Teachers’ instructional strategies and their impact on learner performance in Grade 9 mathematics: Findings from TIMSS 2015 in South Africa
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.38140/pie.v39i2.4394Keywords:
Instructional strategies, Learner performance, Factor analysis, Linear regression, TIMSSAbstract
Teachers use a variety of instructional strategies when they teach various mathematical topics and concepts. Some of these strategies have been found to positively affect the performance of learners while others do not. This study analysed the teacher questionnaire data from the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Studies (TIMSS) 2015 study in which the teachers indicated the instructional strategies that they used in the mathematics classrooms. The five instructional strategies that were determined from the groupings of the questions were teacher-teacher interaction, teacher-learner interaction, teacher explanation of the content, problem solving with direct teacher guidance and problem solving without direct teacher guidance. The results indicate that the two instructional strategies of problem solving with direct teacher guidance and teacher-teacher interaction were found to be significantly associated with learner performance across the four content domains of algebra, numbers, geometry and data and chance.
Downloads
References
Adunola, O. 2011. The impact of local teachers’ teaching methods on the academic performance of primary school pupils in Ijebu-Ode government area of Ogun State. Nigeria: Ego Booster Books.
Alsawaie, O.N. 2003. What roles do mathematics teachers play when their students solve problems? In Proceedings of the Mathematics Education into the 21st Century Project, Brno, Czech Republic, September 2003, 38-42.
Amos, A.A. Folasayo, O.A. & Oluwatoyin, A.E. 2015. Instructional strategies for effective teaching and learning in Nigeria secondary schools. Paper presented at the First Asia-Pacific Conference on Advanced Research, Adelaide, Australia, 23-24 July 2015.
Arends, F., Winnaar, L. & Mosimege, M. 2017. Teacher classroom practices and mathematics performance in South African schools: A reflection on TIMSS 2011. South African Journal of Education, 37(3): 1–11. https://doi.org/10.15700/saje.v37n3a1362
Brousseau, G. 1997. Theory of didactical situations in mathematics. Dodrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers
California Department of Education (CDE). 2015. Mathematics framework for California public schools: Kindergarten through Grade Twelve. Sacramento: CDE.
Carr, J. & Bertrando, S. 2012. Top 10 instructional strategies for struggling students. Leadership, 42(1): 24-26.
Dean, C.B., Hubbell, E.R., Pitler, H. & Stone, B.J. 2012. Classroom instruction that works: Research-based strategies for increasing student achievement. Virginia: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
Eriksson, K., Helenius, O. & Ryve, A. 2018. Using TIMSS items to evaluate the effectiveness of different instructional practices. Instructional Science, 47: 1–18. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11251-018-9473-1
Eze, P.H. 2011. The relationship between instructional strategies/teacher methodologies and student performance and its implication for school leaders. PhD dissertation. Georgia: Clark Atlanta University.
Ganyaupfu, E.M. 2013. Teaching methods and students’ academic performance. International Journal of Humanities and Social Science Invention, 2(9): 29–35.
Gregory, G.H. & Chapman, C. 2013. Instructional strategies for student success. In: G. Gregory & C. Chapman (Eds). Differentiated instructional strategies: One size doesn’t fit all. Thousand Oaks: Corwin Books,
Harris, C.J., Phillips, R.S. & Penuel, W.R. 2012. Examining teachers’ instructional moves aimed at developing students’ ideas and questions in learner-centered science classrooms. Journal of Science Teacher Education, 23: 769–788. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10972-011-9237-0
Hoge, D.M. 2016. The relationship between teachers’ instructional practices, professional development and student achievement. PhD dissertation. Lincoln: University of Nebraska.
Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC). 2015. TIMSS 2015: Highlights of mathematics and science achievement of Grade 9 South African learners. Pretoria: HSRC.
Jepketer, A. 2017. Influence of teaching strategies on students’ performance in academic achievement and co-curricular activities in public secondary schools in Nandi County, Kenya. PhD dissertation. Nairobi: Kenyatta University.
Killian, S. 2016. Know thy impact, improve your teaching & boost student learning. Available at https://www.evidencebasedteaching.org.au/know-thy-impact/.
Levine, D.U. 1994. Instructional approaches and interventions that can improve the academic performance of African American students. The Journal of Negro Education, 63(1): 46–63. https://doi.org/10.2307/2967330
Lipton, M. 1995. Instructional strategies. In V.C. Wang (Ed). Handbook of research on education and technology in a changing society. Pennsylvania: Information Science Reference,
Lu, M. 2019. Analysis of modern teaching concept. Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, 310: 1–3. https://doi.org/10.2991/iccese-19.2019.210
Mangiante-Orsola, C., Perrin-Glorian, M., & Stromskag, H. 2018. Theory of didactical situations as a tool to understand and develop mathematics teaching practices. Annales de Didactique et de Sciences Cognitives, 145–173.
Mullis, I.V., Martin, M.O., Foy, P. & Arora, A. 2012. TIMSS 2011 international results in mathematics. Amsterdam: International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement.
Nafees, M., Farooq, G., Tahirkheli, S.A. & Akhtar, M. 2012. Effects of instructional strategies on academic achievement in a high school general science class. International Journal of Business and Social Sciences, 3(5): 161–166.
Nichols, K.M. 2015. Instructional practices for academic success in high poverty, high performing schools. PhD dissertation. Blacksburg: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.
Onweh, V.E. & Akpan, U.T. 2014. Instructional strategies and students’ academic performance in electrical installation in technical colleges in Akwa Ibom State: Instructional skills for structuring appropriate learning experiences for students. International Journal of Educational Administration and Policy Studies, 6(5): 80–86. https://doi.org/10.5897/IJEAPS2014.0347
Radford, L. 2008. Theories in mathematics education: A brief Inquiry into their Conceptual Differences. Working Paper prepared for the ICMI Survey Team 7. June 2008.
Reif, P. 1995. Understanding and teaching important scientific thought processes. Journal of Science Education and Technology, 4(4): 261–282. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02211259
Schoenfeld, A.H. 1992. Learning to think mathematically: Problem solving, metacognition and sense making in mathematics. In DA Grouws (Ed). Handbook of research on mathematics teaching and learning (pp. 334–368). New York: Macmillan.
Selman, E. & Tapan-Broutin, M.S. 2018. Teaching symmetry in the light of didactic situations. Journal of Education and Training Studies, 6(11): 139–146. https://doi.org/10.11114/jets.v6i11a.3811
Simon, M.A. 1986. The teacher’s role in increasing student understanding of mathematics. Educational Leadership, 43(7): 40–43.
Sriraman, B. & English, L. 2010. Surveying theories and philosophies of mathematics education. In B. Sriraman & L. English (Eds.). Theories of mathematics education. Berlin: Springer-Verlag. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-00742-2
Tebabal, A. & Kahssay, G. 2011. The effects of student-centered approach in improving students’ graphical interpretation skills and conceptual understanding of kinematical motion. Latin-American Journal of Physics Education, 5(2): 374–380.
Wisdom, N.J. 2014. Meta-didactical slippages: A qualitative case study of didactical situations in a ninth grade mathematics classroom. Unpublished dissertation. Georgia: Georgia State University
Yuliani, R.E. 2016. Perspective of theory of didactical situation: Toward the learning obstacle in learning mathematics. Proceedings of the Second SULE-IC, Palembang
Zhao, J., Huo, S., Li, Y., Li, D., Liu, X. & Zhou, J. 2017. Tide and shock: The influential modern teaching methods on Chinese education reform. In Proceedings of the ACM Turing 50th Celebration Conference. New York: Association for Computing Machinery. https://doi.org/10.1145/3063955.3063970
##submission.downloads##
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2021 Prof Mogege Mosimege, Dr Lolita Winnaar
![Creative Commons License](http://i.creativecommons.org/l/by/4.0/88x31.png)
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.