Lots of local and global mathematics resources for learners

Some interesting perspectives here.....Please go and give your 2c worth here: http://mathsliteracy.ning.com/forum/topics/how-to-fix-our-math-education

"Online social network sites like Facebook and Twitter became common destinations for young people. Throughout the world, young people are logging in, creating elaborate profiles, publicly articulating their relationships with other participants, and writing extensive comments back and forth. South Africa was not left behind and Facebook became increasingly popular amongst people of all ages. Figure 1 below gives a summary of the total number of Facebook users in South Africa from March 2011 to July 2011. Study Figure 2.1 and answer the questions that follow:"

In order to ascertain the real-life situations that teachers, as stakeholders, would find suitable and appropriate to deal with in Mathematical Literacy (a compulsory subject for students who are not doing Mathematics at the Further Education and Training level of the South African education system), we embarked on a study known as the Relevance of School Mathematics Education (ROSME). The principle underpinning this article is that there are times when it is necessary to assess the functionality and quality of questionnaires used to ascertain affective domain issues. The study provides an analysis technique which is not affected by the sample of individuals completing a questionnaire, provided that the instrument meets particular requirements. It thus improves the rigour of measurement. Various statistics obtained in this study showed that the instrument used to determine the real-life situations which teachers prefer for Mathematical Literacy reasonably identifies this variable. However, it is cautioned that much more care needs to be exercised in construction of such instruments. The results also indicated the real-life situations which teachers most and least preferred to be included in Mathematical Literacy, providing useful information for policy-makers and textbook authors on contextual situations to be included in learning materials.

New article published online in Pythagoras, 32(1): Rasch modelling of Mathematics and Science teachers' preferences of real-life situations to be used in Mathematical Literacy.