Abstract:

TIMSS is an international exam carried out every four years. The science and mathematics achievement among the countries is evaluated depending on plenty of variables according to this test. Furthermore, TIMSS reveals differences between national education systems. In this study, primary school mathematics curriculum of countries was analyzed on basis of the 2011 TIMSS results. In the context of research, primary mathematics curriculums were examined for both countries. The results of the 8th grade are considered in order to reveal the countries' development levels and differences. For the first time, Turkey participated in TIMSS 2011 for the fourth grade. Thus, in the context of research 2011 TIMSS has been selected. The reason for choosing Singapore as the second country is that Singapore has perfect performance attended almost all international exams in mathematics and takes place in the top three countries. Research was conducted using document analysis technique, one of the qualitative research methods. In this study, primary school mathematics curriculum accessed from the official website of Turkey and Singapore's ministry of education have been examined. In the light of the findings, the number of topics have been more than number of sub-topics in primary school mathematics curriculum of Singapore. However, the study also demonstrated that both Singapore and Turkey apply four hours per week for mathematics in primary school courses. On the other hand, when the percentage of math courses in weekly course was analyzed, it was found that this four hours create 22% of program in Singapore and 13.3% of program in Turkey. Another research result shows that the learning fields in Turkey primary mathematics program is quite convenient TIMSS content areas. Also geometric shapes and measuring learning field has been relatively identified one of the lowest learning fields because of the mean score obtained in general.

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