Ten recommendations for hosting a Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Justice (DEIJ) journal club.

Despite advances and social progress, the exclusion of diverse groups in academia, especially science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields, across the US and Europe persists, resulting in the underrepresentation of diverse people in higher education. There is extensive literature about theory, observation, and evidence-based practices that can help create a more equitable, inclusive, and diverse learning environment. In this article, we propose the implementation of a Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Justice (DEIJ) journal club as a strategic initiative to foster education and promote action towards making academia a more equitable institution. By creating a space for people to engage with DEIJ theories* and strategize ways to improve their learning environment, we hope to normalize the practice and importance of analyzing academia through an equity lens. Guided by restorative justice principles, we offer 10 recommendations for fostering community cohesion through education and mutual understanding. This approach underscores the importance of appropriate action and self-education in the journey toward a more diverse, equitable, inclusive, and just academic environment. *Authors' note: We understand that "DEIJ" is a multidisciplinary organizational framework that relies on numerous fields of study, including history, sociology, philosophy, and more. We use this term to refer to these different fields of study for brevity purposes.

Mentorship for Transfer Student Success in STEM Research: Mentor Approaches and Reflections.

Mentorship has been widely recognized as an effective means to promote student learning and engagement in undergraduate research experiences. However, little work exists for understanding different mentors' perceived approaches to mentorship, including mentorship of students from backgrounds and educational trajectories not well represented in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Transfer students, in particular, face unique trajectories in their pursuit of research opportunities, yet few studies investigate how mentors describe their approaches to supporting these students. Using semistructured interviews, this study examines how mentors approach mentoring students from diverse backgrounds as research trainees, with an emphasis on transfer students. First, using phenomenography as an analytical approach, we identified four categories describing variations in how mentors reflected upon or accounted for the transfer student identity in their approaches. We find that research mentors vary in their understanding and exposure to the transfer student identity and may have preconceived notions of the transfer student experience. Second, we present vignettes to illustrate how mentors' approaches to the transfer student identity may relate or diverge from their general approaches to mentoring students from different backgrounds and identities. The emerging findings have implications for developing effective mentorship strategies and training mentors to support transfer students.

You can count on your fingers: Finger-based intervention improves first-graders' arithmetic learning.

The question of whether finger use should be encouraged or discouraged in early mathematics instruction remains a topic of debate. Scientific evidence on this matter is scarce due to the limited number of systematic intervention studies. Accordingly, we conducted an intervention study in which first-graders (Mage = 6.48 years, SD = 0.35) completed a finger-based training (18 sessions of âˆ¼ 30 min each) over the course of the first school year. The training was integrated into standard mathematics instruction in schools and compared with business-as-usual curriculum teaching. At the end of first grade and in a follow-up test 9 months later in second grade, children who received the finger training (n = 119) outperformed the control group (n = 123) in written addition and subtraction. No group differences were observed for number line estimation tasks. These results suggest that finger-based numerical strategies can enhance arithmetic learning, supporting the idea of an embodied representation of numbers, and challenge the prevailing skepticism about finger use in primary mathematics education.

Exploring the impact of a fraction sense intervention in authentic school environments: An initial investigation.

A solid understanding of fractions is the cornerstone for acquiring proficiency with rational numbers and paves the way for learning advanced mathematical concepts such as algebra. Fraction difficulties limit not only students' educational and vocational opportunities but also their ability to solve everyday problems. Students who exit sixth grade with inadequate understanding of fractions may experience far-reaching repercussions that lead to lifelong avoidance of mathematics. This article presents the results of a randomized controlled trial focusing on the first two cohorts of a larger efficacy investigation aimed at building fraction sense in students with mathematics difficulties. Teachers implemented an evidence-informed fraction sense intervention (FSI) within their sixth-grade intervention classrooms. The lessons draw from research in cognitive science as well as mathematics education research. Employing random assignment at the classroom level, multilevel modeling revealed a significant effect of the intervention on posttest fractions scores after controlling for pretest fractions scores, working memory, vocabulary, proportional reasoning, and classroom attentive behavior. Students in the FSI group outperformed their counterparts in the control group, with noteworthy effect sizes on most fraction measures. Challenges associated with carrying out school-based intervention research are addressed.

The roles of mathematical language and emergent literacy skills in the longitudinal prediction of specific early numeracy skills.

Mathematical language (i.e., content-specific language used in mathematics) and emergent literacy skills predict children's broad numeracy development. However, little work has examined whether these domains predict development of individual numeracy skills (e.g., cardinality, number order). Thus, the aim of the current study was to examine longitudinal relations among mathematical language, emergent literacy skills, and specific early numeracy skills. Participants included 114 preschool children aged 3.12 to 5.26 years (M = 4.17 years, SD = 0.59). Specifically, this study examined whether mathematical language and three emergent literacy skills (print knowledge, phonological awareness, and general vocabulary) in the fall of preschool predicted 12 individual early numeracy skills in the spring, controlling for age, sex, rapid automatized naming, parent education, and autoregressors. Results indicated that mathematical language predicted development of most of the early numeracy skills (e.g., set comparison, numeral comparison, numeral identification), but findings for emergent literacy skills were not robust. Among the three emergent literacy skills, only print knowledge was a significant predictor of development in some specific numeracy skills, including verbal counting, number order, and story problems. Results highlight the important role of mathematical language in children's numeracy development and provide the foundation for future work in designing interventions to improve early numeracy skills.

The Value of Support: STEM Intervention Programs Impact Student Persistence and Belonging.

In response to unwaveringly high attrition from STEM pathways, STEM Intervention Programs (SIPs) support STEM students in effort to increase retention. Using mixed methods (survey and focus groups), we studied students at one university who were either supported or unsupported by SIPs to understand how students may differ in experiences believed to contribute to STEM persistence. We evaluated: sense of belonging, scientific self-efficacy, scientific community values, scientific identity, and STEM involvement. The enrollment status of students two and a half years postsurvey was also tracked. SIP students reported significantly higher science identity and sense of belonging and were more involved in STEM-related activities than counterparts unsupported by SIPs. Differences in these measures were correlated with race/ethnicity, college generation status, and age. Notably, SIP students had higher odds of persisting in STEM than students not supported by SIPs. Focus group data provide additional meaning to the measured survey constructs and revealed nuanced qualitative differences between SIP and non-SIP student experiences. Overall, being involved in a SIP at our institution trends positively with theoretical models that explain STEM student persistence. SIPs have the potential to provide and/or facilitate meaningful and critical support, and students without those intentional supports may be left behind.

Unpacking the challenges and predictors of elementary-middle school students' use of the distributive property.

The distributive property plays a pivotal role in advancing students' understanding of multiplication, enabling the decomposition of problems and the acquisition of new facts. However, this property of multiplication is difficult for students to understand. We used two unique data sets to explore middle school students' use of the distributive property. Study 1 involved data from 1:1 structured interviews of students (N = 24) discussing worked examples and solving associated practice problems. We examined whether or not students used the distributive property to solve the problems and whether or not interviewers followed the recommended distributive property prompts or defaulted to more conventional methods. Despite exposure to worked examples using the distributive property and a protocol calling for attention to it, students and interviewers favored methods like PEMDAS (parentheses, exponents, multiplication, division, addition, subtraction) or long multiplication. Study 2 used a data set with middle school students' (N = 131) item-level responses on Kirkland's (2022; doctoral dissertation, University of Notre Dame) Brief Assessment of Mature Number Sense along with several related measures of domain-general and domain-specific skills. We extracted problems involving the distributive property for analysis. Surprisingly, there was no evidence that students' use of the distributive property improved from sixth grade to eighth grade. However, both grade-level mathematics achievement and cognitive reflection uniquely predicted the correct use of the distributive property. Results suggest that middle school students who exhibit stronger reflective thinking tend to perform better on distributive property problems. Findings highlight cognitive reflection as a potentially important construct involved in the understanding and use of the distributive property.

ChatGPT-generated help produces learning gains equivalent to human tutor-authored help on mathematics skills.

Authoring of help content within educational technologies is labor intensive, requiring many iterations of content creation, refining, and proofreading. In this paper, we conduct an efficacy evaluation of ChatGPT-generated help using a 3 x 4 study design (N = 274) to compare the learning gains of ChatGPT to human tutor-authored help across four mathematics problem subject areas. Participants are randomly assigned to one of three hint conditions (control, human tutor, or ChatGPT) paired with one of four randomly assigned subject areas (Elementary Algebra, Intermediate Algebra, College Algebra, or Statistics). We find that only the ChatGPT condition produces statistically significant learning gains compared to a no-help control, with no statistically significant differences in gains or time-on-task observed between learners receiving ChatGPT vs human tutor help. Notably, ChatGPT-generated help failed quality checks on 32% of problems. This was, however, reducible to nearly 0% for algebra problems and 13% for statistics problems after applying self-consistency, a "hallucination" mitigation technique for Large Language Models.

The development of number line estimation in children at risk of mathematics learning difficulties: A longitudinal study.

Children with mathematics learning difficulties (MLD) show poorer performance on the number line task, but how performance on this task relates to other mathematical skills is unclear. This study examined the association between performance on the number line task and mathematical skills during the first 2 years of school for children at risk of MLD. Children (N = 100; Mage = 83.63 months) were assessed on four occasions on the number line task and other mathematical skills (math fluency, numerical operations, and mathematical reasoning). Estimation patterns were analyzed based on the representational shift and proportional judgment accounts separately. More consistent longitudinal trends and stronger evidence for differences in mathematical skills based on estimation patterns were found within the representational shift account. Latent growth curve models showed accuracy on the number line task as a predictor of growth in some mathematical skills assessed. We discuss impacts of methodological limitations on the study of estimation patterns.

From integers to fractions: The role of analogy in transfer and long-term learning.

Fractions are the gatekeepers to advanced mathematics but are difficult to learn. One powerful learning mechanism is analogy, which builds fraction understanding on a pre-existing foundation of integer knowledge. Indeed, a short intervention that aligned fractions and integers on number lines improved children's estimates of fractions (Yu et al., 2022). The breadth and durability of such gains, however, are unknown, and analogies to other sources (such as percentages) may be equally powerful. To investigate this issue, we randomly assigned 109 fourth and fifth graders to one of three experimental conditions with different analogical sources (integers, percentages, or fractions) or a control condition. During training, children in the experimental conditions solved pairs of aligned fraction number line problems and proportionally-equivalent problems expressed in integers, percentages, or fractions (e.g., 3/8 on a 0-1 number line aligned with 3 on a 0-8 number line). Children in the control group solved fraction number-line problems sequentially. At pretest and a two-week delayed posttest, children completed a broad fraction knowledge battery, including estimation, comparison, categorization, ordering, and arithmetic. Results showed that aligning integers and fractions on number lines facilitated better estimation of fractional magnitudes, and the training effect transferred to novel fraction problems after two weeks. Similar gains were not observed for analogies using percentages. These findings highlight the importance of building new mathematical knowledge through analogies to familiar, similar sources.

The impact of reading metacognitive strategies on mathematics learning efficiency and performance: An analysis using PISA 2018 data in China.

The current study employed latent profile analysis to examine the application patterns of students' reading metacognitive strategies using PISA 2018 data in China. Subsequently, it explored the differences in students' mathematics learning efficiency and performance. The results revealed that: (1) Six types of reading metacognitive strategies application patterns were identified: "Novice - indifferent," "Veteran - average," "Novice - low evaluating," "Veteran - skilled," "Novice - mixed," and "Novice - arbitrary." (2) The primary factors that affect the classification of reading metacognitive strategies application patterns were gender, and family economic, social, and cultural statuses (ESCS). (3) Mathematics learning time could positively predict performance overall, but the mathematics learning time of "Veteran - skilled" and "Novice - mixed" students had no significant correlation with their mathematics performance. The findings suggests that educators should not blindly increase students' mathematics learning time but instead provide appropriate guidance based on their mastery patterns of reading metacognitive strategies to enhance mathematics learning efficiency and performance.

Personalizing real-world problems: Posing own problems increases self-efficacy expectations, intrinsic value, attainment value, and utility value.

BACKGROUND: Real-world problems are important in math instruction, but they do not necessarily trigger students' task motivation. Personalizing real-world problems by (1) matching problems to students' shared living environment (context personalization) and (2) asking students to pose their own problems (active personalization) might be two interventions to increase students' task motivation. AIM: In the current study, we investigated the effects of context personalization and active personalization on students' self-efficacy expectations, intrinsic value, attainment value, utility value, and cost. SAMPLE: The participants were 28 fifth- and sixth-grade students who voluntarily took part in a six-month afterschool program in which they posed problems with the aim of creating a math walk in their hometown. METHOD: Using a within-subjects design, at the end of the afterschool program, the students rated their self-efficacy expectations and task values for four self-developed problems associated with their hometown, four peer-developed problems associated with their hometown, and four instructor-provided problems associated with unfamiliar locations. RESULTS: Students reported higher self-efficacy expectations, intrinsic value, attainment value, and utility value for active-personalized than non-personalized problems. To a lesser extent, context personalization promoted intrinsic value and attainment value. No effect was found for cost. CONCLUSIONS: Active personalization (i.e. asking students to pose their own real-world problems) is suited to enhance students' task motivation, specifically their self-efficacy expectations, intrinsic value, attainment value, and utility value. Context personalization still boosts students' intrinsic value and attainment value. Implementation in classroom instruction is discussed.

Development of early numeracy skills in children with moderate intellectual disability.

This study assessed the effectiveness of a program aimed at improving the early numeracy skills of students with moderate intellectual disability. The persistence of the acquired skills and the program's impact on learning were monitored. Feedback from the students and their mothers was also gathered. Using a multiple-probe design across subjects, the results were visually presented through graphical analysis. Three male students aged 8-9 years participated. After obtaining high-reliability findings from reliability analyses, results showed the program effectively increased students' number skills with a high effect size. These skills persisted post-intervention, and both students and mothers expressed positive views of the intervention.

Effects of a 3-factor field intervention on numerical and geometric knowledge in preschool children.

The main aim of this study was to develop and test the effects of a field math intervention program on both number and geometry knowledge. The intervention was developed based on three basic skills previously associated with mathematical performance: symbolic number knowledge, mapping processes and spatial reasoning. The participants were 117 preschoolers from six schools in Cali and Bogotá. The children were assigned to an intervention group (N = 55) or a control group (N = 62). The intervention lasted 11 weeks with 3 sessions per week where the children participated in different game-based activities. Tests of numerical and geometric knowledge were administered before and after the intervention. The effects of the intervention were tested twice, immediately after the program ended and six months later. The results show that the children in the intervention group improved more than the control group in both number and geometry. The second posttest revealed a significant intervention effect for geometry, but not for numerical knowledge. The implications of these mixed patterns of results are discussed in the paper.

The sums are larger than their natural number addends: Relation to operands understanding predicts growth in arithmetic/algebraic problem solving.

The relation to operands (RO) principles describe the relation between operands and answers in arithmetic problems (e.g., the sum is always larger than its positive addends). Despite being a fundamental property of arithmetic, its empirical relation with arithmetic/algebraic problem solving has seldom been investigated. The current longitudinal study aimed to address this issue. Two-hundred-and-two Chinese fifth graders (57% boys) were assessed on their RO understanding. Their arithmetic/algebraic problem solving were assessed multiple times over 2 years. Results from latent growth curve modeling showed that RO understanding predicted the growth in arithmetic/algebraic problem solving when other known predictors of arithmetic/algebraic problem solving were controlled. The findings highlight the role of RO understanding in children's mathematical development. Interventions should be developed to enhance children's RO understanding. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Digital games for learning basic arithmetic at home.

Many early learners need individualized support when regular teaching is not readily available. Here we present results of a progressive digital game that was played at home rather than under the supervision of the teacher. "NumberBeads" was designed to help low attaining learners, but also typical early learners. The game required learners to construct objects-sets and digits-to match a target object, and was played at home using an online platform. The participants were first-graders (n=140) enrolled in 10 classrooms randomly assigned to two groups. One group played NumberBeads, requiring students to construct solutions in a microworld of sets and digits. Another group played a similar game, NumberChoice, which contained the same elements, sets and digits, but used multiple-choice questions with right/wrong feedback. Results showed that learners using both games were able to complete the game unsupervised at home, but there was greater improvement with NumberBeads especially with learners identified as low attaining. Overall these findings support the feasibility of boosting early numeracy at home using a game designed to help basic numerical competence that requires no teacher supervision, and very little guidance by parents or carers.

Formative evaluation of a STEAM and nutrition education summer program for low-income youth.

In-depth formative evaluations are vital for curriculum development and program planning but are often not conducted before a program pilots. A formative evaluation of Project stRIde was conducted to gain insight from experts and identify revisions to the curriculum. Project stRIde is a science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics (STEAM) and nutrition-based curriculum developed for 4th and 5th grade students from low-income and diverse families. Nine experts spanning the fields of nutrition education, cultural competency, elementary education, summer programs, and STEAM outreach were recruited to participate in an expert content review (ECR) survey and virtual interviews. Seven core themes were identified: effectively promoting student engagement, increased guidance or support needed, activity too difficult for age, time, confidence in teaching lessons, cultural appropriateness, and strengths of curriculum in promoting STEAM education and innovation. Across the lessons, all reviewers agreed that the lessons were accurate, incorporated STEAM concepts, and were culturally appropriate for this population. Future major edits to the curriculum include creating supplemental videos, modifying some activities for age level, and incorporating more opportunities for participant engagement. Overall, an ECR is an effective way to examine a program's strengths and limitations and should be included in the beginning stages of program planning.

Tuning Random Forests for Causal Inference under Cluster-Level Unmeasured Confounding.

Recently, there has been growing interest in using machine learning methods for causal inference due to their automatic and flexible ability to model the propensity score and the outcome model. However, almost all the machine learning methods for causal inference have been studied under the assumption of no unmeasured confounding and there is little work on handling omitted/unmeasured variable bias. This paper focuses on a machine learning method based on random forests known as Causal Forests and presents five simple modifications for tuning Causal Forests so that they are robust to cluster-level unmeasured confounding. Our simulation study finds that adjusting the default tuning procedure with the propensity score from fixed effects logistic regression or using variables that are centered to their cluster means produces estimates that are more robust to cluster-level unmeasured confounding. Also, when these parametric propensity score models are mis-specified, our modified machine learning methods remain robust to bias from cluster-level unmeasured confounders compared to existing parametric approaches based on propensity score weighting. We conclude by demonstrating our proposals in a real data study concerning the effect of taking an eighth-grade algebra course on math achievement scores from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study.

Preschoolers prior formal mathematics education engage numerical magnitude representation rather than counting principles in symbolic ±1 arithmetic: Evidence from the operational momentum effect.

In numerical cognition research, the operational momentum (OM) phenomenon (tendency to overestimate the results of addition and/or binding addition to the right side and underestimating subtraction and/or binding it to the left side) can help illuminate the most basic representations and processes of mental arithmetic and their development. This study is the first to demonstrate OM in symbolic arithmetic in preschoolers. It was modeled on Haman and Lipowska's (2021) non-symbolic arithmetic task, using Arabic numerals instead of visual sets. Seventy-seven children (4-7 years old) who know Arabic numerals and counting principles (CP), but without prior school math education, solved addition and subtraction problems presented as videos with one as the second operand. In principle, such problems may be difficult when involving a non-symbolic approximate number processing system, whereas in symbolic format they can be solved based solely on the successor/predecessor functions and knowledge of numerical orders, without reference to representation of numerical magnitudes. Nevertheless, participants made systematic errors, in particular, overestimating results of addition in line with the typical OM tendency. Moreover, subtraction and addition induced longer response times when primed with left- and right-directed movement, respectively, which corresponds to the reversed spatial form of OM. These results largely replicate those of non-symbolic task and show that children at early stages of mastering symbolic arithmetic may rely on numerical magnitude processing and spatial-numerical associations rather than newly-mastered CP and the concept of an exact number.

Development and Validation of the Brief Math Anxiety Scale (BMAS) in University Students / Desarrollo y Validación de la Brief Math Anxiety Scale (BMAS) en Estudiantes Universitarios

Background: This study developed the Brief Math Anxiety Scale (BMAS), a brief version of the Shortened Math Anxiety Rating Scale (sMARS), maintaining its original three-factor structure, by applying item response theory. Method: The sMARS was administered to 1,349 undergraduates, along with other questionnaires to measure their math ability, trait and test anxieties, and attitudes toward mathematics. Results: Results showed that the original scale could be reduced to nine items (three for each subscale). We provided evidence of good psychometric properties: strong internal consistency, adequate 7-week test-retest reliability, and good convergent/discriminant validity. Conclusions: In conclusion, the BMAS provides valid interpretations and reliable scores for assessing math anxiety in university students, and is especially useful in situations with time constraints where the longer form is impractical.(AU)

Antecedentes: En este estudio se presenta el desarrollo de la Brief Math Anxiety Scale (BMAS), una versión breve de la Shortened Math Anxiety Rating Scale (sMARS) manteniendo su estructura original de tres factores, aplicando la teoría de respuesta al ítem. Método: La sMARS, así como otros cuestionarios para medir su capacidad matemática, la ansiedad rasgo y frente a los exámenes y las actitudes hacia las matemáticas, se administraron a 1.349 estudiantes universitarios. Resultados: Los resultados mostraron que la escala original podía reducirse a nueve ítems (tres para cada subescala). Proporcionamos evidencia de sus buenas propiedades psicométricas: consistencia interna excelente, adecuada fiabilidad test-retest a las 7 semanas y buena validez convergente/discriminante. Conclusiones: En conclusión, la BMAS proporciona interpretaciones válidas y puntuaciones fiables para evaluar la ansiedad matemática en estudiantes universitarios y es especialmente útil en situaciones con disponibilidad de tiempo limitado, donde la forma más larga no es aplicable.(AU)