Dr. Joseph Yeo Kai Kow is an Assistant Professor in the Mathematics and Mathematics Education Academic Group, National Institute of Education (NIE). He has taught mathematics and mathematics pedagogy both at school and university levels since 1988. Presently, he is involved in training pre-service and in-service mathematics teachers at primary and secondary levels. His students come from diverse backgrounds, ranging from the gifted and talented, express, and normal streams. Before joining the National Institute of Education, Joseph Yeo Kai Kow held the post of Vice Principal and Head of Mathematics Department in secondary schools. He was part of the team at the Research and Evaluation Branch in the Ministry of Education between 1998 and 2000, holding various portfolios including evaluation of IT Master plan, Project Work, and Teachers’ Workload and involved in an international study on the First module of the Second Information Technology in Education Study (SITES). His research interests include mathematical problem solving in the primary and secondary level.

The objective of our workshop series is to equip teachers with the necessary skills to guide students effectively in Mathematics.

TW023 Designing Creative Mathematical Open-Ended Tasks for Primary Pupils (3 Hours)

• Assist teachers to examine the techniques and processes of designing open-ended tasks or problems for their primary pupils.
• A discussion of the rationale for introducing open-ended tasks in the classroom, the process of designing open-ended tasks and illustrates some examples of solving open-ended tasks.
• Teachers will also be given the opportunities to assess samples of pupils’ open-ended task solutions.
• Open-ended tasks offer opportunities for pupils to demonstrate their mathematical thinking, reasoning processes, problem-solving and communication skills. As open-ended tasks invite a wider range of solutions and solution methods than closed problems, they can be used to probe deeper understanding of concepts and to promote creative thinking.

TW024 Activity-Based Lessons for Primary Pupils (3 Hours)

• Provides an opportunity for the teachers to learn how to teach less to their pupils so that they will learn more.
• Re-examine the fundamentals of teaching and learning.
• Assist mathematics teachers to examine the techniques and processes of conducting activity-based lessons for their primary pupils.
• The brain learns best and retains most when the organism is actively involved in exploring physical sites and materials and asking questions to which it actually craves answers. Teachers will also learn how to use manipulative to help pupils understands mathematics concepts.
• Learn to help the pupils to link what they have learnt in the mathematics classroom to the real world.

TW025 Keys to Effective Mathematical Problem Solving for Primary Teachers (3 Hours)

• Offers insights on how different types of mathematical problems could be solved using varied strategies.
• Learn how to be better problem solvers through the effective use of heuristics and explore strategies for establishing problem-solving environments.
• In teaching mathematical problem solving, teachers appear to use one or two strategies of solving a mathematical problem in the classroom. Although some teachers have explicitly advocated students to use varied strategies to solve mathematical problems, students continue to solve a problem using one or two strategies. Research has also indicated that good novice problem solvers were unable to solve problems in more than one way.

TW026 Engaging Primary Pupils through Mathematical Reasoning (3 Hours)

• Measures and evaluates what we value in the Singapore mathematics curriculum framework - skills, concepts, processes, meta-cognition and attitude.
• Seeks to highlight problem-solving items which go beyond testing skills. Ideas and approaches to prepare primary pupils to deal with such problem-solving items will be presented. This workshop will also assist primary mathematics teachers to examine the techniques and processes of using assessment items in engaging primary pupils through mathematical reasoning.

TW027 Effective use of Tangram to Enhance the Teaching and Learning of Primary Mathematics (3 Hours)

• Assist primary teachers to examine the techniques and processes of using tangram in teaching mathematical concepts.
• The tangram is a versatile manipulative that could be used to teach and learn mathematical concepts such as shapes, spatial relationships, fractions, percents, ratio, area, and geometry.
• Present ideas, activities and strategies that may be suitable for primary pupils to use tangram in learning mathematical concepts.

TW028 Promoting Journal Writing in Primary Mathematics Classroom (3 Hours)

• Present the rationale for implementing journal writing in the primary school mathematics classrooms.
• Show to teacher how to carry out journal writing in the primary school mathematics classrooms.
• Samples of the primary school pupils’ journals will be illustrated. Scoring rubric for grading journals will be showed.

Journal writing is incredibly flexible instructional tool that may be used for communication between the pupil and teacher. Teachers could use journal writing as an alternative assessment in the mathematics classroom.

TW029 Some Appetizers for Primary Mathematics Lessons (3 Hours)

• Consider the analogy between a mathematics teacher and a chef. A successful chef, besides being able to prepare sumptuous meals to satisfy the taste and needs of his or her customers, must also ensure that the customers enjoy their meals. Of equal importance is the choice of a good appetizer that arouses the taste buds of his or her customers.
• Likewise, in the teaching of mathematics, a short story, a thought-provoking question, mathematical trick and humour can be served as an ‘appetizer’ in some mathematics lessons.
• This sharing session will present some ideas, activities and strategies that may be suitable and engaging for primary pupils. Some ideas are simple which may be appropriate for the start, end and consolidation of a primary mathematics lesson.

TW030 Enhancing Primary Mathematics Teachers’ Questioning Techniques (3 Hours)

• An effective questioning strategy goes beyond finding what has been learned.
• This workshop will assist mathematics teachers to examine the characteristics of effective questioning.
• The workshop will discuss the common problems in connection with questioning in the mathematics lessons.
• Strategies to improve the teachers’ questioning techniques will also be discussed.

TW031 Integrating Mathematical Games in the Primary Mathematics Lessons (3 Hours)

• Mathematical games are popular with teachers as alternatives to more traditional forms of repetitive practice, for many parts of the mathematics curriculum, and especially for arithmetical computation.
• The research literature, as well as popular commercial publishing, supports the idea that mathematical games can fire pupils’ interest and motivation because students enjoy competition, challenge, and fun.
• In this workshop, teachers will learn how to specify learning outcomes related to the mathematical games and reinforce their relevance to pupils.
• This workshop will present the rationale for integrating mathematical games in the primary school mathematics classrooms.
• The workshop will also show to teacher how to carry out mathematical games in the primary mathematics lessons.
• Samples of mathematical games also will be showed, explained and played.