Investigating subject matter knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge in mathematics with the Concept Cartoons method

Abstract

The article focuses on an educational tool called Concept Cartoons and its possible use in professional preparation of future primary school teachers. In particular, it presents the method of how Concept Cartoons can be employed as a tool for diagnosing subject matter knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge in mathematics. The first part of the contribution introduces the concept of teachers' knowledge that is used in the article, and the Concept Cartoon tool. It describes the original Concept Cartoons method for classroom use at primary and secondary school levels that was established by Keogh and Naylor, and then it introduces our work on diagnostic Concept Cartoons method, including a commented summary of our recent research on qualitative diagnosis of subject matter knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge in mathematics. The second part of the contribution introduces another step in the methodology, a mixed approach to the issue that enables to enrich the qualitative results with quantitative characteristics. The mixed method is illustrated through a small empirical study that shows how exactly the quantitative enrichment might be provided.

A Joint Assessment of Reasoning about General Statements in Mathematics and Biology

“…Each Concept Cartoon has a form of a picture with a school or out-of-school everyday situation related to a given curricular content and several children discussing the situation through a bubble dialogue. Our previous research showed how Concept Cartoons might be used as a tool for diagnosing various types of teacher knowledge (e.g., Samková, 2019). In this study, we employ three Concept Cartoons related to the topic of general statements, one located in arithmetic, one in biology and one in geometry.…”

“…In recent years, we have been analysing an educational tool called Concept Cartoons (Keogh and Naylor, 1999) and its possible use in the professional preparation of future teachers, especially in investigating various aspects of teacher knowledge in mathematics. We focused on Concept Cartoons as a tool for assessing reasoning on arithmetic topics (e.g., Samková and Tichá, 2017), in qualitative as well as mixed research designs (Samková, 2019). To systematically map the terrain, we naturally proceeded to a question whether and how it is possible to use Concept Cartoons to assess reasoning about mathematical statements.…”

An examination of pre-service teachers' knowledge on the concept cartoon: A longitudinal study

“…When the related literature is examined, it is seen that concept cartoons are frequently used in other fields of mathematics education. Samkova (2020) examined the mathematical pedagogical content knowledge of classroom teachers using concept cartoons. Yilmaz (2020) stated that education supported by concept cartoons had positive effects on the success of fourth-grade students in the "earth crust" unit.…”