Pre-Service Teachers' Attitudes About Gender, Education, and Mathematical Aptitude: A Quantitative Study

Author

Paige Barnett, University of MississippiFollow

Date of Award

Spring 5-10-2024

Document Type

Undergraduate Thesis

Department

Education

First Advisor

David Rock

Second Advisor

Amy Wells Dolan

Third Advisor

Erika Schmit

Relational Format

Dissertation/Thesis

Abstract

Females and mathematics are often not grouped together due to the gender bias surrounding the two. Perhaps attending an all-girls high school has instilled a higher level of confidence in me and my mathematical abilities than many females exhibit. The focus of my research is to examine preservice elementary teachers for their confidence levels in mathematics, as well as if they hold a form of unconscious gender bias. I completed this research by developing a six-question survey instrument. The survey was administered in the Spring and Fall of 2023 Math 245 and Math 245 classes. Both are required math courses for elementary education students. These classes cover methods for teaching elementary level mathematics. Because Education is a predominantly female major, the highest percentage of participants enrolled in these courses is female. The survey results indicated there is a higher level of math confidence than predicted, which provided hope that not all females are being pushed out of math. While these participants had a higher confidence level, they still managed to hold a level of gender bias. When picking a working partner for a graded problem, the majority of participants chose partners based upon math confidence score. However, when the problem is ungraded the highest chosen characteristic in a working partner is gender. The research has helped to highlight the importance of both mathematical confidence and gender when selecting a working partner in math class. It has also indicated that gender bias is present in many differing forms, which is a key point in understanding how to combat it in the classroom.

Recommended Citation

Barnett, Paige, "Pre-Service Teachers' Attitudes About Gender, Education, and Mathematical Aptitude: A Quantitative Study" (2024). Honors Theses. 3029.
https://egrove.olemiss.edu/hon_thesis/3029

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License