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The Middle School Mathematics Institute (msmi 2010) will be held in Saint Paul, MN June 14 - June 18, 2010. This event is for teachers in grades 4 - 8. The institute is a 5 day course, where middle school teachers will learn the mathematics behind the math they teach. This year the subject is fractions, decimals, and percentages.

abstract: "In this paper I address the use of digital tools (GeoGebra) in open ended design activities, with primary school children. I present results from the research and development project "Creative Digital Mathematics", which aims to use the pupil's development of mathematical board games as a vehicle for teaching skills with GeoGebra, as well as an entrepreneurial attitude towards mathematics. Using the instrumental approach I discuss how open ended transdisciplinary design activities can support instrumental genesis, by considering the extent to which the pupils address mathematical knowledge in their work with GeoGebra and how they relate their work with GeoGebra and mathematics to fellow pupils and real life situations. The results show that pupils' consider development of board games as meaningful mathematical activity, and that they develop skills with GeoGebra, furthermore the pupils considers potential use of their board game by classmates in their design activities."

Why Teaching Mathematics is So Hard The Realities of Teaching Mathematics in the Modern World (Distilled from overhead transparencies)

Published by University of Chicago Press, July 2012. "Math and science hold powerful places in contemporary society, setting the foundations for entry into some of the most robust and highest-paying industries. However, effective math and science education is not equally available to all students, with some of the poorest students-those who would benefit most-going egregiously underserved. This ongoing problem with education highlights one of the core causes of the widening class gap. While this educational inequality can be attributed to a number of economic and political causes, in Empowering Science and Mathematics Education in Urban Communities, Angela Calabrese Barton and Edna Tan demonstrate that it is augmented by a consistent failure to integrate student history, culture, and social needs into the core curriculum. They argue that teachers and schools should create hybrid third spaces-neither classroom nor home-in which underserved students can merge their personal worlds with those of math and science. A host of examples buttress this argument: schools where these spaces have been instituted now provide students not only an immediate motivation to engage the subjects most critical to their future livelihoods but also the broader math and science literacy necessary for robust societal engagement. A unique look at a frustratingly understudied subject, Empowering Science and Mathematics Education pushes beyond the idea of teaching for social justice and into larger questions of how and why students participate in math and science. " Excerpts in Google Books

Great blog re mathematics teaching

"Beautiful Mathematics is about beautiful mathematical concepts and creations. Mathematical ideas have an aesthetic appeal that can be appreciated by those who have the time and dedication to investigate. Mathematical topics are presented in the categories of words, images, formulas, theorems, proofs, solutions, and unsolved problems. Readers will investigate exciting mathematical topics ranging from complex numbers to arithmetic progressions, from Alcuin's sequence to the zeta function, and from hypercubes to infinity squared." (MAA, 2011)

by dr. sarah-marie belcastro, "You might wonder why one would want to knit mathematical objects. One reason is that the finished objects make good teaching aids; a knitted object is flexible and can be physically manipulated, unlike beautiful and mathematically perfect computer graphics. And the process itself offers insights: In creating an object anew, not following someone else's pattern, there is deep understanding to be gained. To craft a physical instantiation of an abstraction, one must understand the abstraction's structure well enough to decide which properties to highlight. Such decisions are a crucial part of the design process, but for the specifics to make sense, we must first consider knitting geometrically."

From the abstract: "Studies on creative mathematics conducted in the past decades revealed that the importance of creation of learning and teaching environment favourable to the identification and nurturing creativity in mathematics. Based on psychological, methodological and didactical models created by Krutetskii (2006), Shchedrovtiskii (2008), Brousseau (2007) and Sierpinska (2004), we have developed our challenging situation approach. During 5 years of field study in the elementary grade VII classroom, we collected sufficient amount of data that demonstrate how these challenging situations help to discover and to boost mathematical creativity in very young children, keeping and increasing their interest towards more advanced mathematics curriculum. This article is an humble attempt to present our model and illustrate how it works in the mixedability classroom. We will also discuss different roles that teachers and students might play in this kind of environment and how each side could benefit from it."

Abstract: "Together, brain science and learning design inform Adaptive Interaction Design (AID), a technique for curriculum planning and development. Mathematics is a particular case in which AID can help. The Way of the Game is vital to learning design. There are many definitions of "game." Here, we mean game to be the means by which spontaneous play becomes responsible learning. That innovative games figure as the centerpiece of many 21st century curricula is no accident. Games are a critical element in modern theories of learning design especially when related to insights from neuroscience and online learning/teaching methods. But beyond simple gamification, can games provide the disruptive transformation to mathematics education that is required to effect substantive and sustainable improvement? Can we game the educational system to ensure students' success in mathematics? To find out, we will look at the AID process and two sample products for the development of mathematical thinking and practice based on the Way of the Game."

"I often sit on a Thursday evening about 2000hrs and watch the ukedchat hashtag. This week it was about physical education. Although this is not one of my strong subjects in teaching (or even in real life) I was interested in the first question which asked how physical education could be related to literacy and/or mathematics. Just like a GSCE multiple choice essay question I chose to answer how it could be related to mathematics. You can see the full tweet chat conversation here - but I thought I would expand my response in this week's waffle."

Math journals provide advantages for students to develop a better understanding of mathematics, with teachers learning their student's views and beliefs regarding math.

ORC enhances teaching and learning by promoting standards-based best practices in mathematics, science, and reading for Ohio schools and universities. ORC serves as a trusted source of easily accessible, peer-reviewed, high-quality, and effective resources.

ORC enhances teaching and learning by promoting standards-based best practices in mathematics, science, and reading for Ohio schools and universities. ORC serves as a trusted source of easily accessible, peer-reviewed, high-quality, and effective resources.

In defense of mathematics and mathematical literacy

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"Complicated mathematics presented in a generally understandable way Examples from everyday life are mathematized Many examples presented with a good sense of humor Small riddles and conjuring tricks garantee an entertaining reading Imagine that you've finally found a parking space after a long and harrowing search, but are now encountering some difficulty in trying to enter this space."

Review of Conway's Mathematical Connections, written for undergraduate mathematics courses, with the aim that instructors help students find connections across branches of math. Two similar books for undergraduates, recently published, are mentioned as well.

Lecture from 2010 ""Mathematics and Art: The Good, the Bad, and the Pretty," "use of mathematics to create realistic art"

"Several of our classes involve students using mathematical expressions, but there was no way for us to automatically check this work. The stated solution to a problem may be x+y, but if a student answers y+x, our system needs to understand that this is also correct." "sympy, an open source Python library for symbolic mathematics," is proposed as a solution.

Abstract: "In spite of the efficacy of Operations Research (OR), its tools are still underused, due to the difficulties that people experience when describing a problem through a mathematical model. For this reason, teaching how to approach and model complex problems is still an open issue. A strong relation exists between (video) games and learning: for this reason we explore to which extent (real time) simulation video games could be envisaged to be an innovative, stimulating and compelling approach to teach OR techniques."

"This is a rather unusual structure for organizing mathematical content, but offers an exciting opportunity for teachers across the nation and abroad to exchange ideas and discuss what they teach. This Wiki will address the underlying central concepts and propose activities that also provide rich opportunity to engage students in the Mathematical Practices. "

"Mathematical Expeditions is a collection of over 500 culturally and historically diverse mathematical problems carefully chosen to enrich mathematics teaching from middle school through the college level." Forthcoming June 2012.