REPLY: Re: [Maths-Education] Being outdated

[Paul Ernest]

Re refs being out of date

There are a couple of issues here that need to be separated.

First of all, the enduring import of seminal references. I 
think my earliest ref has been to the Epic of Gilgamish and 
some Ancient Egyptian creation myths. c. 2000 BCE!

There are some interesting Babylonian clay tablets on 
errors and methods in maths. C. 1500 BCE

These may not be seminal, but, eg, Plato will never be out 
of date. Nor Freud, Piaget, Marx, CS Peirce, etc etc. We 
may criticise aspects of their work but we can never do 
away with them.

In maths ed. there is relevant stuff by Thorndike, 
Schonell, Gattegno, Polya, Dienes and many more that 
predates 1970.

I have well over 100 volumes on my shelves that I think are 
important in maths ed and pre-date 1990.

Insisting that all refs are very recent is quite 
unreasonable (perhaps a symptom of neophilia )

Some old papers, eg Worthen on discovery vs direct 
instruction from c. 1968, are paradigms of clear thinking 

Second. In reviewing certain texts that present themselves 
as definitive or cliam to provide a survey of research in 
a topic area I think it important that recent research is 
included as well as standard or classic refs. How can a 
review published today be definitive if all refs are 1999 
or earlier?

>> I have just been shown a review of someone else's paper 
in which
> > citations from 1999 are criticised for being 'out of date' for no other
> > reason than they are 'not recent'.
> >
This is clearly absurd! Despite the RAE pressure on recent 
publication, it is the quality of publications that 
matters. One seminal paper or book is worth 100+ throw away 
ones! 

Paul
_____________________________________________________
Professor Paul Ernest    
Leader of Masters and Doctoral Degree Programmes in
Mathematics Education    Phone: +44-1392-264796
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