There is need for increased focus on geometric transformations and symmetry in primary and secondary education, as well as increased research to support learning and teaching of geometric transformations. To identify directions for future research and teaching, we set out to map the research that has already been conducted and to identify key areas of focus and opportunity going forward. Toward these goals, this systematic review examines 62 peer-reviewed articles on teaching and learning about 2D geometric transformations and symmetry since 1990. To guide our review, we use the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) protocol. The review explores the research in terms of: (a) how students learn about transformations, (b) how teaching about transformations has been conceptualized, (c) how media have been leveraged to support learning about transformations, and (d) which theoretical frames have been leveraged and how have those frames shifted over time. Discussion and conclusions consider key areas of growth for the field going forward to better support teachers and students learning about symmetry and transformations.

Academic writing in both face-to-face and online environments is often fraught with tension, emotion, and challenge. The quality of doctoral students’ online academic writing experiences can be a difference maker in the successful completion of programs. This study examines how mentoring practices support online doctoral students’ academic writing, building on prior research that identified five enabling factors of effective online doctoral supervision, with a focus on cultivating a collaborative online community of support for academic writing. Using a comparative case study approach, interviews with five recently completed faculty of education doctoral graduates at a large university in western Canada were analyzed to identify four mentoring supervisory practices that support online doctoral students’ academic writing: (a) fostering a trusting, supportive community of practice; (b) engaging in regular synchronous meetings combined with iterative cycles of mentoring and scaffolding; (c) using coursework and program structures as a springboard for writing; and (d) providing diverse models of academic writing. Central to the effectiveness of the four online supervisory mentoring practices was the notion of trust which enabled students to develop their academic writing skills, scholarly identities, and successfully complete their doctoral degrees. This study is significant for identifying supervisory mentoring practices that led to students’ sense of gratitude and flourishing, further highlighting how crucial relational trust is for online doctoral students’ academic writing.

This paper explores how a teaching sequence designed using the notion of Papert’s “powerful ideas” might bridge the disparate institutional logics found in makerspaces and schools. Using a case study approach, we analyzed two elementary novice maker teachers’ implementations of a maker teaching sequence while navigating the institutional logics of schooling. We studied the teachers’ experiences through the lenses of maker learning practices, the institutional logics of schooling, and Papert’s notions of powerful ideas. Findings highlight teachers engaged in Papert’s notion of “idea work” as they navigated the tensions and synergies when bridging making and schooling, leading them to see powerful curricular possibilities through making. More challenging was assessment, where schooling logics overwhelmed other considerations as the teachers attended to a more traditional focus on using assessment for reporting purposes.

Academic writing in both face-to-face and online environments is often a challenging experience for many faculty and students and can be fraught with tension and emotion. Thus, the quality of doctoral students’ online academic writing experiences can be a difference maker in successful completion of programs. Building on our earlier work identifying five enabling factors of successful online doctoral supervision, this study explores practices that enable factor five: Cultivating a collaborative online community of support for academic writing. Using a comparative case study approach, we analyzed the data from interviews with five recently completed doctoral graduates to determine the mentoring practices that cultivated for them, effective online doctoral student academic writing relationships. Findings identified four supervisory practices: (a) engaging in regularly scheduled meetings with iterative cycles of mentoring and scaffolding; (b) engaging students in a trusting, supportive community of practice; (c) using coursework and program structures as a springboard for writing; and (d) providing diverse models of academic writing. Central to the effectiveness of these practices was the notion of trust. Most of the doctoral students trusted their supervisor to engage in the four practices to support them. Through the provision of timely and thoughtful feedback and feedforward strategies from their community, doctoral students were able to develop their academic writing as a tool for communication, as a tool for thinking and creating new knowledge, and for developing their academic identities.

BackgroundK12 teachers need a wider range of design approaches to foster feasible qualitative improvements in all students' schooling experiences. We propose a framework for conceptualizing pre-service teachers' stances toward designerly thinking.MethodsWe developed the framework following Crismond and Adams' scholarship of integration approach combined with an inductive content analysis of 43 pre-service teachers' conceptualizations of design across two versions of a design course.ResultsThe resulting framework focuses on six dimensions including: (a) co-evolution of problem frames and possible solutions, (b) problem complexity and structure, (c) idea fluency and scope, (d) inquiry and stakeholder engagement, (e) conceptualization of the design process, and (f) attitude toward ambiguity. Each dimension articulates anchor points and examples based on the literature and grounded content analysis of the data. The analysis and discussion consider the conceptual accessibility of the framework's goals for pre-service teachers and whether they considered the goals feasible to implement in the context of curricular mandates.ContributionThe proposed framework provides the foundation for a hypothetical learning trajectory that can be elaborated and validated through future research to support K12 teachers in their development as informed designers who might better serve the needs of all their students.

Aim/Purpose: In this case study research, we aimed to understand the development of effective doctoral supervision practices in Educational Research by examining supervisors’ experiences as doctoral students and how they learned their evolving supervision and mentoring roles as professors. Background: Doctoral supervision is shaped by institutional systems, program structures, research cultures, and national guidelines. Supervisors impact doctoral students’ research experiences, academic success, and personal growth. Many new professors lack formal training, rely on their own experiences being supervised, and learn how to supervise effectively through trial and error and on the job. Methodology: Our case study research involved interviewing five tenured, mid-career doctoral supervisors who were deemed effective based on doctoral student completions. Using reflexive thematic analysis and evaluative coding of interview transcripts, we identified two key findings and nine themes to describe supervisors’ experiences as doctoral students and their on-the-job development and practices as supervisors. Contribution: This study highlights how experiences being supervised as a doctoral student impact and influence the development of supervision practices in combination with various experiences of learning on-the-job during one’s academic career. We expand understanding of the complexity of supervision practice and uncover differences between contemporary contexts and past experiences being supervised. We demonstrate how several supervisors translated impoverished experiences with their own supervisor into targeted efforts to learn how to effectively supervise their own students, to change history, and to deliberately not supervise the way they were supervised. Findings: Two findings are presented: (1) experiences being supervised influence early supervision practices, and (2) learning to supervise on-the-job happens in a variety of ways. Nine themes describe how supervisors’ experiences being supervised influenced their supervisory practices and the various informal on-the-job development approaches, such as learning from students, colleagues, and prior career experiences. Findings highlight the roles of doctoral supervisors, academic peers, doctoral students, programs, and institutions that contribute to developing effective supervisory practices. In our case study, we demonstrate how supervisors can transform academic and research cultures over time. Recommendations for Practitioners: Institutions, programs, and supervisors play crucial roles in ensuring doctoral student success. Institutions should offer structured professional learning and peer mentoring that supports supervisors in developing effective practices early in their careers. By leveraging study findings, institutions can design professional learning opportunities that increase faculty adoption of effective supervision practices and accelerate their learning. Recommendation for Researchers: Given the vital role played by supervisors in research training and talent development of the next generation of researchers and leaders across society, we argue it is crucial to understand and optimize the ways in which doctoral supervisors develop effective supervisory practice as a matter of ongoing research interest. Future research can investigate the importance of intergenerational learning and knowledge transfer in academia, encouraging a more reflective and informed approach to supervisory development. Impact on Society: Findings can inform how to maximize individual, institutional, and governmental investments in higher education. This research can improve outcomes in doctoral education by expanding effective, research-informed development of supervisory practices. Quality supervision impacts doctoral students’ academic success, mental health, and career progression. Understanding supervisory lineage enables universities to enhance current and future doctoral experiences. Future Research: Four questions are provided to guide and promote supervisory development and ongoing research. There is an ongoing need to examine how supervisors and doctoral students define the impact and outcomes of successful supervision and mentoring practices beyond the completion of the thesis.

Guided by contemporary theory and research from design fields, we propose a framework for conceptualizing K-12 educators' stances towards design that focuses on problem framing, information gathering, divergent thinking, and iteration.We use this framework to analyze data drawn from 28 pre-service teachers' conceptualization of design within the context of a design course taken by over 400 pre-service teachers.Our analysis demonstrated that most participants made only moderate progress in refining their thinking about design. Theoretical frameworkInsights from design fields suggest that a designerly stance towards design for K-12 educators focused on supporting second order changes would emphasize four key themes as follows: (a) view of the problem space (e.g.,

This article presents findings from a design-based research study that investigated curriculum implementation in a makerspace with a grade six teacher and her class over the course of one year. In comparing the figured worlds of classroom and makerspace, the authors explore through the examples of three students and the teacher how they each adopted personal improvisations from the makerspace into the culture of the classroom, leading to developments in agency and identity on the part of all. In particular, by engaging in collaborative design-based research, the teacher was able to embrace the iterative, collaborative, risk-taking nature of maker culture, which led her to rethink and transform her teaching practice. Findings suggest that the makerspace serves as a specialized learning environment in which teachers can prototype inquiry-based approaches to curricular learning.

Research on geometric transformations suggests that early learners possess intuitive understandings grounded in motion metaphors, transitioning to mappings. The processes through which students transition between these two conceptions are not fully understood. We propose that Vygotskian hybridizing (related to Vygotsky’s articulation of everyday and scientific concepts) may provide a lens for thinking about the relationship between these conceptions. Design features of block-based programming environments provide affordances to support hybridizing by providing a co-action space for learning. We conducted a comparative case study of four grade seven and eight students working in a Scratch task (Code the Quilts) and a game (Transformations Quest) to construct understandings of geometric transformations. Our findings suggest: (1) students hybridized their personal experience of motion and mathematical knowledge of mapping to build geometric transformations understandings and (2) the co-action space in which students worked promoted distributed interactions between students, block-based environments, and tasks to support hybridizing.

What does it mean for a game to engage players in academically meaningful play? Much has been written about the integration of educational learning within the design of games in terms of intrinsic/endogenous design. While these framings capture the positioning of learning within games, they provide less insight into what might distinguish design choices that are powerful in terms of both learning and gameplay from design choices that might be limiting from one or both of these perspectives. In this article, we therefore propose a framework for thinking about academically meaningful play that builds upon and extends more general ideas about meaningful play (Salen & Zimmerman, 2003). The proposed framework focuses on (a) discernability of choice outcomes, (b) integration of choice outcomes into unfolding game state, (c) meaningful choices grounded in core academic ideas, and (d) thematic and challenge access. We analyze three academic games that focus on geometric transformations as comparative cases to consider the potential affordances of the proposed framework for analyzing the implications of design choices.

Purpose Using Johansson-Sköldberg et al. ’s (2013) descriptions of design discourses, this study aims to analyze teacher interviews, research notes and teacher and student artifacts to determine if engagement in design practices led to changes in the teacher’s thinking. Design/methodology/approach This article presents results from a year-long study that explored how a teacher enacted design discourses to engage in curriculum learning within an elementary school makerspace. The design-based study involved a collaborative partnership where a teacher and researcher co-designed, co-enacted and co-reflected on three cycles of making featuring curriculum studies in science, mathematics and social studies. Findings The authors determined that engagement in all four design discourses led to transformative changes in the teacher’s thinking about herself as a teacher and her students as learners. The evidence suggests the school makerspace can serve as a liminal design space for professional learning, given that implicit in the makerspace is the embodiment of design practices such as problem finding, iteration and reflection. Research limitations/implications Engaging in design discourses in the makerspace can lead teachers to question the frames they hold about teaching and learning. However, teachers need ongoing support in developing discipline knowledge and prioritizing the time required for designing, iterating and reflecting on learning in the makerspace. Practical implications The makerspace provides a liminal space for teachers’ professional learning in that implicit in the makerspace is the embodiment of design practices such as problem finding, iteration and reflection. Originality/value This study is unique, in that it places the importance of teacher learning in the elementary school makerspace on equal footing with student learning, thereby creating a culture of inquiry for all.

In this case study research, we examine online supervision and engagements in a blended education doctorate (EdD) programme through a lens of relational trust. Interviews with supervisors and EdD graduates enabled us to examine practices and strategies used to cultivate relationships and learning alliances that supported doctoral candidates in conducting research and dissertation writing. We explored opportunities and challenges in fostering effective supervisory relationships online. Five enabling factors for cultivating effective online supervisory relationships address programme design, supervisors' roles and responsibilities, and doctoral students' experiences. Establishing relational trust and learning alliances in early and ongoing engagements in programme through to culminating milestones was vital for effective student-supervisor relationships.

A makerspace is a place where people create artifacts while sharing ideas, equipment, and knowledge. In so doing, makers develop a range of knowledge and skills, such as creativity, problem-solving, collaboration, and self-regulation, to help them achieve their goals. These skills are broadly touted as key for learning and transferable across disciplines and making contexts. This article will first review the state of play in the literature to assess skill development. Secondly, itreports on the trial of an assessment framework developed through a literature review and implemented in a maker learning environment with an elementary school context. Finally, the article concludes with implications for practice.

Attracting and retaining teachers for rural and remote areas are pervasive global problems, and Canada is not immune to these issues. As recommended by the Northern Alberta Development Report (2010), communities need to make an increased priority of local teacher recruitment, by “growing our own teachers” (p. 11). One way to do just that is to allow students to stay in their communities for preservice teacher education, thereby increasing access to potentially qualified individuals who might not otherwise be reached. In light of this provincial directive, this paper will examine the provision of blended preservice teacher education by examining student and instructor perspectives in one community-based program. While the emphasis of the study highlighted how alternative provisions of teacher education programs may better support students who live in rural regions, the results gave rise to the ways in which shifts in our delivery of programs may alter notions of relationality and at an institutional level, the evolving nature of the university itself.

In this article, we focus on the case of a Canadian teacher and her students who engaged with a researcher in a year-long design-based research study exploring the implementation of curriculum within a makerspace context. Together, the grade six teacher and researcher co-designed, co-enacted, and co-reflected on three curricular making cycles, one related to sky science, another to mathematical transformations, and a third focused on core concepts of democratic systems. The two-fold purpose of this DBR was to promote pedagogical change through designs for making and to articulate design principles that could be utilized when engaging with curriculum for making. Findings show that the makerspace as learning environment and design-based research as methodology provided a double helix scaffold that compelled the teacher to reconsider her frame when enacting curriculum. For this teacher, collaboration on design-based research and designs for learning in the makerspace promoted a shift in pedagogy and led the teacher and her students to rethink notions of curriculum while questioning what is important to know. An expansion of the intervention to engage multiple teachers in multiple sites to determine scalability is recommended. Study findings point to the makerspace as a promising design frame for rethinking curriculum and pedagogical practice.

Makerspaces are locations where people with common interests can work on projects, share ideas, tools and expertise to make or create. There is an abundance of "how to" guides and research studies on physical makerspaces, little research focuses on describing thevirtualmaking processes and the experiences therein. This qualitative study explores the experiences of seven participants who engaged in a synchronous virtual makerspace. Meeting once a month over 16 weeks, members of the International Maker Educator Network participated in the making of a robot. This case study describes how the virtual making occurred, the personal experiences of the makers, technology used to support virtual making, and the affordances and inhibitors of virtual making. Data are analysed through the lens of a professional learning community and the People, Means and Activities makerspace framework. The paper concludes with implications for virtual making in practice and future research opportunities.

•Learning from study abroad experiences was not uniform, indicating pre-service teachers’ level of professional development.•The majority of pre-service teachers’ reflections post-sojourn remained at the descriptive levels.•Reflections at the critical level showed clear implications for teaching and learning practices.•Customized reflective practice approaches may better support learning in study abroad programs.•Additional structure and facilitation are needed to encourage reflection about future teaching roles and practices.