Taiwanese primary school teachers’ perceived enablers for and barriers to the integration of children’s literature in mathematics teaching and learning

Abstract

AbstractThis study is part of the international survey studies on teachers’ beliefs concerning the integration of children’s literature in mathematics teaching and learning, and this paper reports the findings of the thematic analysis of open-ended survey responses elicited from 287 primary school teachers and teacher trainees in Taiwan. Using the seminal social psychology theory, the Theory of Planned Behaviour (Ajzen in Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 50, 179–211, 1991) to frame the findings, this study highlights 11 perceived barriers and 11 perceived enablers that are thought to influence the teachers’ intention to integrate children’s literature in their mathematics teaching. More specifically, we identified time constraint, lack of pedagogical knowledge and confidence, and resource constraint as being the most-cited perceived barriers, while pedagogical benefits, desire to improve teaching, and enabling social norms were identified as the top perceived enablers. Ultimately, this article offers several recommendations to address some of these key perceived barriers.