations in secondary mathematics, and acts as a companion to the earlier paper in this journal (Crawley, 2023). Exploring meaningful ways in which teachers can elicit students' interest and engagement in mathematics is vital, and…

In this report we show an investigation of how high-school students learn strategies to find intermediate numbers in an interval to understand the property of numerical density. Research has shown that some high-school students have difficulty in understanding this property. To mitigate this difficulty, we proposed a Hypothetical Learning…

In this article, we consider the phenomenon of improvisation by small groups of middle years students while engaged in rich mathematical tasks in a classroom setting. Working from the premise that improvisation comprises a spectrum of behaviour, we propose that there is a range of improvisational behaviours that may be observed as the students…

The use of tasks to promote mathematical reasoning (MR) in teaching practice is essential to meet curricular goals. However, that practice is often a huge challenge for teachers, and particularly for prospective teachers and thus it is essential to highlight it as a goal for initial teacher education. This study focuses on preservice mathematics…

What is a teacher to do when students share an idea with underlying mathematics that is different from that of the student contribution being discussed? Could such situations be avoided to begin with? In this article, the authors share strategies that can help teachers better keep the mathematics related to the student contribution under…

Off You Go is a PK-12 mathematical routine that leverages children's home resources and assets to help students take a concept with which they have initial or informal understanding and explore and test its boundaries to support defining or estimating with precision. The authors provide a guide for how to adapt this routine to engage students at…

Representing repeating nonterminating decimals as rational numbers is a topic introduced in the seventh-grade Common Core State Standards for Mathematics. According to Content Standard 7.NS.2.D., students should be able to represent a rational number as a decimal and understand that the decimal will either end in zeros or eventually repeat (NGO…

There are opinions about approaching the proof in mathematics education need to change as providing students to understand the mathematical proof rather than developing formal mathematical proof skills. In this context, proofs without words described as informal proofs can be used in proof teaching. The purpose of this study was to investigate the…

This article details a high school classroom activity in which algebra tiles are used to help students gain a conceptual understanding of completing the square. The activity utilises the eight elements of effective mathematics education suggested in the National Council of Teacher of Mathematics' (NCTM's) "Principles to action: Ensuring…

A study with prospective teachers without prior mathematical modeling experience sheds light on how their newly developed conceptual understanding of modeling manifested itself in their work on the final task of a modeling module within a pedagogy course in secondary mathematics curriculum and assessment. The main purpose of the module was to…

This article describes the implementation of a collaborative--competative pedagogy in a Year 10 class and the productive motivational outcomes that followed.

Originally written 30 years ago, this paper is an analysis of the central challenge of schooling--that of engaging fully the powers of students' minds in classroom learning. This challenge maintains its relevance today. The work of engaging what John Dewey referred to as students' "inner attention" becomes the focus of an investigation…

By means of three case studies, we will present two mathematical modelling activities that are suitable for students enrolled in senior high school and the first year of mathematics at university level. The activities have been designed to enrich the learning process and promote the formation of vital modelling skills. In case studies one and two,…

Applying the Mathematical Knowledge for Teaching framework, we discuss the components of teacher knowledge that might be useful in supporting mathematical inquiry, and examine ways in which we strive to develop this knowledge within a middle grades mathematics program for undergraduate students who are prospective teachers. Using sample activities…