Effect of Mathematics Method Course on Pre-Service Teachers’ knowledge of Content and Teaching Fractions (Published)
The study sought to examine the effects of mathematics teaching methods course on pre-service mathematics teachers’ knowledge of content of teaching mathematics. The data were collected from 120 level 300 pre-service mathematics teachers. Participants were given Fraction Knowledge Questionnaire to test their knowledge of content of teaching mathematics at the beginning and after method course. The purpose of the pre-test and post-test assessment was to measure the amount of change in the participants’ knowledge for mathematics teaching. The result of the study revealed pre-service teacher recorded gains in their knowledge of content and teaching fraction operations from content level to epistemic level. An eta squared statistic of 0.63 revealed a large effect size of mathematics teaching methods course on pre-service teachers’ knowledge of content and teaching fraction operations. Consequently, it was recommended that other studies be done in the other content domains of the basic mathematics in order to find the effect Mathematics Method course might have on those contents.
Keywords: Teacher Knowledge, content knowledge for teaching mathematics, mathematics teaching methods course, pre-service elementary mathematics teachers