Date on Master's Thesis/Doctoral Dissertation

12-2025

Document Type

Doctoral Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph. D.

Department

Elementary, Middle & Secondary Teacher Education

Degree Program

Curriculum and Instruction, PhD

Committee Chair

Bay-Williams, Jennifer

Committee Co-Chair (if applicable)

Peters, Sue

Committee Member

Immekus, Jason

Committee Member

Marin, Katherine

Author's Keywords

mathematics anxiety; mathematics teaching anxiety; preservice teachers; number sense; procedural fluency; instructional routines

Abstract

This dissertation, presented in three articles, examines how elementary preservice teachers (PSTs) experience and develop as mathematics learners and future educators when methods coursework deliberately integrates mathematical reasoning with affective supports. Collectively, the studies investigate how research-informed instructional design may help address mathematics anxiety (MA), mathematics teaching anxiety (MTA), procedural fluency, and instructional practice. The first article, written for practitioners and elementary mathematics teachers, illustrates how well-established instructional routines, such as number talks and student work analysis, can be facilitated to support procedural fluency in multiplication. Using classroom vignettes, this article highlights instructional moves that make structure visible, promote strategy comparison, and encourage reasoning, offering practical guidance for elementary teachers and teachers seeking to strengthen multiplication instruction. The second article, developed for an audience of mathematics teacher educators, examines how a redesigned mathematics methods course functioned as an intervention to support PSTs’ procedural fluency with multiplication and professional noticing of student strategies. Drawing on clinical interview data, the study traced within-participant changes in strategy use and noticing, revealing that PSTs broadened their repertoires of reasoning strategies and developed greater precision in their professional noticing of student thinking. The third article, prepared for a research-focused mathematics education audience, reports a mixed-methods study of changes in PSTs’ MA and MTA across the same mathematics methods course that foregrounded number sense and conceptual reasoning. Quantitative analyses indicated significant reductions in both MA and MTA, and qualitative findings highlighted changes in PSTs’ self-perceptions, confidence, willingness to engage with mathematics, and mathematics teaching efficacy. Together, the articles suggest that coherent, research-informed course designs may be associated with reductions in MA and MTA, the strengthening of PSTs’ conceptual and procedural fluency, and the development of instructional practices that are consequential for teacher preparation.

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