The Relationship Between Awareness on Effective Teaching Practice and Creative Thinking Skills Among Math Major Students: A Mixed-Methods Study

This study examined how students majoring in mathematics at a local college related to their awareness of effective teaching practices (AETP) and their creative thinking skills (CTS). Since students' ability to solve mathematical problems requires creative thinking, the study sought to ascertain how students' awareness of instructional tactics influences their creativity. The study used a convergent parallel mixed-methods design, and for the quantitative phase, 90 BSED Mathematics students were chosen via proportionate random sampling. Fourteen people were specifically chosen to participate in the qualitative phase, including 7 for focus groups and 7 for in-depth interviews. High levels of knowledge about good teaching techniques and capacity for original thought were indicated by quantitative results. The two variables showed a strong positive connection (r(88) =.748, p <.001), suggesting that improved creative thinking skills are linked to greater awareness of successful teaching techniques. Themes including adaptability in problem-solving, the drawbacks of conventional education, the significance of teacher feedback, and the necessity of reflective learning and active participation were all underlined by the qualitative findings. The integration of the two data sets supported the idea that good teaching practice will make a significant difference to mathematical creativity in students. While informative, results were derived from a single institution, and generalizability might be diminished. To corroborate and extend these results, it will be necessary to use research design with larger and more heterogeneous student samples. The research underscores the importance of teachers’ employment of student-centered, reflective and feedback-informed teaching strategies to cultivate creativity in students’ mathematical learning.