An Examination of the Cognitive Levels and Content Dimensions in Activities Developed by Pre-service Mathematics Teachers within the MATH Taxonomy Framework

Source abstract

The purpose of this study is to analyze the questions included in three-dimensional modeling activities developed by pre-service mathematics teachers in terms of the cognitive levels and mathematical content dimensions of the MATH taxonomy. This analysis aims to reveal which mathematical processes and skills the pre-service teachers prioritize in their instructional materials. Adopting a case study design, one of the qualitative research methods, this research examined activities developed by 26 secondary pre-service mathematics teachers, selected through convenience sampling, for teaching three-dimensional geometric shapes. Descriptive analysis was used to evaluate a total of 122 activity questions. Regarding content dimensions, it was found that the activities primarily focused on solid objects (f=20), with limited integration of topics such as applications of the derivative, equations, and probability. The cognitive level findings indicate that the pre-service teachers predominantly created tasks requiring the use of previously practiced procedures or algorithms in familiar contexts (Group A, 62%). It was determined that tasks involving higher-order cognitive processes such as verification, interpretation, and evaluation (Group C, 13%) were significantly less common in the activities.