Curriculum Guidelines for Undergraduate Programs in Data Science

The Park City Math Institute (PCMI) 2016 Summer Undergraduate Faculty Program met for the purpose of composing guidelines for undergraduate programs in Data Science. The group consisted of 25 undergraduate faculty from a variety of institutions in the U.S., primarily from the disciplines of mathematics, statistics and computer science. These guidelines are meant to provide some structure for institutions planning for or revising a major in Data Science

Affordances of spreadsheets in mathematical investigation: Potentialities for learning

This article, is concerned with the ways learning is shaped when mathematics problems are investigated in spreadsheet environments. It considers how the opportunities and constraints the digital media affords influenced the decisions the students made, and the direction of their enquiry pathway. How might the leraning trajectory unfold, and the learning process and mathematical understanding emerge? Will the spreadsheet, as the pedagogical medium, evoke learning in a distinctive manner? The article reports on an aspect of an ongoing study involving students as they engage mathematical investigative tasks through digital media, the spreadsheet in particular. In considers the affordances of this learning environment for primary-aged students

Perception of the next generation science standard instructional practices among Vietnamese pre-service and in-service teachers

The STEM education has been emphasized in many countries around the world because of its benefits for students in the new century. In response to the STEM education, Next Generation Science Standard (NGSS) has released a new vision of science education in which learning disciplinary content and crosscutting concepts is to engage science and engineering practices. Thus, science teacher education programs need to have training for pre-service teachers to implement these science and engineering practices. To prepare better for pre-service teachers, it is necessary to know their perception of the science and engineering practices. Besides, understanding in-service teachers’ science instruction and principals’ direction of teaching at school helps prepare better training. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the perception of pre-service teachers and in-service teachers’ implementation of instructional practices aligning with the NGSS approach as well as school principals’ views of science teaching. A convergent parallel mixed-method research design was employed in which quantitative data is obtained from a survey of science instructional practices from 187 pre-service teachers and 100 in-service teachers and qualitative data is obtained from interviews of 10 school principals in Can Tho City, Vietnam. The finding indicated that pre-service teachers highly appreciated science and engineering practices in teaching science while in-service teachers’ implementation of these practices was lower. In-service teachers tend to use more traditional instruction and incorporate students’ prior knowledge in their teaching. Although school principals revealed their appreciation toward teaching science through practices, they admitted that currently, implementation of these practices has been still limitedPeer Reviewe

Common Visual Representations as a Source for Misconceptions of Preservice Teachers in a Geometry Connection Course

In this paper, we demonstrate how atypical visual representations of a triangle, square or a parallelogram may hinder students’ understanding of a median and altitude. We analyze responses and reasoning given by 16 preservice middle school teachers in a Geometry Connection class. Particularly, the data were garnered from three specific questions posed on a cumulative final exam, which focused on computing and comparing areas of parallelograms, and triangles represented by atypical images. We use the notions of concept image and concept definition as our theoretical framework for an analysis of the students’ responses. Our findings have implication on how typical images can impact students’ cognitive process and their concept image. We provide a number of suggestions that can foster conceptualization of the notions of median and altitude in a triangle that can be realized in an enacted lesson