The development of Augmented Reality technologies has enabled students to learn in an environment that combines learning resources from the real and digital world. This paper integrates three mobile Augmented Reality-based applications into a series of mathematics lessons on probabilities in a junior high school. This paper aims to examine how mobile AR-based learning applications affect students’ learning gains through ANCOVA. Moreover, students’ attitudes towards the applications are discussed. The participants are 68 junior high school students. The experimental results show that the mobile AR-based applications would be helpful for students’ learning gains in the topic of probability. Students’ attitude towards the AR applications in this series of lessons was positive. Overall, it was found that mobile AR-based learning applications have positive effects on junior high students learning mathematics.

Due to rapid social and economic development in China over the last three decades, information and communication technologies (ICTs) have become increasingly available in Chinese classrooms and families. However, there is a lack of research regarding Chinese students’ use of ICTs in mathematics learning. In this study, we examined how Chinese students access, use, and perceive ICTs in learning mathematics. To this end, a conceptual framework for ICTs and the role of ICTs in students’ learning of mathematics was established. Using a mixed-methods approach, we collected data from 223 students in four randomly selected secondary schools in Shanghai through a questionnaire survey, followed by classroom observations and interviews with students and teachers. The results revealed that various ICTs are widely accessible in Shanghai classrooms and students overall have a positive view about the role of ICTs in their mathematics learning, especially in problem solving and in learning geometry. When learning mathematics at home, students used handheld technological devices more frequently than non-portable devices. Furthermore, there were significant differences between different students in terms of school performance levels, grade levels, and genders in their use of ICTs in learning mathematics. In particular, students from high-performing schools had more access to various ICTs but used them less frequently than their peers from ordinary schools. Suggestions and implications of the findings are discussed at the end of the paper.

Using multiple representations is advocated and emphasized in mathematics and science education. However, many students have difficulty connecting multiple representations of linear functions. Augmented Reality (AR) may affect these teaching and learning difficulties by offering dynamically linked representations. Inspired by this, our study aims to develop, implement, and evaluate an AR-based multi-representational learning environment (MRLE) with three representations of linear functions. The data were collected from 82 seventh graders from two high-performing classes in an urban area in China, through a pre-test, a post-questionnaire, and follow-up interviews. The results reveal that students were satisfied with the AR-based MRLE, which assisted in enhancing their understanding of the real-life, symbolic, and graphical representations and connections among them. Regarding students’ interactions with multiple representations, apparent differences in learning sequences and preferences existed among students in terms of their representational learning profile. In sum, learning in the AR-based MRLE is a complex interaction process between the mathematics content, forms of representations, digital features, and students’ representational learning profile.

Professional development (PD) for mathematics teachers in China, especially in Shanghai, has received growing international attention. However, most of available research concerning Chinese PD has focused on successful practices, and far too little attention has been paid to less successfully organized PD practices, particularly for mathematics teachers in Shanghai. This study aims to examine key aspects and underlying reasons for less successfully organized PD practices in Shanghai from teachers’ perspectives. The data were collected from 132 mathematics teachers in 9 randomly selected secondary schools in Shanghai through a questionnaire survey and follow-up interviews. The results show that Shanghai mathematics teachers perceived “time, duration and frequency”, “assessment and management” and “objective” as the three most unsatisfactory aspects in less successfully organized PD they attended, and they considered that organized PD practices were less successful mainly due to lack of assessment for the PD organizers and of necessary coordination between PD organizers at different levels. In addition, there were statistically significant differences in teachers’ perceptions of various specific problems in different aspects about less successfully organized PD between teachers with different demographic features, such as length of teaching experience and gender. Implications of the findings of the study to Chinese educational settings and beyond are discussed at the end of the paper.