[Maths-Education] Money Counts

[Laurinda Brown]

John Truran wrote:
> 
> I was certainly producing a conservative response because I am conscious in
> my own country of how good mathematics (dare I say accurate mathematics) is
> so often disregarded by teachers (at all levels) and by
> administrators/politicians. Perhaps the question I have been feeling
> towards is really one about whether mathematics knowledge really does make
> a difference in this world (at least at the level of ordinary people) and
> how it is possible to demonstrate this to students.
> 
> This os not very well put, but I would be very interested to read case
> studies of where sound mathematical arguments were actually listened to by
> people who initially had different agendas from the answers.

>From Laurinda Brown:

If students are not engaged by the mathematics that they do whether 
'value for money' or within the mathematics itself then mathematics 
certainly will not make a difference in the world of the students and 
thence not in the wider world. I see myself as a mathematician and 
teacher as well as a person/human being and mathematics makes the most 
difference in my own world because of my engagement with it which also 
allows me to be numerate in the sense of being aware of how mathematics 
is used and using it in the way talked about in the book 'Innumeracy'.

I suppose what I try to do in classrooms is to work with students so 
that they are listened to as they discuss mathematically ( and this 
means their strong arguments in response to questions like 'why?' 
'how?' 'what makes a difference?' 'what happens if?' etc and that they 
learn the power of their thinking mathematically so that they can 
achieve something they couldn't do without it. David Wheeler's 
challenge of all children experiencing 'mathematising at least once in 
their lives so they know what they are choosing away in deciding not to 
study mathematics has certainly coloured my thinking. The lecture 
in which this was said was entitled 'Humanising mathematics education' 
and as he talked it started to snow gently - all in all an inspiring 
event - a long time ago - but I believe that students will not 
necessarily experience this power of mathematics internally for 
themselves through someone else's political agenda. This does not mean 
that I rule that possibility out. Mathematics makes a difference at the 
level of ordinary people when it makes a difference at the level of the 
students. This is the challenge I work with.

Laurinda

----------------------
Laurinda Brown
Laurinda.Brown@bristol.ac.uk

0117-9287019