A Study on Mathematics Project Management in Newly Expanded Secondary Shools.

Abstract

The objectives of the research were to study Mathematics project management in primary schools under the Office of Maha Sarakham Educational service Area 1 focusing on project preparation, project management, project evaluation and problems of Mathematics project management. The target population consisted of 32 administrators, 48 Mathematics teachers and 48 students from 16 newly expanded secondary schools in the second semester Academic year of the 2010 under the Office of  Maha Sarakham Educational Service Area 1 which the schools got an excellent award of the Mathematics Project Competition. They were selected by purposive random sampling. The research instruments were a questionnaire and an interview form with validity values of 0.67-1.00. The research statistics used frequency and percentage. Results of the research were as follows:

1.    Project preparation : the finding indicated that the policy was made by the school committee, the policy was publicized to teachers at the meeting. The teachers were supported to attend seminars and training courses, and the budget, teaching materials and rewards were also provided to the teachers
2. Project management : it was found that Mathematic projects were survey projects based on their interest and ability. The participatory approach was employed to specify the research topic. The basic numerical knowledge of Mathematics was applied for the project management. The excellent former projects were shown to students. The Mathematics projects were done by students of the Mathematics club in office hours and after school. The projects were followed up and reported by students. The complete projects were presented to the class by students and they were evaluated by teachers, students and parents.
3. Project evaluation : it was found that the complete projects were presented and

evaluated for the future plan.

   4. Regarding the problems of the project management, it was found that the teachers did not have enough time to advise students about the project management. The students rarely got support for the project. Moreover, the students did not understand explicitly about the writing steps of project report and data analysis skill.