Students’ Collaborative Problem Solving in Mathematics Classrooms: An Empirical Study (Perspectives on Rethinking and Reforming Education)

This open access book provides key insights into the social fundamentals of learning and indications of social interactive modes conducive and restrictive of that learning in China. Combining theoretical and technical advances in an innovative research design, this book focuses on collaborative problem solving in mathematics to increase the visibility of social interactions in teachers’ designing, students’ learning and teachers’ instructional intervention. It also explores students’ cognitive and social interaction as well as teacher intervention in students’ group collaboration.

Cao Yiming is a distinguished professor in School of Mathematical Sciences at Beijing Normal University, China. He is also the leader of the revision group of compulsory education mathematics curriculum standard. During the past twenty years, he has explored how to support students' mathematics learning through teachers' development of high-quality instructional practices. He has worked with different school systems and teachers throughout China, the USA, Australia, Japan, Finland, and Germany. He also has research collaborations with scholars from the UK, Austria, Hungary, and Singapore. In 2018, he published a book The 21st Century Mathematics Education in China (Springer), which was co-edited with Frederick K.S. Leung and provided a comprehensive introduction to the status of development of Chinese mathematics education in the twenty-first century.