Student primary teachers’ levels of mathematics competence and confidence in teaching mathematics: some implications for initial teacher education and national qualifications

The requirements of A Curriculum for Excellence suggest that teachers will have to revise the way they teach mathematics. This new approach will require teachers to take much less specific learning outcomes than is currently the case in the 5-14 mathematics document and make connections within mathematics and between the subject and other curricular areas. This requires a degree of competence and confidence in mathematics that may not currently be present. A study was carried out with 180 Professional Graduate Diploma in Education (Primary) students who completed an online survey and online mathematics competence test. The study went on to look at the same data gathered from 80 Bachelor of Education students. This paper will look at some of the processes used and share some of the findings.