Overview
If you are currently teaching mathematics in a Primary School, Secondary School or Further Education setting, then this Masters course is designed for you. It offers high quality professional development for early career teachers seeking a grounding in Mathematics Education, for subject changers, and for advanced teachers looking to take a more research-engaged approach to their specialist areas of expertise.
Key Facts
| Award: | Masters |
| Academic School: | School of Teacher Development |
| Duration: | 2-3 years |
| Mode of Study: | Part-time |
| Start Date: | April |
| Awarding Institution: | Bishop Grosseteste University |
| Institution Code: | B38 |
Entry Requirements
You will need to have obtained, or be predicted to obtain, normally an undergraduate honours degree with a minimum of lower second class honours (or equivalent), preferably with mathematics or education content. MA in Mathematics Education students need to be working in an educational setting where they are involved in mathematics education.
It is recommended that applicants have some relevant professional experience, either in teaching or in other educational practice such as policy. However, applications from candidates who do not have any experience will always be considered.
If you have any questions about the entry requirements for this course, please contact our Enquiries team for advice on +44 (0) 1522 583658 or email enquiries@bishopg.ac.uk.
BGU is committed to widening access and participation and we adhere to a strict policy of non-discrimination
Accreditation for Prior Learning
If you’ve recently completed or studied a particular module as part of a previous qualification, this may mean that you’re not required to undertake a particular module of your BGU course. However this must be agreed in writing and you must apply for this.
Further Information
About The Course
This Masters degree will give you the tools to refine your own professional practice, study the latest innovations in mathematics teaching, and enable you to provide leadership in the area of Mathematics Education. It will allow you to compare international systems of Mathematics Education, critically explore policy at a range of scales, and develop excellent departmental practice.
Aimed at Mathematics educators (both with and without a Mathematics background) this course will create informed, reflective practitioners with strong pedagogical and policy knowledge. You will engage in sustained reflection on your role as a professional Mathematics practitioner, looking at how educational theory and practice may be the topic of research, which may be utilised to inform and adapt professional practice within individual, organisational and wider contexts.
The programme structure of the course has been designed to accommodate your work-based context, with learning outcomes that can be applied to a range of professional roles in educational settings. With a clear research focus throughout the programme, it aims to examine the relationship between research, educational policy and practice.
This course will develop your ability to critically reflect on the subject of Mathematics Education.
Four taught modules are designed to support the systematic acquisition and understanding of a specialised body of knowledge, tackling an area of Mathematics Education which is pertinent to current teaching practice. Your dissertation will build on the taught modules, allowing you to demonstrate a deep knowledge of the research process at Masters level.
Delivery
This Masters course will present you with learning situations where you apply your own knowledge and are actively engaged in your own learning. Teaching is delivered though lectures, workshops and tutorials and will feature alongside online strategies such as blogging, forum discussions, podcasts or directed reading tasks. The course maximises pedagogical technologies, taking a blended approach including one weekend of face-to-face learning per module (two for the dissertation), whilst the remainder of the course will be guided through the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE).
Assessment
You will be assessed through a mixture of written work and oral or video presentations. These different types of assessment are used to appropriately test and apply different areas of knowledge, and allow you to demonstrate a wide range of skills.
Careers & Further Study
By the end of this course, your employability will have been enhanced by the specialist mathematics training you will have received. The demand for confident mathematics teachers is on the rise as industries continue to play an increasingly dominant role in global economies. This course is ideal for teachers in all phases, from Primary to Further Education, along with secondary school teachers who trained in subjects other than mathematics, re-training them to become mathematics education specialists.
Modules
Perceptions of the best practice in Mathematics Education are subject to rapid change. This module seeks to support teachers in developing research-aware practice that evaluates and develops pedagogical or innovative issues in Mathematics teaching. It provides structured support for rigorous exploration and critical analysis leading to plans for the informed development of practice.
There is a growing interest in international comparisons in Mathematics results and Mathematics systems (e.g. Shanghai Mastery, MYP non-setting) among teachers, parents and politicians. This module will deal with international comparisons from a broad perspective, considering the merits of comparison studies and developing the tools for critical discussion of comparison studies, their limits and assumptions.
This module explores the construct “Mathematical Resilience”, which describes the positive attributes that learners require in order to be prepared to engage with, learn, control and use mathematics both at school and beyond. It explores the research which shows that possessing this resilience is fundamental in learning, and particularly in continuing to study, mathematics.
Research Skills is a core module intended to provide you with sufficient theoretical, conceptual and philosophical grounding in qualitative, quantitative and mixed method research designs to become an increasingly informed and productive member of your own professional and scholarly community. The module will provide you with the research skills to commission or carry out and critically evaluate rigorous research in the field of Mathematics Education.
The dissertation is the culmination of the Masters in Mathematics Education course, combining the skills and understanding developed in the previous modules into one written piece of research. It demands enquiry and research skills, intellectual awareness of issues, discriminating use of research methodologies and refinement of argument, all at the highest level of scholarship. Supported by supervisors, you will develop a sustained, accurate, subtle and reflective argument on an educational issue.
Academic Staff
Zoe Nye
Academic Staff
Zoe trained and worked as a secondary Mathematics teacher in Boston, UK before moving overseas in 2005 to w
Dr Steven Puttick
Academic Staff
Steve has oversight of Secondary PGCE, FE, and Research Education which includes the school’s Masters pro
Dr Matthew Dunn
Academic Staff
Following Matthew’s teacher training in the South West, he moved to Lincolnshire in 1995 and taught in se
Support
Studying at BGU is a student-centred experience. Staff and students work together in a friendly and supportive atmosphere as part of an intimate campus community. You will know every member of staff personally and feel confident approaching them for help and advice, and staff members will recognise you, not just by sight, but as an individual with unique talents and interests. We will be there to support you, personally and academically, from induction to graduation.
Fees & Finance
A lot of student finance information is available from numerous sources, but it is sometimes confusing and contradictory. That’s why at BGU we try to give you all the information and support we can to help to throughout the process. Our Student Advice team are experts in helping you sort out the funding arrangements for your studies, offering a range of services to guide you through all aspects of student finance step by step. Click here to find information about fees, loans and support which will help to make the whole process a little easier to understand.
Undergraduate course applicants must apply via UCAS using the relevant UCAS code. The application fee is £12 for a single choice or £23 for more than one choice. For all applicants, there are full instructions at UCAS to make it as easy as possible for you to fill in your online application, plus help text where appropriate.
