The Perceptions and Experiences of Math Anxiety
Start Date
April 2020
End Date
April 2020
Major Field of Study
Psychology
Second Major
Education
Student Type
Graduate
Presentation Format
Poster Presentation
Abstract/Description
In today’s educational practices, students of all levels of education experience math anxiety. Furthermore, fearing math is frequently linked to poor teaching practices and which creates a poor relationship between the teacher and student. The purpose of study is to examine the causes of why math is feared to produce math anxiety and to explore the perceptions and experiences of middle school eighth graders and their math teachers. The methodology included conducting personal interviews with seven math teacher and interviewing five student focus groups interviews to provide an overview of the causes of math anxiety. The data indicated that students perceived and experienced bad teaching molding. These causes include lacking teacher knowledge, and the lack of trust and environmental factors which compromises the teacher and student relationships. Furthermore, the data indicates that facing math anxiety have empowered the participants to devise strategies to try to overcome the fear of math. Self-regulating and developing a stronger self-confidence with the teachers can help offer a better understanding in mathematics.
The Perceptions and Experiences of Math Anxiety
In today’s educational practices, students of all levels of education experience math anxiety. Furthermore, fearing math is frequently linked to poor teaching practices and which creates a poor relationship between the teacher and student. The purpose of study is to examine the causes of why math is feared to produce math anxiety and to explore the perceptions and experiences of middle school eighth graders and their math teachers. The methodology included conducting personal interviews with seven math teacher and interviewing five student focus groups interviews to provide an overview of the causes of math anxiety. The data indicated that students perceived and experienced bad teaching molding. These causes include lacking teacher knowledge, and the lack of trust and environmental factors which compromises the teacher and student relationships. Furthermore, the data indicates that facing math anxiety have empowered the participants to devise strategies to try to overcome the fear of math. Self-regulating and developing a stronger self-confidence with the teachers can help offer a better understanding in mathematics.
Comments
This presentation was accepted for the Scholarly and Creative Works Conference at Dominican University of California. The Conference was canceled due to the Covid-19 Pandemic