Welcome to Volume 9, Issue 1 of Investigations in Mathematics Learning. This is an exciting time for the Research Council on Mathematics Learning (RCML) as we begin our partnership with Taylor & Francis to publish our journal. One of the many benefits of our partnership is online access to journal articles once they have been typeset and proofs have been approved by authors and the Editor. This website—http://www.tandfonline.com/uiml—is a place you will want to bookmark and check in order to access newly published articles.
In this issue we have three articles that include studies about elementary school learners as well as college students who are preservice teachers. In the first article, Tanase and Lucey studied preservice teachers that were planning to be elementary, middle school, and high school teachers. They found that their participants had isolated views of mathematics, and struggled to see connections between mathematics, financial literacy, and social justice. In the next article, Cramer and her colleagues studied third grade students’ experiences using the number line as a representation to develop understanding of fractions. Based on their findings, recommendations for future studies, as well as using the number line with students, are shared. In the final article, Wilburne and Dause studied levels of perseverance among fourth grade students while solving word problems. They found benefit in goal-setting and developing students’ self-monitoring skills.
Through Investigations, RCML seeks to stimulate, generate, coordinate, and disseminate research efforts designed to understand and/or influence factors that affect mathematics learning. During the past few years, this has spanned multiple populations in the studies that have been published in the journal, including, but not limited to, primary children through college-age learners. There also has been a growing number of articles about teachers’ mathematics learning through professional learning experiences.
I invite you to consider Investigations as a possible outlet for your research studies that examine mathematics learning. As you begin to prepare your manuscript for submission, I encourage you to consider the following prior to submitting:
Why is my study important to contribute to the knowledge base about mathematics learning?
How has my study been designed and carried out in a way that meets the expectations for peer-reviewed research?
How do the findings of my study contribute to what we know about the topic of my study?
We hope to see your manuscript in the near future!