As teachers’ informal professional development is visible in social media, this study probes teachers’ participation in self-organized Facebook groups in mathematics or Swedish-language education. In total, 553 posts from six Facebook groups were categorized using Shulman’s knowledge-base framework, and analysed using systemic functional grammar. Teachers use “questions” and “offers” most frequently (88%). Within these speech functions, pedagogical content knowledge dominates (63%), indicating that these groups constitute professional learning communities that teachers use as a professional development resource, focusing the interaction on pedagogical content knowledge. This study finds a largely similar practice in Facebook groups across the two subjects.

This paper focuses on problem solving and problem posing in mathematics education with 6-year-olds. After working on a problem-solving activity, the young students were asked to pose a similar task to a friend. This article explores how the students interpret the notion of similar. To be able to pose a problem-solving task themselves the students had to change perspective, from searching for information to providing information, and from searching for a solution to searching for a question. Also, to create a similar task the students had to reflect on the original problem-solving task. Thus, their posed tasks shed light on their interpretation of what the original problem-solving task was really about. The results show that the large majority of the students included some three-dimensional aspects from the original problem-solving task in their posed tasks. However, the questions they posed varied in terms of whether or not they included mathematical elements.

Instructional quality is a research topic that has received increased attention over the past decades. However, despite evidence for its importance to student learning, few studies are designed to examine patterns of prevalent instruction. The present study aimed to enhance the understanding of instructional quality in Swedish lower secondary school by examining patterns of instruction in 7th grade language arts and mathematics. 274 lessons from 73 separate classrooms were video-recorded and analyzed using the Protocol for Language Arts Teaching Observation (PLATO). Findings of the study show that lessons were largely organized through either whole-class instruction or individual seatwork. Mathematics included significantly more explicit teacher scaffolding and mathematics teachers scored higher than language arts teachers on nearly all instructional dimensions. However, in both subjects, there were substantial differences between teachers, meaning that students in different classrooms received systematically different kinds of instruction. Implications for instructional development and future research are discussed.

In mathematics education, digital tools have been used to enhance young children’s understanding of specific subject matter. In such implementations, the digital tool can replace, amplify or transform ‘ordinary’ mathematics teaching. In an initial study, systematization and duplication were identified as critical when young children were to solve a combinatorial task. Therefore, a digital version of the task was developed and combined with a non-digital version, to introduce the use of dual artefacts. The digital version of the task enabled the children to visually explore systematization as well as the principle of completion. After using this digital version of the task, the children’s written records became more systematic and included fewer duplications. We conclude that the digital version of the task reinforced young children’s understanding of the combinatorial task and that the use of dual artefacts enhanced children’s understanding of what a combinatorial problem encompasses.

This article is about the systematization and representation young children spontaneously use when they are working on a combinatorial task. In this article, documentations from 123 children working on the same task are analysed. The question asked is if there are any connections between the systematizations and representations used in the documentations and how the children solve the task. The results indicate that there are some connections between systematization and representations and that both prepossess children’s solutions. In this paper, we provide some possible reasons; however, we also state that more studies are needed to give deeper insights on these issues.

This study explores how assessment is presented in Swedish early years’ steering documents and considers risks for young gifted students in relation to assessment (or lack thereof). Document analysis was undertaken on, firstly, Swedish curriculum documents for the preschool and for the compulsory school, and secondly, mapping materials used in the preschool class with six-year-old children. Results show that assessment is not a term used in Swedish early years curricula. Instead, preschool teachers are asked to evaluate their own practice; preschool class teachers are asked to engage with mapping and only to consider working toward later assessment goals in year 3 of school. A plethora of alternative assessment terms are used in the curriculum without definition. Giftedness is also invisible in the curriculum. However, the mapping materials used with six-year-old students in the subject areas of mathematics and Swedish do encourage teachers to consider children who achieve mastery early. Further, these materials provide supportive questions and activities for teachers to use in exploring further. The specific examples of assessment discourses and the need to consider gifted children are combined in this article to highlight aspects of teacher work that are important for the educational rights of an often-forgotten group of learners.