Profile of Conceptual Understanding and Pedagogical Competence of Primary Teacher Education Students in Elementary Mathematics Learning
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.65430/jssm.v1i4.75Keywords:
Conceptual Understanding, Pedagogical Ability, Preservice Primary Teachers, Elementary Mathematics, Mathematical Knowledge For TeachingAbstract
This study describes the conceptual understanding and pedagogical competence of 37 Primary Teacher Education students in elementary mathematics. A descriptive document analysis combined quantitative scoring and qualitative analysis of 185 evaluative feedback notes from an anonymized assessment document in one learning group in East Java. Five domains were examined: place value and base-ten blocks, properties of division, factors and prime factorization, least common multiples using the ladder method, and multiplication of negative integers. The overall mean was 91.14 (SD = 6.88). An exploratory reclassification of rubric indicators showed conceptual understanding of 94.75% and pedagogical competence of 85.41%. The lowest domain was negative-integer multiplication (85.15%). The weakest indicators involved explaining the pedagogical advantage of the ladder method (80.0%) and representing negative multiplication with a coin/charge model (80.3%). The findings suggest that students were generally accurate in concepts and procedures but less consistent in converting mathematical knowledge into explanations, representations, and instructional rationales. Teacher education should therefore strengthen links among mathematical meaning, multiple representations, anticipated misconceptions, and pedagogical explanation.
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