Teacher beliefs about child early math skill development

• In Event: Exploring the Connection Between Preschool Teacher Beliefs, Responsiveness and Child Learning Outcomes

Abstract

Background & Objectives:
Early math learning is an important foundation for later school learning (Geary et al., 2018: Duncan et al., 2007). However, pre-k teachers often feel more anxiety about teaching math (Beilock et al., 2010; Richland et al., 2020), feel more unsure about how to assess child math learning (Chen et al., 2014), and feel more comfortable teaching early literacy than early math (Brenneman et al., 2009). Considering this, our team has developed a formative assessment-instruction system that aims to increase children’s learning and teachers’ knowledge about child math learning. We found that the intervention – Getting on Track (GoT) – significantly increased children’s math outcomes (Raudenbush et al., 2020). For the current study, I am interested in how teachers learn about child math skill and how teacher beliefs about child skill shifts through GoT. My research question is: How do teachers describe child math skill and react to new information about child math skill that they learn from GoT?

Data & Methods:
To examine how educators react to new information about child math skill, I conducted semi-structured interviews with 30 educators participating in GoT in Midwest preschools. I employed grounded theory coding to identify emerging themes in the interview transcripts with educators. This analysis focuses on the following broad themes: knowledge of child skill and implications/decisions for practice.
Results & Implications:
Teachers are questioning and grappling with their underlying beliefs about child math skill as they participate in GoT. Teachers describe the data they receive from GoT as unexpected at times because they are learning about new math skills through GoT – like spatial awareness. Additionally, teachers describe a child’s performance on GoT as unexpected at times because they hold a different expectation of that child’s math skill. These unexpected moments demonstrate how teachers are learning about new math skills and learning about their students’ math skill through GoT. In many instances, teachers are talking about children performing better than expected, with one teacher saying, “there's been a couple of kids that have surprised me a lot [with] what they can actually do”. This quote exemplifies how teachers are reexamining their assumptions about child math skill to ensure that they have an accurate picture of child math skill.

These findings demonstrate that educators are not refuting novel messages that they learn from GoT but accounting for new learning from GoT to shift their beliefs about early math. Although educators often refute novel messages, as insufficient for their learning environment (Coburn, 2001), this sample of teachers is challenging their underlying beliefs about child math skill. For educator beliefs to shift, it is necessary that a novel message implicates the self directly and is appraised as a challenge, otherwise belief change is artificial (Ebert & Crippen, 2010; Gregoire, 2003). It seems that through GoT, teachers are challenging and updating their underlying beliefs about child math skill in moments when child performance on GoT is unexpected and novel skills are assessed. This demonstrates the ways teachers re-evaluate their beliefs about child learning to better serve their students.

Author

• Emilia Wenzel, University of Chicago