Ute Suhl

Teacher Education Effectiveness: Quality and Equity of Future Primary Teachers’ Mathematics and Mathematics Pedagogical Content Knowledge

The effectiveness of teacher education was examined by taking two indicators into account (Creemers and Kyriakides, “The dynamics of educational effectiveness: a contribution to policy, practice and theory in contemporary schools”, 2008): future teachers’ mean achievement on a paper-and-pencil test as an indicator of quality and the variability of teacher achievement due to background characteristics as an indicator of equity. In detail, the effects of gender and language on mathematics content knowledge and mathematics pedagogical content knowledge were examined. The analyses were embedded in IEA’s “Teacher Education and Development Study in Mathematics” (TEDS-M) and they referred to primary teachers from 15 countries in their final year of teacher education. The study revealed significant cultural differences in the effectiveness of teacher education. Gender and language effects could be decomposed into direct and indirect effects. The latter represented a combination of differential choices of teacher education programs according to background characteristics and differential achievement of teachers from these programs. Implications for educational policy are discussed.

Family background, entry selectivity and opportunities to learn: What matters in primary teacher education? An international comparison of fifteen countries

First findings of IEA’s “Teacher Education and Development Study in Mathematics (TEDS-M)” had revealed differences in the demographic background, prior knowledge, opportunities to learn (OTL), and outcomes of primary teacher education between future teachers from different countries. In this chapter, two hypotheses are examined: (1) OTL and teacher background are significant predictors of mathematics content knowledge (MCK) and mathematics pedagogical content knowledge (MPCK) as teacher education outcomes. (2) OTL effects are partly mediated by differential student teacher intake. Data from multilevel models reveal that effects on MCK are in general larger than on MPCK. Gender, prior knowledge and OTL in mathematics are significantly related to both types of outcomes whereas other background characteristics affect MPCK only. Motivation mediates the effects of prior knowledge and the OTL effects are partly mediated by teacher intake. Consequences for educational policy are discussed based on these results. Policymakers have on the one hand to be aware of the continuing problem of societal inequalities. Providing OTL in mathematics as well as increasing entrance selectivity may, on the other hand, have positive consequences for the outcomes of primary teacher education.

Diagnosing Teacher Knowledge by Applying Multidimensional Item Response Theory and Multiple-Group Models

Researchers are still struggling to define a concept of pedagogical content knowledge that separates this dimension from content knowledge. Based on data from TEDS-M, an IEA study of mathematics teacher education in 16 countries, this paper aims to contribute to this discourse by using different multidimensional approaches to modeling teacher knowledge. Another question of cross-cultural research is whether the characteristics of the latent traits examined and their interplay are homogeneous across countries (measurement invariance) or if it is necessary to treat the countries as separate groups. Our basic hypothesis is that more sophisticated multidimensional and multiple-group IRT models lead to valuable additional information that gives diagnostic insight into the composition of teacher knowledge. This is demonstrated using the TEDS-M data.

Kompetenzentwicklung in der Mathematik-Gymnasiallehrerausbildung eine empirische Studie an fünf deutschen Universitäten

Zentrales Ziel der von der Deutschen Telekom Stiftung geförderten Studie ist die Evaluation des ebenfalls von der Stiftung finanzierten Projekts „Mathematik Neu Denken“ zur Verbesserung der Gymnasiallehrerausbildung an den Universitäten Siegen und Gießen (ab WS2009/2010 auch DuisburgEssen). Diese innovativen Ansätze wurden nun aus einem externen Blickwinkel in Hinblick auf die erzielten Effekte im Bereich der mathematischen und mathematikdidaktischen und erziehungswissenschaftlichen Kompetenzentwicklung der Studierenden und der Entwicklung der zugehörigen Überzeugungen (beliefs) untersucht.

Relation of Student Achievement to the Quality of Their Teachers and Instructional Quality

This chapter examines how crucial input and process characteristics of schooling are related to cognitive student outcomes. It was hypothesized that teacher quality predicts instructional quality and student achievement, and that instructional quality in turn predicts student achievement. The strengths of these relations may vary across countries, making it impossible to draw universal conclusions. However, similar relational patterns could be evident within regions of the world. These hypotheses were investigated by applying multi-level structural equation modeling to grade four student and teacher data from TIMSS 2011. The sample included 205,515 students from 47 countries nested in 10,059 classrooms. Results revealed that teacher quality was significantly related to instructional quality and student achievement, whereas student achievement was not well predicted by instructional quality. Certain characteristics were more strongly related to each other in some world regions than in others, indicating regional patterns. Participation in professional development activities and teachers’ sense of preparedness were, on average, the strongest predictors of instructional quality across all countries. Professional development was of particular relevance in Europe and Western Asian/Arabian countries, whereas preparedness played an important role in instructional quality in South-East Asia and Latin America. The ISCED level of teacher education was on average the strongest predictor of student achievement across all countries; this characteristic mattered most in the Western Asia/Arabia region.

Zwei Kulturen? Mathematiklehramtsstudierende mit unterschiedlichen Zweitfächern

Ziel des vorliegenden Beitrags ist zu klaren, ob sich unter Mathematiklehramtsstudierenden verschiedene Kulturen identifizieren lassen, je nachdem ob sie ein Unterrichtsfach aus dem mathematisch-informatisch-naturwissenschaftlich-technischen (MINT) Spektrum oder ein anderes Zweitfach gewahlt haben. Deutlich wird, dass der Anteil von Studierenden, die sich unter sonst gleichen Umstanden fur ein MINT-Zweitfach entscheiden, bei Mannern mehr als doppelt so hoch ist als bei Frauen. Ebenso betragt der Anteil im Falle des Besuchs eines Leistungskurses in Mathematik im Vergleich zu einem Grundkurs mehr als das Doppelte. Die Kompetenzentwicklung verlauft in den ersten beiden Jahren der Sekundarstufenlehrerausbildung unterschiedlich. Allerdings stellt die Wahl des Zweitfachs keinen ausschlaggebenden Faktor dar. Stattdessen wird das Geschlecht ein weiteres Mal relevant, wenn es um den Erwerb fachwissenschaftlichen Wissens geht. Fur den Erwerb fachdidaktischen Wissens spielt die Abiturnote eine Rolle. Die Ergebnisse sprechen eher gegen die Annahme zweier Kulturen.

Empirische Studien zur Wirksamkeit der Mathematiklehrerausbildung

Die international vergleichende Lehrerbildungsstudie TEDS-M wurde von der International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) aufbauend auf TIMSS und PISA als Reaktion auf die kontinuierliche Kritik an der Lehrerausbildung beschlossen. Die Kritik an der Lehrerbildung und ihrer geringen Wirksamkeit ist sehr alt und wurde bereits Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts von Klein (1908) als „Doppelte Diskontinuitat“ beschrieben. Allerdings lagen bis dato keine gesicherten Erkenntnisse uber deren Wirksamkeit vor. Die umfassenden Reformdiskurse liefern allerdings Hinweise auf Wirkungsannahmen, die mit TEDS-M am Beispiel der Ausbildung von zukunftigen Mathematiklehrerinnen und -lehrern in den Klassen 4 und 8 uberpruft wurden: