Community Building With And For Teachers At The Math Forum

This chapter addresses the way in which the Internet forms the core of an intentional, online community by promoting communication between interested parties. The Math Forum (mathforum.org) is a unique group of individuals who are committed to using computers and the Internet to enhance what they know about learning, teaching, and doing mathematics. The Math Forum includes programmers, project and service staff, Web persons, and an ever-expanding number of teachers, students, and other individuals (i.e., parents, software developers, mathematicians). Thus, community building for The Math Forum staff includes work with teachers, with partners (National Council of the Teachers of Mathematics, Mathematics Association of America, and so on), and with specific services developed by The Math Forum staff that enable teachers and students to come together to pose and seek solutions to problems. The Math Forum uses the Internet to provide interactive services that foster mathematical thinking and discussion. These services include Ask Dr. Math and several Problems of the Week (PoWs); a teacher discussion format called Teacher to Teacher (T2T); an archive of problems, participant contributions (e.g., lesson plans), and past discussions; and an Internet newsletter. Within four years, with no explicit efforts to garner promotion or publicity, the site grew to include 1,600,000 Web pages and to attract 3.5 million accesses and over 800,000 visitors per month – a third of which constitutes sticky traffic ranging from world-famous mathematicians to elementary school children

An Uncommon Textbook: Review of \u3cem\u3eCommon Sense Mathematics\u3c/em\u3e by Ethan Bolker and Maura Mast

Ethan D. Bolker and Maura B. Mast. 2016. Common Sense Mathematics.(Washington DC.: Mathematics Association of America) ISBN-13: 978-1-93951-210-9. Common Sense Mathematics is an integrative quantitative reasoning (QR) textbook that is built around scores of exercises derived from authentic circumstances from public media and other public sources. The exercises elicit responses from students requiring extensive communication and analyses and distinguish the book from ones typically encountered in a mathematics or science course. Responses to exercises often require one-half page or more of writing and can occupy considerable class time in discussion. The book has material for a one- or two-semester course. Use of the Internet for information is assumed, and the use of spreadsheet technology is incorporated but can be avoided for portions of the latter chapters

How the Internet is Used in a Secondary Mathematics Classroom

This project was designed to study how the Internet was used in a secondary mathematics classroom. It looks at a Year 12 Mathematical Modelling class and how the internet is used by the students and teacher in their mathematics lessons. The study consisted of observing and interviewing students to determine how they felt about using the Internet in a secondary mathematics classroom and how they used the Internet. Analysis of observations and the audio-taped interviews involved categorizing the students\u27 usage of the Internet, the types of activities the Internet was used for, the length of time spent on the Internet, the organisation of the students with the computers, and how the students interpreted and used the teacher\u27s instructions. Documents were also collected to illustrate the Internets use in the mathematics classroom. The research found that the Internet was used for research purposes. It was used to gather information for projects in Modelling with Mathematics. The students also used the Internet to \u27surf when the projects were completed. They would look up information that reflected their interests. The research also found that there were mixed responses in the attitudes to using the internet in a secondary mathematics classroom. All students agreed that the Internet would be used more in the future of mathematics education, especially in Modelling with Mathematics (Year 12) and Mathematics in Practice (Year 11). They highlighted many advantages and disadvantages of using the Internet m the secondary mathematics classroom and agreed that the advantages out-weighed the disadvantages. The research has found that the Internet has been successfully implemented into a secondary mathematics classroom and provides some ideas of how other teachers can implement the Internet into their classrooms

Helping Change of Career Individuals to Prepare to Become Secondary Mathematics Teachers

This article describes the development and content of a special introductory course developed and offered at New York University for change of career individuals entering the field of mathematics and science teaching at the graduate rather than the undergraduate level. With a critical shortage of qualified mathematics and science teachers at the secondary level being exacerbated in urban public schools, such as those in New York City, by high attrition rates during the first few years of teaching, it is important to find and encourage new populations of potential teachers. One such population is that of career changers, and the course described in this article is an attempt to help such individuals make their career change more smoothly and successfully. The focus of this course, and the illustrations provided in this article, are on the three major themes: What Does It Mean To Be An Effective Mathematics Teacher ; Technology and the Internet ; and, A Model of Effective Mathematics Teaching

Are classroom internet use and academic performance higher after government broadband subsidies to primary schools?

This paper combines data from a government programme providing broadband access to primary schools in Ireland with survey microdata on schools’, teachers’ and pupils use of the internet to examine the links between public subsidies, classroom use of the internet and educational performance. Provision of broadband service under a government scheme was associated with more than a doubling of teachers’ use of the internet in class after about a two year lag. Better computing facilities in schools were also associated with higher internet use, but advertised download speed was not statistically significant. A second set of models show that use of the internet in class was associated with significantly higher average mathematics scores on standardised tests. There was also a less robust positive association with reading scores. A set of confounding factors is included, with results broadly in line with previous literature

EFFECT OF INTERNET ADDICTION AMONG STUDENTS OF MATHEMATICS IN ADEYEMI FEDERAL UNIVERSITY OF EDUCATION, ONDO

This study investigated the effect of internet addictions among students of mathematics in Adeyemi College of Education, Ondo. Descriptive survey research questions were raised to guide the study. Data were collected by the researcher using questionnaire and analysed using descriptive statistics. The findings revealed that internet significantly influence student learning experiences. Also, the addiction of mathematics students on social media negatively influences their academic performance. Gender significantly influences internet addiction among undergraduate students. It was recommended that counselors should assist in counseling mathematics students on the danger of internet addiction on their academic performance. Mathematics students should desist from internet activities such as gambling, watching pornographic videos as it can distract them from their academic pursuit

Models for harnessing the Internet in mathematics education

In recent years, the Internet has increasingly been used to provide significant resources for student to learn mathematics and to learn about mathematics, as well as significant resources for teachers to support these. Effective access to and use of these has been hampered in practice by limited facilities in schools and the limited experience of many mathematics teachers with the Internet for mathematical purposes. This paper offers models for understanding the effective use of Internet resources, based on typologies of resources for learning and teaching mathematics. Six categories of Internet resources for mathematics student use are identified: (i) Interactive resources; (ii) Reading interesting materials; (iii) Reference information; (iv) Communication; (v) Problem solving; and (vi) Webquests. Similarly, five categories of Internet resources for mathematics teacher use are identified: (i) Lesson preparation; (ii) Official advice and support; (iii) Professional engagement; (iv) Commercial activity and support; and (v) Local school web sites. The paper recognises that web resources can be used in a range of ways, including supporting both teaching and learning. The prospects for sound use of the Internet are briefly described in terms of these models of use

Teaching mathematics using the internet

This paper examines teachers\u27 use of the Internet in the teaching and learning of Mathematics. The study draws upon data collected via an online survey and interviews with six teachers. It reports on their beliefs, strategies for use and their perceptions on how it impacts on students and their learning of mathematics. Some comparisons are made between the ways teachers used the Internet.<br /

Mathematics teachers’ professional development and identity in a distance education setting

This paper discusses the influence of an in-service distance education course in the construction of mathematics teachers’ professional identity, especially regarding their views and practices of reflection and collaboration and their relation with information and communication technology. The course was based in open-learning pedagogy and focused on conducting exploratory and investigative work in the mathematics classroom. Evaluation results show that the perspectives and involvement of the participant teachers depend very much on their previous professional experience and relationship with the Internet. Teachers that use e-mail for collaborative work found this a very stimulating experience whereas those with less professional involvement had some difficulty in assuming the roles and values required for this kind of activity