Assessing the attitudes of pre-service primary mathematics teachers towards statistics and gender influence

Abstract

AbstractThe aim of this research is to assess the attitudes exhibited by pre-service primary mathematics educators towards statistics, while concurrently investigating the influence of gender on these attitudes. The research methodology employed in this study involved the adaptation of the Survey of Attitudes toward Statistics (SATS-36) to pre-service teachers from Teacher Training Colleges (TTCs) in Rwanda. The study participants are 355 pre-service teachers from7 randomly selected TTCs. Since the Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was undertaken to ascertain the model fit yielded suboptimal indices concerning both the reliability and validity of the data, an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted, leading to the validation of a novel model comprising 25 items distributed across four distinct factors. The subsequent phase of the investigation involved the evaluation of pre-service teachers’ attitudes towards statistics, with a specific emphasis on discerning the impact of gender using the refined four-factor model. The findings of the study provide empirical evidence indicating that pre-service teachers tend to exhibit positive attitudes towards statistics, while concurrently highlighting the statistically significant influence of gender on these attitudes. In light of these outcomes, the researchers proffer recommendations suggesting that educators should prioritize efforts aimed at cultivating favorable attitudes towards statistics among pre-service teachers, thereby fostering an enriched and more productive learning milieu for students.

Keywords

• Statistics education
• attitudes
• pre-service teachers
• TTC
• Colby Tofel-Grehl, School of Teacher Education and Leadership, Utah State University, Logan, UT, USA
• Mathematics Education