James Russo — Monash University

Accepting PhD Students

PhD projects

How games are used by teachers in the primary mathematics classroom
Estimation in the early primary years
How practising classroom teachers engage with academic research

20062024

Research activity per year

Personal profile

Biography

Having completed my PhD in 2017, I am interested in three interelated goals for primary mathematics education: 

- For effective, student-centred pedagogies to be embraced across all Australian primary classrooms.

- For mathematics learning to be effectively differentiated, in a manner that is both inclusive and well targeted to student learning needs.

- For mathematics to be enjoyable to learn and teach.

My professional purpose is to shift our edicational system further towards all three of these goals, starting with better supporting teachers.

My major research interest relating to working towards these three goals is in learning design and its implementation in classrooms. This includes looking at issues such as:

- Task design: What is the role of challenging tasks, games and narrative-rich problem-solving tasks as pedagogical approaches to support effective, differentiated and enjoyable mathematics instruction? How are these pedagogies actually utilised in classrooms?

- Lesson structure: How does how the lesson is organised interact with the student learning experience, including their changing emotional states as the lesson unfolds? How can differentiation be effectively built into the structure of a lesson? How does shifting from individual work to collaborative work impact the student learning experience?

- Sequencing learning: How can we effectively sequence learning with effective pedagogies (e.g., challenging tasks, mathematical games)? How does the student emotional experience track across several, interconnected learning experiences?   

I am keen to engage with potential higher-degree research students interested in inquiring into issues of learning design and its implementation in a primary mathematics context.  

Expertise related to UN Sustainable Development Goals

In 2015, UN member states agreed to 17 global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity for all. This person’s work contributes towards the following SDG(s):

  • SDG 4 - Quality Education

Research area keywords

  • Mathematics Education
  • Maths Education
  • Challenging Tasks
  • Primary Education
  • Games
  • Teacher Education
  • Teacher Research
  • Teacher Emotions
  • Teacher Attitudes
  • Teacher Beliefs
  • Student Emotions
  • Student Engagement
  • Research and Practice
  • Estimation
  • Mental Computation
  • Number Sense
  • Early Childhood Education
  • Transforming teaching and learning
  • Educating for diversity and inclusion

Collaborations and top research areas from the last five years

Recent external collaboration on country/territory level. Dive into details by clicking on the dots or