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This paper draws from a broad study that explored mathematics teachers’ engagement with textbooks within the Lesson Study context. In the current paper, we report on teachers’ use of mathematics textbook activities to inform their instructional decisions during collaborative lesson planning of numeric and geometric patterns. The study took place within the Lesson Study (LS) context – a teacher development practice that emphasises, inter alia, collaborative lesson planning. Data was collected by observing teachers during collaborative lesson planning and through interviews. Data analysis was informed by the Mathematics Knowledge for Teaching (MKT) framework and Modes of teacher engagement with the textbook. Findings suggest that teachers’ instructional decisions are mainly stimulated by the textbooks, teachers use textbook activities with fidelity, and they seldom adapt the activities drawn from the textbooks. However, where adaptation occurs teachers do it superficially. We contend that the capacity to conduct in-depth interrogation of the text is a derivative of mathematics subject matter knowledge (SMK) as well as pedagogical content knowledge (PCK). Therefore, the widespread adoption of text without interrogation could be indicative of the lack of requisite content knowledge and pedagogical skills.

Despite the emphasis on Sustainable Development Goals 4 and 5, which advocate for quality education and gender equity for all, the gender gap in the admission and enrolment of students in STEM fields, particularly in engineering, persists. The study, therefore, investigated the extent SDG has been achieved in the enrolment of students into Engineering courses. Faculty of Engineering in Nigeria University was used. The population of the is 6,159 (5,481 males and 678 females). Documentation analysis was used for quantitative data collection, while the Interview guide was used for qualitative data collection. Data were analyzed using frequency, percentages, and Chi-square (x2). Findings indicate that there exists a gender gap in enrolment among students admitted to Engineering courses in the university, among others. It was recommended that the government, parents, students, and teachers/lecturers have a lot of roles to play to see that this gender disparity or gap is narrowed.   

The Student Evaluation of Teaching (SET), although controversial, is a common practice at the higher education level for faculty appraisals and promotions, but seldom at secondary school level. Concerns have been raised as to whether students are informed and experienced enough to evaluate teachers’ teaching practices in a reliable way and arrive at valid outcomes. The purpose of this research was to explore the reliability of students’ evaluations of mathematics teaching at secondary school level. This research involved eight teachers, and 194 Grade 11 students from eight secondary schools in Bojanala District, North West province in South Africa. A SET questionnaire was developed, validated and used for data collection. The data were analysed by calculating the average deviation index of the students’ evaluations of each teacher per item and the Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC) with SPSS. This was done using one-way random effects, absolute agreement and a multiple raters/measurements model. Both the ADI and ICC values showed a high degree of reliability of the SET. Hence, SET at secondary school level may provide a reliable indication of teachers’ educational practices that might be used for the formative assessment of teachers’ instruction. It can also assist in designing teacher training programmes for pre-service teachers and professional development programmes for in-service teachers.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of the university curriculum in preparing pre-service technology teachers. The study examines the course guide of the technology education course at one of the universities of technology in South Africa in relation to grades 7–9 (senior phase) of the technology policy document. The study found that the university technology curriculum places emphasis on both content breadth (CB) and content strands (CS). However, some of the CSs in the university technology curriculum have no relevance to the CB and were not designed to enhance its depth. Therefore, this means that the CSs of the university technology curriculum were not designed to focus on the notion of ‘fitness-for-purpose’ which is market driven. However, it is imperative that students be given an opportunity to explore both CB and content depth (CD) as well as how other CSs can be used to develop a deeper understanding of CB.

Learners’ underachievement in mathematics is one major challenge in South Africa. Reports show that one of the topics that learners struggle with is functions. Many teachers also struggle to teach the topic effectively. The foundation of functions in the school mathematics curriculum is in the senior phase of schooling (Grades 7-9). Functions need to be taught effectively at the foundation level in order to ensure smooth content progression into the higher grades. Several studies globally have advocated the integration of graphing software with the teaching of some topics in mathematics including functions to enhance students’ learning of the topics. This study investigated the effect of in-tegrating GeoGebra with the teaching of linear functions on Grade 9 learners’ achievement. The study was guided by the constructivist theory of learning and followed a pre-test post-test, non-equivalent groups and quasi-experimental de-sign. The participants were 62 learners from two schools in Limpopo South Af-rica. The control group was 29 learners from one school and the experimental group was 33 learners from the second school. GeoGebra was integrated with the teaching in the experimental group while the control group was taught using chalk and talk. Data was collected using an achievement test and analysed using a t-test at 5% level of significance. The results showed that the experimental group (M = 51.76; SD 17.95) achieved statistically higher scores than the control group (M = 20.00, SD 11.16) with a large effect of 0.53. Implications are discussed.

The aim of this research was to examine the extent to which algebra content was taught to Grade 9 mathematics learners in four schools within a specific education district in Gauteng province, South Africa. This qualitative case study was conducted within the framework of interpretive qualitative research. Document analysis was employed as the method of data collection. The findings of the study indicate that the coverage of algebra content in the participating schools did not align with the prescribed curriculum. Consequently, it can be inferred that the learners did not have adequate opportunities to learn the algebra content. It is recommended that teachers adhere to the curriculum guidelines when delivering instruction.

Mathematics textbooks are commonly considered to be tools for efficient teaching and implementing change in mathematics classrooms worldwide, helping teachers to teach and learners to learn. When the content as described in the curriculum is not faithfully and relevantly represented in textbooks, learners’ opportunity is limited. Against this background, opportunity to learn Euclidean geometry was investigated by scrutinising four Grade 11 mathematics textbooks used in South African schools, using deductive content analysis. The Kurz Opportunity to Learn (OTL) Model was the theoretical foundation focusing on content coverage and the quality of tasks. In this paper, the embedding of context within geometry questions is investigated as one of the criteria in judging the quality of tasks. The study revealed that although the four textbooks covered almost all the Euclidean geometry topics in depth, contextualisation was absent, despite its ability to improve learners’ problem recognition, interpretation and understanding abilities. All the questions were intra-mathematical. With the use of contextualised tasks, possibly the real world can enter the mathematics classroom, so that the age-old learner question, “Why am I doing this?” may be answered with a demonstration of relevance.

This study examined the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in supporting the mathematics education of students with special educational needs (SEN). Thirty peer-reviewed articles were analysed to examine (i) the types of AI technologies implemented in mathematics education, (ii) evidence on the effectiveness of AI interventions in improving learning, (iii) the benefits and limitations of AI in special education, (iv) comparisons of AI applications with traditional methods in terms of personalisation, engagement, and accessibility, and (v) applications of AI in supporting specific disabilities. The findings indicated that intelligent games, chatbots, personalised learning systems, and intelligent tutoring systems were the most frequently utilised AI-powered tools. All studies assessing effectiveness reported positive impacts on mathematical achievement, as well as benefits such as reduced mathematics anxiety, increased motivation, and enhanced independence among learners. Reported challenges included high costs, ethical concerns, teacher preparedness, and a digital divide limiting equitable access. Compared to traditional methods, AI offers more accurate diagnosis of learning difficulties, greater opportunities for personalised learning, and increased accessibility. AI showed promise in addressing specific disabilities such as dyscalculia and autism through adaptive and diagnostic tools. The review concluded that AI should be viewed as a complementary tool that extends teachers’ capacity to individualise mathematics instruction for students with SEN. Keywords: artificial intelligence, conceptual knowledge, mathematics, special education, special needs, disabilities, learning disabilities