Measuring the subject-specific quality in mathematics instruction: factor structure and relations to mathematics teachers' professional competence

Jentsch, Armin, Schlesinger, Lena, Heinrichs, Hannah, Kaiser, Gabriele, Koenig, Johannes and Bloemeke, Sigrid . Measuring the subject-specific quality in mathematics instruction: factor structure and relations to mathematics teachers' professional competence. J. Math.-Didakt.. HEIDELBERG: SPRINGER HEIDELBERG. ISSN 1869-2699

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DOI:10.1007/s13138-020-00168-x

Abstract

German educational research has already for a long time distinguished three basic dimensions of instructional quality: classroom management, constructive support and cognitive activation. Since the three basic dimensions are regarded as a generic conceptualization of instructional quality, recently the question has arisen as to how far this model can adequately reflect the characteristics of mathematics teaching. Against this background, an observation instrument was developed for assessing the quality of mathematics instruction at the lower secondary level, which claims to measure both generic and subject-specific characteristics. The present study examines the factor structure of the observational instrument as well as correlations with subject-specific competence facets of the observed mathematics teachers as validity criteria. Instructional quality was operationalized by high-inferent rating scales and assessed by trained raters in 156 lessons. Descriptive statistics indicate an acceptable psychometric quality of the rating scales. An explorative factor analysis yielded a four-dimensional structure for the observational instrument, which is interpreted as the three basic dimensions and a fourth dimension, called mathematics educational structuring. With the exception of classroom management, all dimensions correlated at least weakly positively with subject-specific teacher competence. We discuss our findings with regard to the subject-specifity of the observational instrument and the conceptualization of instructional quality.

Item Type:

Journal Article

Creators:

Creators	Email	ORCID	ORCID Put Code
Jentsch, Armin	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED
Schlesinger, Lena	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED
Heinrichs, Hannah	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED
Kaiser, Gabriele	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED
Koenig, Johannes	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED
Bloemeke, Sigrid	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED	UNSPECIFIED