Analysis of Primary School Teachers’ Knowledge of Geometry

Gamze Kurt-Birel; Şule Deniz; Fatih Önel

Vol. 12 No. 4 (2020) IEJEE

Analysis of Primary School Teachers’ Knowledge of Geometry

Gamze Kurt-Birel
Şule Deniz
Fatih Önel

Published April 12, 2020 | Pages: 303-309 | Views: 923

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Abstract

This study investigated geometry knowledge of inservice primary school teachers through considering their content and pedagogical content knowledge with a descriptive and qualitative approach. The participants of the study were 23 primary school teachers who work in public schools with a teaching experience ranges from 6 months to 30 years. The teachers attended to study voluntarily in a teacher training seminar conducted by the researchers and they completed a test which includes open-ended questions. This study summarized here is a part of a design study which aimed to design that seminar in order to develop primary school teachers in terms of mathematics teaching. Collected data were analysed through qualitative data analysis with a holistic approach and discussed. The findings of the study were discussed based on three geometric concepts focused here: quadrilaterals, angle measurement and transformation geometry. On the whole, content knowledge (CK) of the primary school teachers could be claimed as weak and their pedagogical content knowledge could be claimed relatively less than their (CK) because their PCK was related with their CK as it was concluded. Hence, primary school teachers should be offered different teacher training sessions in order to improve their CK and PCK with different learning opportunities for their students.

<p>This study investigated geometry knowledge of inservice primary school teachers through considering their content and pedagogical content knowledge with a descriptive and qualitative approach. The participants of the study were 23 primary school teachers who work in public schools with a teaching experience ranges from 6 months to 30 years. The teachers attended to study voluntarily in a teacher training seminar conducted by the researchers and they completed a test which includes open-ended questions. This study summarized here is a part of a design study which aimed to design that seminar in order to develop primary school teachers in terms of mathematics teaching. Collected data were analysed through qualitative data analysis with a holistic approach and discussed. The findings of the study were discussed based on three geometric concepts focused here: quadrilaterals, angle measurement and transformation geometry. On the whole, content knowledge (CK) of the primary school teachers could be claimed as weak and their pedagogical content knowledge could be claimed relatively less than their (CK) because their PCK was related with their CK as it was concluded. Hence, primary school teachers should be offered different teacher training sessions in order to improve their CK and PCK with different learning opportunities for their students.</p>

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Keywords

geometry knowledge, content knowledge (CK), inservice primary school teachers, mathematics teaching, pedagogical content knowledge (PCK).

Affiliations

Gamze Kurt-Birel

Mersin University

Şule Deniz

Fatih Önel

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How to Cite

Kurt-Birel, G., Deniz, Şule, & Önel, F. (2020). Analysis of Primary School Teachers’ Knowledge of Geometry. International Electronic Journal of Elementary Education, 12(4), 303–309. Retrieved from https://iejee.com/index.php/IEJEE/article/view/1053