Poster #28 - Does Instructional Quality Mediate the Impacts of Pedagogical content knowledge on Student Achievement in Mathematics

• In Event: Friday Poster Reception

Abstract

Pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) is presumed to have a significant influence on students’ academic outcomes. The theoretical underpinning of this presumption lies in the belief that teachers with high level of PCK are better equipped to deliver high-quality instruction, thereby facilitate student learning and improving their academic performance. 

Yet prior research on these relationships has yielded inconclusive results regarding the potential mediation mechanism. First, measures of PCK and instructional quality are inconsistent across previous studies, with each research team designing their own measures or choosing certain items from an existing instrument based on their specific focuses, making it difficult to integrate and generalize the findings. Second, causal evidence is lacking, particularly those employing a mediation framework to analyze relations among the three constructs. Experimental designs targeting teacher PCK in previous studies have typically been based on professional development programs of short duration, which failed to detect significant improvements because PCK is difficult to change in a short time frame, limiting their ability to observe impacts on instructional quality and student achievement. 

To fill in the gaps of previous research, this study utilized the experimental data from the Measures of Effective Teaching project, which surveyed 537 mathematics teachers across 162 schools in six urban school districts and their 12,204 students. The research design that randomized teachers across exchangeable classrooms removed between-class contextual differences within each randomization block at the school-by-grade level. With improved PCK measures and large-scale experimental data, this study contributes valuable insights into how PCK causally influences student achievement through the mediation pathway of mathematical instructional quality and the complex nature of the relationships between teacher content knowledge, instructional quality, and student achievement. While the direct effects of PCK on student outcomes are minimal, the role of mathematical instructional quality as a mediator warrants further exploration. 

Author

• Mengyuan Liang, Rutgers University
  Presenting Author