• Research in Mathematical Education
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.23-30
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• 2009

How to promote creativity for all students in mathematics education is always a hot topic for mathematics educators. Based on the theory study and practice in the project "Open-ended Questions in Mathematics" granted by Ministry of Basic Education Curriculum Study Center in China, the paper reported the effect of "Open-ended Questions in Mathematics" on the way to change the development of thinking ability, to inspire students to develop thinking flexibility, to expand their imagination, to stimulate their interest in learning, and to foster students' creativity.

• Journal of Elementary Mathematics Education in Korea
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.39-64
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• 2005

The purpose of this study is to transform questions in the 7th curriculum to open-ended problems and exam students' attitude towards open-ended problems. Research questions in this thesis are as follows: First, to transform questions in the 7th curriculum to open-ended problems and apply to a class in the fourth grade D elementary school. Second, to find how students respond to learning mathematics with open-ended problems. As a result of this study, the following are identified. First, the students showed positive reactions towards learning mathematics with open-ended problems. Those experience with open-ended problems make student solve mathematics problems with interest and confidence. Second, both good and bad students in the math class show interest and concentration toward open-ended problem. But a few students show less interest towards those problems. Third, through discussion about problem-solving with open-ended problems, students take part in math class actively and show respect one another. Fourth, especially students show more interest and confidence towards the open-ended problems transformed from mathematics textbook and like the constructive open-ended problems.

• The Mathematical Education
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• v.55 no.2
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• pp.209-232
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• 2016

This study analyzed the process of steps in a program introducing Renzulli's enrichment triad model and various levels of posing open-ended problems of those who participated in the program for mathematics-gifted elementary students. As results, participants showed their abilities of problem posing related to real life in a program introducing Renzulli's enrichment triad model. From eighteen mathematical responses, gifted students were generally outstanding in terms of producing problems that demonstrated high quality completion, communication, and solvability. Amongst these responses from fifteen open-ended problems, all of which showed that the level of students' ability to devise questions was varied in terms of the problems' openness (varied possible outcomes), complexity, and relevance. Meanwhile, some of them didn't show their ability of composing problem with concepts, principle and rules in complex level. In addition, there are high or very high correlations among factors of mathematical problems themselves as well as open-ended problems themselves, and between mathematical problems and open-ended problems. In particular, factors of mathematical problems such as completion, communication, and solvability showed very high correlation with relevance of the problems' openness perspectives.

• Journal of Elementary Mathematics Education in Korea
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.907-935
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of using open-ended problems in ability-level activities in mathematics instruction and to draw some informative conclusions in order to improve the practice of teaching and learning mathematics in the elementary school. To fulfill the purpose, the research questions were established as follows: 1. Is there any difference between the academic achievements of the experimental group(doing ability-level activities using open-ended problems) and the control group(doing general ability-level activities)? 2. Which sub-group(grouped by achievement score in pretest) get affected most by ability-level activities using open-ended problem in the experimental group? 3. What kinds of responses do students show in their ability-level activities using open-ended problems? By applying t-test and analysing the response, the conclusions were drawn as follows: First, using open-ended problems in ability-level activities has positive effects on the academic achievement of the experiment group. The mean of posttest scores of the experiment group was statistically meaningfully higher(p<.05). Second, using open-ended problems in ability-level activities affect most to the achievement of lower sub-group in the experiment group. The mean of posttest scores of lower sub-group in the experiment group was statistically meaningfully higher than that of control group(p<.05). Third, students showed various and creative response in their ability-level activities using open-ended problems.

• Education of Primary School Mathematics
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.25-35
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• 2010

The purpose of this research was to analyze questioning types of the Korean Elementary Mathematics Textbook in grade 3 and suggest the direction of questioning strategies for enhancing creativity in mathematics lessons. For the research, the researcher analyzed questioning types of the 3rd grade mathematics textbook and the changes of the questions compared with the questions in the previous textbooks. The author suggested the following recommendations. First, the questioning strategies of the revised mathematics textbook tends more to enhance students' creativity than the previous ones did. Second, teachers need to know the students' level of mathematics before starting their mathematics lessons because teachers can provide more effective differentiated questioning to the students. Third, students can response tuned to their level of mathematics if they meet with open-ended questions. It is desirable to develop good open-ended questions to fit students' abilities. Last, teachers should provide opportunities for students to share their own mathematical thinking. In risk-free environment, students can willingly participate at debating over mathematics proofs and refutation. Teachers should make efforts to make the classroom norm or culture free to debate among students, which leads to enhancement of students' creativity or mathematical creativity.

• Journal of the Korean School Mathematics Society
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.439-460
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• 2019

In this study, we examined classroom interaction to explore the relationships among teacher questions, turn-taking patterns, and student talks in mathematics classrooms. We analyzed lessons given by three elementary teachers (two first-grade teachers and one second-grade teacher) who worked in the same school using a conversation-analytic approach. We observed individual classrooms three times in a year. The results revealed that when teachers provided open-ended questions, such as "why and how" questions and "agree and disagree" questions, and used a non-IRE pattern (teacher initiation-student response-teacher feedback; Mehan, 1979), students more actively engaged in classroom discourse by justifying their ideas and refuting others' thinking. Conversely, when teachers provided closed-ended questions, such as "what" questions, and used an IRE pattern, students tended to give short answers focusing on only one point. The findings suggested teachers should use open-ended questions and non-IRE turn-taking patterns to create an effective math-talk learning community. In addition, school administrators and mathematics educators should support teachers to acquire practical knowledge regarding this approach.

• The Mathematical Education
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• v.62 no.1
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• pp.57-78
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• 2023

Students' engagement in lessons not only determines the direction and result of the lessons, but also affects academic achievement and continuity of follow-up learning. In order to provide implications related to teaching strategies for encouraging students' engagement in elementary mathematics lessons, this study implemented lessons for middle-low achieving fifth graders using open-ended tasks and analyzed characteristics of students' engagement in the light of the framework descripors developed based on previous research. As a result of the analysis, the students showed behavioral engagement in voluntarily answering teacher's questions or enduring difficulties and performing tasks until the end, emotional engagement in actively expressing their pleasure by clapping, standing up and the feelings with regard to the topics of lessons and the tasks, cognitive engagement in using real-life examples or their prior knowledge to solve the tasks, and social engagement in helping friends, telling their ideas to others and asking for friends' opinions to create collaborative ideas. This result suggested that lessons using open-ended tasks could encourage elementary students' engagement. In addition, this research presented the potential significance of teacher's support and positive feedback to students' responses, teaching methods of group activities and discussions, strategies of presenting tasks such as the board game while implementing the lessons using open-ended tasks.

• Research in Mathematical Education
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.209-221
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• 2014

In the last few decades there has been much interest in how mathematics can be effectively taught and learnt. The Third Wave is a unique ongoing international collaborative mathematics education research project, which aims to explore the relevant values of effective school mathematics teaching from both the teacher and student perspectives. As part of this project, this study investigates the related findings from students on the Chinese mainland. Multiple data were collected through classroom observations, focus group interviews, and written, open-ended questions. Twenty-four students from junior and senior secondary schools were invited to write down their views on an effective lesson, a good mathematics teacher, and how to do well in mathematics learning. Results showed that among the eight values determined in the study, the values of involvement, explanation, and examples were embraced by students across all grades. Students preferred teacher-led mathematics teaching. Junior secondary students placed more value on teachers' personalities, whereas senior students placed more value on teachers' teaching manners.

• School Mathematics
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.73-95
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• 2000

In this study, on the basis of the seventh national mathematics curriculum, the achievement standards were developed to specify the objectives and contents of teaching-learning at the first and second elementary school mathematics. The assessment standards were also developed to differentiate students’ levels of achievement with ‘high’, ‘mid’ and ‘low’ categories. Furthermore, this stuffy suggested the exemplary test items including short-answer and open-ended questions while putting emphasis on students' real performance to increase their ability in solving problems rather than in calculating. In addition to the test items, it introduced the grading system developed to grade the items with concrete guidelines and to report students' achievement on doing mathematics.

• School Mathematics
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.203-241
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• 2000

This study aims to suggest a model of task development for mathematics performance assessment and to develop performance tasks for the fifth graders in the primary school on the basis of this model. In order to achieve these aims, the following inquiry questions were set up: (1) to develop open-ended tasks and projects for the fifth graders, (2) to develop checklists for measuring the abilities of mathematical reasoning, problem solving, connection, communication of the fifth graders more deeply when performance assessment tasks are implemented and (3) to examine the appropriateness of performance tasks and checklists and to modify them when is needed through applying these tasks to pupils. The consequences of applying some tasks and analysing some work samples of pupils are as follows. Firstly, pupils need more diverse thinking ability. Secondly, pupils want in the ability of analysing the meaning of mathematical concepts in relation to real world. Thirdly, pupils can calculate precisely but they want in the ability of explaining their ideas and strategies. Fourthly, pupils can find patterns in sequences of numbers or figures but they have difficulty in generalizing these patterns, predicting and demonstrating. Fifthly, pupils are familiar with procedural knowledge more than conceptual knowledge. From these analyses, it is concluded that performance tasks and checklists developed in this study are improved assessment tools for measuring mathematical abilities of pupils, and that we should improve mathematics instruction for pupils to understand mathematical concepts deeply, solve problems, reason mathematically, connect mathematics to real world and other disciplines, and communicate about mathematics.