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Individuals learn to develop problem solving strategies and make connections between their mathematical ideas while programming, so they have the opportunity to improve their thinking skills. Scratch provides an environment to experience problem scenarios and encourages them to act out imagination while having fun. The purpose of the study is to investigate the development of reflective thinking skills towards problem solving and computational thinking of elementary school students based on their Scratch instruction. The study used a sequential exploratory design as a mixed method approach with 524 students and 8 mathematics teachers. The results of the study revealed that Scratch significantly strengthened students' reflective thinking skills for problem solving and computational thinking. Based on the results, the reflective thinking towards problem solving and computational thinking did not vary by gender. In addition, Scratch instruction led to positive reflections in the mathematical learning environment.

Sociomathematical norms are the explicit or implicit arrangements that affect participation in mathematics classes and the emerging interactive structure of mathematical practice. For effective instruction, the teacher should guide the creation and development of acceptable sociomathematical norms. Thus, pre-service teachers should be given experiences in teacher education programs that demonstrate how the nature of sociomathematical norms influences critical abilities such as mathematical understanding and problem solving. This study aims to look at how pre-service teachers' knowledge of sociomathematical norms changes over time. This knowledge exchange is investigated throughout the pre-service training process, which involves dialogue writing and dramatization activities based on sociomathematical norms and psychological principles. Sixty-eight pre-service teachers took part in this study, which used the case study method. A semi-structured interview, the pretest and posttest containing the sociomathematical norm-framed dialogue analysis, video recordings of class discussions, and the researchers' observation notes in the lectures where the applications were carried out were all employed as data collection tools. This study would contribute to the literature with its components, positive outputs and suggestions for future studies.

The aim of the study was to investigate the noticing skills of prospective teachers and teachers at schools. The study adopted the case study design. The participants of the study were selected voluntary basis via criterion sampling method, and were composed of 12 student teachers of Mathematics at the Elementary Mathematics Teaching program of a state university, and 3 teachers of Mathematics in the practice school of participant student teachers. The student teachers analyzed mathematical thinking focused videos of students' problem solution activities in the course for 5 weeks with 3 hours each. In schools, a teacher's lesson was analyzed every week. The data collection tools consisted of the written opinion forms, observation notes, video recordings of classes, and follow-up meeting transcriptions. Written opinions of student teachers and teachers were analyzed week by week via theoretical framework (Van Es, 2011) in order to determine their level of noticing. The results revealed that after the sessions, the noticing levels of student teachers were improved. In addition, teachers did not make interpretations at extended level in the level of noticing.

We investigated and compared sociomathematical norms in secondary mathematics teachers' classrooms before and after using mathematical modeling activities. Participants were four secondary mathematics teachers. The data included 104 h of videotaped classroom observations and teacher interviews. The data analysis revealed notable changes in sociomathematical norms in teachers' lectures not utilizing modeling activities beyond those utilizing modeling activities. The results implied that teachers and students were convinced by and adopted what was done in the modeling environment. We discussed that modeling activities could be a powerful tool for mathematics teachers and students in challenging and transforming traditionally oriented classroom norms to those aligned with reform-oriented mathematical classrooms and their sustainability.

This study aims to examine mathematics teachers' interpretations of students' thinking within the scope of teaching experiments as a professional development activity. The method used in this study is a teaching experiment. The participants are 3 elementary school mathematics teachers. The teaching experiment consists of 5 teaching episodes and clinical interviews in each episode. The study was conducted in 15 weeks. The data collection tools consist of student solution sheets, written opinion forms, and video recordings of interviews and observation notes taken in clinical interviews after the application. Conceptual analysis of the data obtained from the teaching experiment was conducted as retrospective and prospective analysis. The results show that teachers developed the interpretation level of students' thinking by not only describing/commenting on students' solutions but also making appropriate comments on students' solutions in the process of teaching experiments. Considering that teachers can structure the content of their courses and classroom interaction based on students' different ways of thinking, it is believed that this study will provide foresight for future studies.

Storytelling is a popular instrument used in every domain of natural and social interaction for human communication and commonly used in classrooms to enrich the learning experience. With the use of technological tools in every field of our daily lives, its use in educational environments has become inevitable and in parallel with the development of these tools, digital stories have started to replace traditional storytelling. Digital storytelling offers advantages such as providing diverse applications in the classroom environment, personalizing the learning experience, being interesting, helping difficult subjects explained, addressing real-life-related situations, supporting active learning, allowing for the creation of costless learning environments, and improving motivation and achievement. Materializing a course such as mathematics in which abstract concepts are given, helping students use the learned information with stories and associate it with daily life, developing activities to make learning environments enjoyable when learning and applying by taking students away from the traditional understanding of instruction are considered some of the most important duties of teachers in this process. In accordance with the related considerations, this study aims to investigate the effects of mathematics courses instructed by association with digital storytelling on 8th-grade students' academic achievements and the teacher and student opinions on the application process. The study using the quasi-experimental method was conducted with 58 students. The Achievement Test, written opinion forms to receive student opinions and interview form for teacher were prepared by the researchers to this end. At the end of the study, although no statistically significant differences were found between the groups in the posttest and the delayed-posttest in terms of academic achievement score averages of the students in the experimental group were found to be higher than the score averages of the students in the control group. The results achieved in this study show that digital storytelling is a powerful instrument to create more interesting and enjoyable learning environments which facilitate association with daily life, allow for effective learning and participation. It was also stated that the students and the mathematics teacher had positive opinions on use of digital stories in the courses and its contribution to the courses.

Differentiated instruction is an instructional method complying with the constructivist approach that takes individual differences into consideration. Importance of pre-service education becomes apparent so that the differentiated instruction of which positive contributions such as having positive effects on students' academic achievements and enabling them to develop a positive attitude toward mathematics have been shown in mathematics education research can be applied in an efficient way. In this context, the purpose of this study is to examine elementary mathematics teacher candidates' competence of differentiated instruction and their opinions on the process during a pre-service education which has the components through which they become informed of the differentiated instruction method, develop differentiated instructional activities, these activities are observed by teachers and they discuss the effectiveness of the practices. The study group of the research was composed of 49 pre-service elementary mathematics teachers. Accordingly, competence level of differentiated instruction was found to be a value very close to the high level. It is thought that this study will provide information on the points to be taken into consideration in future studies to be conducted on obstacles and conveniences presented by pre-service teachers regarding the use of differentiated instruction method and the learning environment in the light of the practices.

WebQuests are designed to ensure meaningful learning by combining technology with a constructivist approach in the classroom setting. This study aims to examine the effect of WebQuests used in instruction on students' academic achievements and the student and teacher opinions on WebQuests. The participants of this study using the quasi-experimental method were composed of 78 ninth-grade students and five mathematics teachers. Within this scope, WebQuests for the attainments in the domains of Data, Counting and Probability learning in the ninth-grade curriculum were developed by the researchers. The academic achievement test developed by the researchers was applied to the experimental and control groups as pretest, posttest and delayed posttest. In the implementation process, the experimental group was expected to solve the non-routine problems within WebQuests. The student and teacher opinions on the implementation were received at the end. The SPSS software package was utilized for quantitative data analysis and the qualitative data were subjected to a content analysis in the study. Consequently, it was discovered that the WebQuest teaching strategy had a positive impact on the student learning retention. Furthermore, the themes obtained through teacher and student opinions and recommendations of the study emphasize important issues for future studies.

Recent developments in technology have changed the learner's profile and the learning outcomes. Today, with the emergence of higher-order thinking skills and computer literacy skills, teaching through traditional methods is likely to fail to achieve the learning outcomes. That is why; teachers and teacher candidates are expected to have computer literacy skills. Programming is the main focus of this study since it is an important part of computer literacy. The study aims to analyze mathematics education students' skills in the process of programming and their practices of integrating it into their teaching. The participants of the study are 42 third grade students of an Elementary Mathematics Education Program of a state university in Turkey. Within the study in which theory and practice was carried out simultaneously, the participants were taught the basics of programming and the algorithms with C programming language. The teacher candidates put the theoretical knowledge into practice using the visual programming application by MIT App Inventor at the computer laboratory. In addition, they used the MIT App Inventor visual programming environment to develop programs they will use in teaching mathematics in groups. Given the component of teaching of programming during this process, it is considered that the process of teaching in question will be effective in planning the teaching process of future studies. The reason is that not only it analyses the development of the variables used in this study but also because it takes into consideration the opinions of teacher candidates.

It is seen that students face certain difficulties when learning the concepts and the relationships between them in the mathematics education that aims at enabling students to learn on the highest level. Identifying and eliminating these difficulties, helping students in the learning process and guiding them are among teachers' tasks. Overcoming the difficulties experienced by students is considered one of the contributions of the technological use to the mathematics education. Yet, the efficient use of information and communication technologies in overcoming student difficulties is possible through bringing teachers and pre-service teachers in basic knowledge and skills. To this end, the effectiveness of the instruction in which pre-service teachers benefit from information and communication technologies to overcome the difficulties regarding a given concept was investigated. The participants were 32 third-year pre-service teachers attending at the elementary mathematics education of a state university. The effectiveness of pre-service teachers' micro-instructions and their opinions on the role and effect of technology in their instructions were analyzed within the framework of specified themes. The instructional plans, observation sheets, self-evaluations, and the inventory of the interviews performed in regard to self-evaluations which affected the change in the process were analyzed with the content analysis. Consequently, the findings obtained in the study showed how the pre-service teachers performed effective instructions and revealed the positive change in their perspectives, possible means that technologies can offer to students in the mathematics education, and their positive contributions to their own learning. As for the components and recommendations of this pre-service educational program, it will be effective in the planning of instructional process in future studies.

A natural outcome of change in technology, new approaches towards teaching and learning have emerged and the applicability of the flipped classroom method, a new educational strategy, in the field of education has started to be discussed. It was aimed with the study to examine the effect of using flipped classroom method in academic achievements and motivations of students and reveal the student opinions. The quasi-experimental method was used in this study and the participants were 50 sophomores studying Elementary Mathematics Education in a state university. The results of the study shows that the flipped classroom method does not have a significant effect on improving students' perceptions of technology use, and the students in the experimental group were more successful and had higher levels of motivation than the students in the control group. It was also revealed that the students had positive thoughts about the implementation of the flipped classroom method.

It is considered that teacher candidates offering their expectations and solution recommendations as well as assessing themselves on the competence aspect will be effective on eliminating the main problems in teacher training. In this respect, purpose of the research is to specify the opinions of teacher candidates on how they evaluate themselves and the faculty in which they study regarding qualifications they possess.The sample of the research conducted within the scope of descriptive study is consisted of 164 junior teacher candidates. The teacher candidates were asked first to examine the qualification documents as well as to identify the basic issues, and to answer a written interview form. The obtained data were examined under the themes of "deficiencies," "expectations" and "solution recommendations." Considering the outcome model, it is suggested that in-service-process should be investigated in more details with new studies on subjects such as teacher recruitment and career development.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of using a dynamic geometry environment (DGE) together with inquiry-based explorations on the sixth grade students' achievements in polygons and congruency and similarity of polygons. Two groups of sixth grade students were selected for this study: an experimental group composed of 66 students (34 boys and 32 girls); and a control group composed of 68 students (35 boys and 33 girls). The students in the experimental group taught with a DGE, while the students in the control group received textbook-based direct instruction. An achievement test was administered as pre-test, post-test, and delayed post-test in both groups. Qualitative data were collected through videotaped classroom observations. The results showed that the DGE together with open-ended explorations significantly improved students' performances in polygons and congruency and similarity of polygons. Furthermore, students in the experimental group showed greater interest and motivation toward learning geometry compared to those in the control group whom often showed lack of interest and curiosity. Also, students' comments and interpretations during lessons and tests were more accurate and advanced in the experimental group as they engage more in the DGE. Moreover, qualitative data suggested that boys showed greater interest in the computer-based learning environment than girls in the experimental groups although no significant gender effect on achievement was found. (Contains 6 figures and 4 tables.)

STEM education is an interdisciplinary educational implementation, and can easily be designed via collaborative efforts of teachers in order to provide students with comprehensive, meaningful and unique learning experiences. For effective STEM practices, the role of teachers is very important. The teachers who are able to handle STEM education are supposed to integrate different disciplines in the teaching/learning situations in the achievement of course objectives. In this sense, awareness and intention of pre-service teachers have a very important place for their future professional implementations. In this study, pre-service teachers' awareness of and intention towards STEM education were examined. The study adopted one group pre-test post-test research design. The participants were composed of 192 pre-service teachers in the departments of Computer Education and Instructional Technology, Science Education, Elementary Mathematics Education and Turkish Language Education in a state university in central Anatolia. The results revealed that the participants who could adopt STEM education, make use of interdisciplinary activities, and who were interested in developing their interdisciplinary knowledge were more aware of STEM and had positive intention towards STEM education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]