A critical exploring of grade 10 rural learners' experiences and attitudes towards learning mathematics in Acorhoek classrooms, Mpumalanga province

Submitted in fullfilment of a degree of Master of Education by dissertation Wits school of Education, curriculum studies University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa March 2017The purpose of this study was to critically explore Grade 10 rural learners’ experiences and attitudes towards learning mathematics in Acornhoek classrooms, Mpumalanga province. The study further sought to understand factors that shape learners’ experiences and attitudes towards learning mathematics. While the widely accepted view of the study of individuals’ attitudes fall in the quantitative research approaches, this study used critical phenomenological qualitative methodology. I should make it clear that I have deliberately used qualitative approaches to critically explore and interrogate learners’ experiences and attitudes towards mathematics and mathematics learning, because interviews and observations of behaviours are some of the methods that can be used to gain insight into individuals’ experiences and attitudes. Semi-structured one-to-one individual interviews and non-participant classroom observations of twelve learners during learning were used in this study. In addition, this study uses Fairclough’s analytical framework of Critical Discourse Analysis and Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological systems theory as the theoretical framework to give meaning to the information provided by the learners about their learning of mathematics. To date, the dearth of mathematics education research in rural areas and schools has not been able to offer an account of learners’ experiences and attitudes towards mathematics and mathematics learning within rural schools. Thus, this study is the beginning for other researchers to start researching rural learners’ learning in general, specifically the learning of mathematics in ways that pay respect to the dynamic relationships of various factors that shape the experiences and attitudes of learners towards learning mathematics. The findings emerging from the study illustrate that even when learners are taught in the same way in the classroom by the same teacher, their experiences and attitudes towards mathematics and its learning are inevitably different, which resonates with the research ontology for the study, which is constructionism.MT 201

Applying Ethnomodelling to Explore Glocal Mathematical Knowledge Systems

Background: Ethnomodelling methods examine how members of distinct cultural groups have come to develop local mathematical knowledge. However, what may indeed be less evident is how mathematical thinking can be part of the way in which researchers and educators attempt to make sense of the underlying cultural frameworks within which mathematical ideas, procedures, and practices are embedded. Objectives: The main objective of this theoretical article is to present arguments that link mathematics and culture in order to develop an effective understanding of the development of dialogical mathematical knowledge. Design: The theoretical and methodological concepts of this qualitative study are supported by the assumptions of ethnomodelling that adds an important cultural perspective to the modelling process through the development of an extensive literature review on this topic. Results: We present arguments to show that the linking of mathematics and culture is appropriate and necessary for an effective understanding of the development of dialogical mathematical knowledge, which aims at providing a holistic understanding of human knowledge. This means that cognition is a process that is not only embodied and situated, as well as distributed because the members of distinct cultural groups create, process, accumulate, and diffuse mathematical information conjointly. Conclusions: We discuss the role of ethnomodelling in order to develop an understanding the connection between ethnomathematics and modelling. In this context, we present concepts related to the use of both local (emic), global (etic) approaches by applying the glocal (dialogical) approach found in ethnomodelling research

Functional Skills Support Programme: Developing functional skills in citizenship

This booklet is part of "... a series of 11 booklets which helps schools to implement functional skills across the curriculum. The booklets illustrate how functional skills can be applied and developed in different subjects and contexts, supporting achievement at Key Stage 3 and Key Stage 4. Each booklet contains an introduction to functional skills for subject teachers, three practical planning examples with links to related websites and resources, a process for planning and a list of additional resources to support the teaching and learning of functional skills." - The National Strategies website

Recognizing Best Practice in Portuguese Higher Education Libraries

The purpose of this paper is to identify best practices in order to improve the quality of services in Portuguese academic libraries. This article describes an ongoing project to assess the performance of library services, resulting from a partnership of six Portuguese higher education libraries. The study has three main steps: (1) selection of criteria to be evaluated and selection of their corresponding performance indicators; (2) data collection and analysis; (3) identification of best practices. The selection of the criteria to be evaluated is based on a mixed model combining the Common Assessment Framework and the Balanced Scorecard. The associated performance indicators are in accordance with International Standards ISO 11620:1998 and ISO 2789:2006

History of economic thought

International audienceThe chapter provides an overview of the main areas of research in history of economic thought, that correspond to a classic division of phases of development of the economics discipline from its origins to its present state. Following the Journal of Economic Literature classification, the evolution of economics is subdivided into two phases—namely, history of economic thought through 1925 and since 1925; a shorter third part on recent developments is added to this basic scheme. Focus is on what each period contributed to the study of three foundational issues in economics, namely, the theory of individual economic behavior, the market mechanism as a coordinating device, and the respective roles of markets and governments in the regulation of economic systems. Reflection on these issues has progressively formed economists’ understanding of society and has then been extended to a broad range of social phenomena, from monetary and financial matters to health and the environment. These very issues have been the object of major controversies that have divided economists into different schools and have ultimately shaped the history of the discipline. In outlining these developments, similarities and differences between past and present theories are emphasized

A History of Cluster Analysis Using the Classification Society's Bibliography Over Four Decades

The Classification Literature Automated Search Service, an annual bibliography based on citation of one or more of a set of around 80 book or journal publications, ran from 1972 to 2012. We analyze here the years 1994 to 2011. The Classification Society's Service, as it was termed, has been produced by the Classification Society. In earlier decades it was distributed as a diskette or CD with the Journal of Classification. Among our findings are the following: an enormous increase in scholarly production post approximately 2000; a very major increase in quantity, coupled with work in different disciplines, from approximately 2004; and a major shift also from cluster analysis in earlier times having mathematics and psychology as disciplines of the journals published in, and affiliations of authors, contrasted with, in more recent times, a "centre of gravity" in management and engineering.Comment: 23 pages, 9 figure

Assessment of Connections Between Knowledge- Based Economy Characteristics and Selected Macroeconomic Categories in the European Union's Countries by Means of Panel Models

The aim of the article is to analyze the impact of knowledge-based economy variables on the selected macroeconomic categories - the share of total investments in GDP and the employment rate- in European Union's countries in the years 2000-2007, conducted with application of panel models.Celem artykułu jest analiza wpływu zmiennych opisujących gospodarkę opartą na wiedzy na podstawowe kategorie makroekonomiczne - udział całkowitych inwestycji w PKB i stopę zatrudnienia - w krajach Unii Europejskiej (z podziałem na kraje UE-15 i nowe kraje członkowskie UE) w latach 2000-2007, przeprowadzona w oparciu o modele panelowe