Mathematics education as sociopolitical: prospective teachers’ views of the What,Who, and How

In this article, I introduce a framework—the What, Who, and How of mathematics—that emerged from studying my teaching of prospective teachers and their views of the social and political dimensions of mathematics teaching and learning. The What, Who, How framework asks us to consider What messages we send about mathematics and the world, Whose perspectives are represented in mathematics, and How mathematical concepts and our world are related. I situate each aspect of the framework in the literature on social justice and critical mathematics and provide examples of prospective teachers’ views. The What, Who, How serves as a tool to understand prospective teachers’ views, to navigate a broad range of literature on social justice mathematics, and a means of informing the practice of teachers and teacher educators.     

Continuity between school curriculum and vocation: Manual labour's ineffective role

The author's thesis is that, in the foreseeable future, the school is incapable of successfully promoting favourable changes in values, attitudes and behaviour towards manual labour among the majority of pupils in any society, but particularly in low-income countries or areas of the world.The focus of this article is on the integration of manual productive work into the teaching-learning processes of school education. The relationship of formal education to other institutions in pre-literate, minimally literate and mostly literate societies is very briefly sketched. Attempts to introduce manual labour in the school curriculum in Canada, India and China are discussed. The reasons, internal to the educational system, for the failure of these attempts are listed. The article concludes by discussing the reasons external to the educational system which determine the fate of reforms if the reforms do not take account of political, cultural and international economic forces.

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Zusammenfassung Der Verfasser vertritt die These, daß die Schule in absehbarer Zeit nicht in der Lage sein wird, bei der Mehrheit der Schüler in jeder Gesellschaft, aber besonders in den Niedriglohnländern und-gebieten, begünstigende Veränderungen der Wertvorstellungen, Haltungen und Verhaltensweisen gegenüber manueller Arbeit zu fördern.Schwerpunktmäßig behandelt der Verfasser die Integration manueller produktiver Arbeit in die Lehr- und Lernprozesse der Schulerziehung. Die Beziehung von formalen Bildungseinrichtungen zu anderen Institutionen in prä-alphabetisierten und vorwiegend alphabetisierten Gesellschaften wird kurz umrissen. Ansätze zur Einführung manueller Arbeit in das Schulcurriculum in Kanada, Indien und China werden angeführt und die dem Erziehungssystem inhärenten Gründe für das Scheitern dieser Ansätze aufgezählt. Abschließend werden die außerhalb des Erziehungs-systems zu suchenden Gründe besprochen, die den Verlauf der Reformen bestimmen, wenn diese die politischen, kulturellen und internationalen Wirtschaftsfaktoren nicht berücksichtigen.

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Résumé L'auteur de cet article pense que, dans un futur proche, l'école sera incapable de promouvoir avec succès des changements favorables de valeurs, d'attitudes et de comportement à l'égard du travail manuel chez la plupart des élèves de toute société, mais en particulier des pays ou des régions du monde à bas revenus.Cet article place un accent sur l'intégration du travail manuel productif dans les processus d'enseignement-apprentissage de l'éducation scolaire. On expose très brièvement le rapport entre l'éducation formelle et les autres institutions des sociétés en situation de préalphabétisation, d'alphabétisation rudimentaire ou d'alphabétisation presque complète. On analyse les tentatives qui ont été faites pour introduire le travail manuel dans le curriculum scolaire au Canada, en Inde et en Chine. On énumère les raisons, inhérentes au système éducatif, de l'échec de ces tentatives. L'auteur conclut en examinant les raisons externes au système éducatif qui déterminent l'échec des réformes, si ces réformes ne prennent pas en compte les forces politiques, culturelles et économiques internationales.

     

Attitudes of Australian chiropractic students toward whole body donation: A cross‐sectional study

Cadavers play an important role in anatomy education. In Australia, bodies for anatomy education are acquired only through donations. To gain insight into educational dynamics in an anatomy laboratory as well as to facilitate body donation programs and thanksgiving ceremonies, it is important to understand students' attitudes toward body donation. In this cross‐sectional study, the attitudes of Macquarie University's first, second, and fifth year chiropractic students toward body donation were investigated. Macquarie University chiropractic students have a four semester long anatomy program, which includes cadaver‐based instruction on prosected specimens. A questionnaire was used to record respondents' demographics and attitudes toward body donation: personal, by a relative, and by a stranger. It was found that ethnicity and religion affect attitudes toward body donation, with Australian students being more willing to donate a stranger's body and atheists and agnostics being more willing to donate in general. Furthermore, willingness to donate one's own or a family member's body decreases as year of study increases, suggesting a possible negative impact of exposure to cadavers in the anatomy laboratory. This was only true, however, after controlling for age. Thus, the impact of viewing and handling prosected specimens, which is the norm in anatomy classes in Australia, may not be as strong as dissecting cadavers. It is suggested that anatomists and educators prepare students for cadaver‐based instruction as well as exhibit sensitivity to cultural differences in how students approach working with cadavers, when informing different communities about body donation programs and in devising thanksgiving ceremonies. Anat Sci Educ 7: 117–123. © 2013 American Association of Anatomists.     

Does branding impact student recruitment: a critical evaluation

This study focuses on segmentation feasibility within the private college/university market. There is considerable overlap for private and public college/university students with respect to their consideration criteria; however, previous research suggests that there are some criteria that appear to be differentially important based on the type of student and institution. Therefore, using factors considered by university students in a previous study, the current research sought to further explore the existence of segments within a private university. The findings suggested that three segments of students exist – one segment considers all university criteria as important, another places high importance on the financial aspects of attending a university, and another segment moderately evaluates all university criteria. Implications of the findings are discussed.