Browsing by Author "Jääskeläinen, Juulia"

Objectives. The goal of this thesis is to examine what kind of mathematical identity the groups of third, fourth and fifth grade students have. In addition, the study aims to decipher, through drawings produced by students, what kind of positive methods teacher use in math lesson, and considers whether positive pedagogy has an effect on students’ mathematical identities. Methods. The research method for this thesis was a qualitative case study of pupils’ drawings and writings. The research material comprised of 44 drawings and 44 writings. The research group consisted of three school classes from Uusimaa. The teaching methods of the class teachers were largely in line with positive pedagogy. The drawings were analyzed through drawing analysis and the writings by using classifications. Results and conclusions. The mathematical identities of the data were defined into four different categories: positive mathematical identity, conflicting mathematical identity, neutral mathematical identity, and negative mathematical identity. In the studied groups, over half of the students had a positive mathematical identity. Negative mathematical identities occurred the least. The majority of students described positive means in teacher action. The postive means of teachers manifested themselves in three different ways: encouraging and positive precence, support for learning, and encouraging and positive words. Based on the data, the teachers had the most encouraging precence and support for learning. Although the various words of encouragement were not very much present, the students for the most part described their relationship with the teacher positively. The research findings the encourages the use of positive pedagogy because it has the potential to positively influence a learner’s mathematical identity. The research also shows that drawing research, especially with combined with students’ writings, is a good method of research in analyzing mathematical identity.