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Do textbooks address known learning challenges in area measurement? A comparative analysis

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Abstract

This study compared area lessons from Korean textbooks and US standard-based textbooks to understand differences and similarities among these textbooks, as well as how these textbooks address known learning challenges in area measurement. Several well-known challenges have been identified in previous studies, such as covering, array structure, and linking array structure to area formula. We were interested in knowing if textbooks addressed these issues in their treatments of area measurement and, in doing so, provided students with opportunities to overcome or become familiar with known challenges. The results show that both countries’ textbooks demonstrated similar limitations; only few area and area-related lessons are covered and three important learning challenges in area measurement are not covered well, which need to be informed to practicing teachers.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Education, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA

    Dae S. Hong

  2. University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA

    Kyong Mi Choi

  3. University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA

    Cristina Runnalls & Jihyun Hwang

Authors
  1. Dae S. Hong
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  2. Kyong Mi Choi
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  3. Cristina Runnalls
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  4. Jihyun Hwang
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Correspondence to Dae S. Hong.

Appendix

Appendix

Textbooks Analyzed

enVision Math Common Core edition 2.0, Grade 1 (2015 a). New York, NY: Pearson/Scott Foresman– Addison Wesley.

enVision Math Common Core edition 2.0, Grade 2 (2015 b). New York, NY: Pearson/Scott Foresman– Addison Wesley.

enVision Math Common Core edition 2.0, Grade 3 (2015 c). New York, NY: Pearson/Scott Foresman– Addison Wesley.

Go math! Common Core edition, Grade 1 (2015 a) (student edition e-book). Orlando, FL: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Go math! Common Core edition, Grade 2 (2015 b) (student edition e-book). Orlando, FL: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Go math! Common Core edition, Grade 3 (2015 c) (student edition e-book). Orlando, FL: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

MyMath, Grade 1. (2014 a). New York, NY: Macmillan/McGraw-Hill.

MyMath, Grade 2. (2014 b). New York, NY: Macmillan/McGraw-Hill.

MyMath, Grade 3. (2014 c). New York, NY: Macmillan/McGraw-Hill.

The Ministry of Education in Korea (2014a) Mathematics 1. Seoul, Korea.

The Ministry of Education in Korea (2014b) Mathematics 3. Seoul, Korea.

The Ministry of Education in Korea (2015) Mathematics 5. Seoul, Korea.

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Hong, D.S., Choi, K.M., Runnalls, C. et al. Do textbooks address known learning challenges in area measurement? A comparative analysis. Math Ed Res J 30, 325–354 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13394-018-0238-6

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