Mathematical creativity is important for students to reason flexibly, generate meaningful ideas, and experience mathematics as a space for exploration rather than only procedural accuracy. This multiple case study examines how three middle school students experienced and engaged with mathematical creativity during creativity-directed tasks and how they perceived opportunities for creative mathematical thinking in their regular classroom settings. Data sources included task-based interviews, observations, student reflections, group discussions, and problem-solving artifacts. Thematic analysis identified ten themes organized across three focal areas: students’ engagement with mathematical creativity, their perceived barriers to creative participation, and the influence of prior learning experiences on their creative confidence. Findings indicate that creativity-directed tasks supported students’ self-expression, deeper reasoning, collaborative idea generation, and sense of mathematical agency. In contrast, students perceived their regular classroom experiences as providing fewer opportunities for creative risk-taking and as more often validating the contributions of high-achieving or outspoken students. Implications emphasize the importance of classroom structures and pedagogical approaches that support all students as capable of engaging in creative mathematical thinking, offering guidance for designing instruction that promotes both creativity and equity in mathematics education.
Ali Bicer, Tugce Aldemir, Micayla Gooden et al.· Mathematics Education Resear...· 0 citations
This embedded case study examined how eight in-service teachers from rural and under-resourced districts engaged with mathematical creativity (MC), content knowledge (CK), and pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) during an AI-guided professional development program, and how specific AI-mediated mechanisms shaped that engagement. Teachers completed ten interactive modules in which a generative AI system served as a cognitive and instructional partner by prompting problem solving, problem posing, representational reasoning, simulated student interpretation, and reflective instructional decision-making. Data sources included teacher-AI dialogue logs, teacher-generated mathematical artifacts, and interviews, which were analyzed through iterative thematic analysis. Findings showed that teachers engaged with MC, CK, and PCK as interconnected forms of reasoning rather than as isolated domains. Three cross-case themes characterized this engagement: creative mathematical exploration, conceptual deepening of proportional reasoning, and expansion of pedagogical reasoning. These trajectories were shaped by six core AI-mediated mechanisms: adaptive and personalized prompting, real-time feedback, progressive scaffold fading, simulated student reasoning, conversational nonjudgmental tone, and flexible pacing. Two cross-cutting mechanisms, representational nudges and cycles of creative challenge and reflection, further supported teachers’ movement between mathematical exploration, conceptual reasoning, and pedagogical decision-making. Teachers emphasized that these mechanisms enabled productive struggle within a psychologically safe environment and positioned AI as a thinking partner rather than a content-delivery tool. The study contributes to research on AI-supported teacher learning by showing how mathematical creativity-aligned AI scaffolding can support teachers’ integrated engagement with mathematics and pedagogy in rural professional learning contexts where access to sustained professional development is limited.
Ali Bicer, T. Aldemir, Unggi Lee et al.· ZDM: Mathematics Education· 1 citation
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