Helping Teachers Teach Mathematics Conference -HTTMC – 2025

Helping Teachers Teach Mathematics Conference -HTTMC

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Speaker Abstracts

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Rich Dlin

Title: Engaging Students in Mathematics Requires Only Active Minds

In 2024, Rich had the pleasure of travelling to many different schools in Ghana over the course of three weeks, to work with students and meet and discuss math education with teachers and administrators. It was truly informative and gave him a deep appreciation for the work that Ghanaian educators do. In this talk, Rich will present some of his ideas for teaching mathematics in a way that can engage and challenge students at all ability levels using the resources available. The talk will include problem solving strategies as well as different approaches to the curriculum that can bring deeper appreciation of mathematics to your students.

Ian VanderBurgh

Title: Providing challenges to strong students

Having strong students in our classrooms can be a real blessing, but also presents a challenge to us as educators.  How can we best engage these students to allow them to progress and excel, recognizing that our attention is always divided between various groups of students?  This session will discuss this challenge from both philosophical and practical angles.

Carly Ziniuk

Title: Boole Bezier and Beauty

Approximating curves by using lines and line segments is fundamental to the understanding of Calculus, yet all students in high school math courses can explore this concept through both historical contexts and modern applications. You can explore the historical connections with the creativity of these beautiful and geometrical creations while developing your own perspectives while you build your algebraic skills. We will demonstrate connections to Mary Everest Boole’s Curve Stitching, coding with Scratch and Desmos, and Bézier curves from architecture and computer graphics. How do these curves describe both the Ba-ila settlements of southern Zambia and the coronal loops, the plasma arcs from the sun? 

Judith Ann Koeller 

Title:  A Window from your Math Classroom to the World

Try your hand at some mathematical problems with real-world applications, including planning more efficient routes, transmitting photos from space, saving lives through organ donations, and predicting future population numbers. We will see how these connect to high school curriculum topics, including polynomials, factorials and probability.

Jen Nelson

Title:  Let’s solve some problems!

Abstract: At its best, math is all about the art of problem-solving.  A good problem offers the opportunity to think carefully and systematically, as well as the chance to exercise creativity in discovering a path to the solution.  In this session, we will experience these things for ourselves as we work through several interesting problems that could be used for discussion and enrichment in your classroom.  Along the way, we will discuss problem-solving tips to share with your students and other resources where you can find more problems to try out in your schools and classrooms.

David Stern

Title: TBD

Salomey Addo

Title: PRIMM – an approach to teaching programming in schools

PRIMM is a structured approach to teaching programming in schools. The acronym stands for Predict, Run, Investigate, Modify, Make, and it is grounded in research on programming education. This framework supports teachers in delivering programming lessons in a collaborative and learner-centred way. By using PRIMM, teachers can scaffold learning and design targeted tasks that help students grasp key programming concepts. Studies have shown that teachers who implement PRIMM often see improved understanding among students who previously found programming challenging. In my talk, I will demonstrate how PRIMM can be effectively used in the classroom to enhance the teaching and learning of programming.

Gloria Armah

Title: Beyond the Bars

This study explored the ability of first-year pre-service mathematics teachers to interpret graphical representation, with an emphasis on histograms. The descriptive survey design was employed as the methodological framework for the investigation. The study was carried out at the Department of Mathematics Education, University of Education, Winneba, Ghana, during the 2022/2023 academic year. The purposive and convenient sampling techniques were used to sample 342 first-year pre-service mathematics teachers. This sample included 31.3% (107) trained teachers who have taught mathematics at the basic school level. Females also formed 15.5% (53) of the sample. The test used as the instrument for collecting data was adapted from previous studies and classified into two skill types: statistical literacy (SL) and statistical reasoning (SR). Data was analysed by computing the success rates for the items as well as assessing participants’ valid justifications for their responses. This gave insight into the challenges participants encountered. Under statistical literacy items, findings revealed that for items which covered tasks like reading frequencies and identifying axes, success rates ranged from 45.6% (156) to 63.7% (218), whereas those which required identification of the median of a categorical dataset in a bar chart and comparing modes of two histograms presented a more complex situation with success rates around 26.0% (89). Under the statistical literacy items, only 12.1% (11) could provide valid justifications for their correct response on the item on identifying the median of a categorical dataset in a bar chart, and 28.1% (25) for the item on comparing modes of two histograms. On statistical reasoning items, moderate success rates were recorded for items requiring interpretation of information from histograms with success rates ranging from 33.0% (113) to 56.1% (192).

Challenges were encountered with matching a given description to an appropriate histogram and comparing and contrasting distribution characteristics, with success rates of 24.0% (82) and 0.6% (2), respectively. Under these statistical reasoning items, participants’ lack of conceptual understanding was evident, as either zero conceptually sound justifications were recorded or an abysmally low one (5.3% (9) or 6.2% (7)), even for correct responses, with just a repetition of the choice of answer from the options. Participants demonstrated moderate proficiency in basic statistical tasks; however, significant challenges were encountered with more complex tasks which required inferential reasoning. It was recommended that teachers integrate creative pedagogical approaches and interactive technologies that emphasise statistical reasoning into their teaching.