Mathematics and crises

Educational Studies in Mathematics - One can identify at least three different types of relationships between mathematics and crises. First, mathematics can picture a crisis. This is in accordance...     

Diagnosing word decoding problems: A process-analytic approach

In this article we attempt to demonstrate the theoretical and practical limitations of traditional subgroup classifications of acquired and developmental dyslexia. As an alternative, we suggest a process-analytical approach. A variant of a dual-route model for word processing is presented. The model guided the design of a computerized test battery for assessing strategies in word decoding and processes underlying each strategy. The usefulness of the approach was demonstrated on two cases, which according to traditional criteria, were classified as auditory dyslexics. Although both cases displayed marked deficiencies in the phonological route for word decoding, they differed in terms of underlying processes. In one case the primary problem could be located to phonological synthesis, whereas the other case had poor access of letters (phonological recoding). Such individual processing characteristics are not normally revealed by the traditional subgrouping approach.     

Mathematics as part of technology

Competence in dealing with fundamental problems connected with mathematical model building requires three different forms of knowledge. Mathematical knowledge itself, technological knowledge about how to develop a model, and reflective knowledge relevant for evaluation of the model building process. We find that reflective knowledge cannot be reduced to technological knowledge, so that it is important for mathematical education that is to be consistent with a critical pedagogy to provide opportunities for development of that type of knowledge.A general conceptual framework for identification of reflective knowledge is presented via a structural (synchronic) and a developmental (diachronic) perspective of a mathematical model.The synchronic perspective includes relationships between the model, its object in reality, a complex of theories, a complex of interests, and a conceptual framework or system mediating the connection between model and object. The diachronic perspective includes the components: problem identification, structure of argumentation, basis for critique, and space of possible actions, all of them sensitive to the application of mathematics. In that sense mathematics is not a neutral tool in a technological investigation, a fact which mathematical education has to reflect.     

Vexing questions that sustain sensemaking

Current science education reforms highlight the importance of students making sense of scientific ideas. While research has studied how to support sensemaking in classrooms, we still know very little about what drives students to pursue and persist in it on their own. In this article, we use a set of parallel case studies of undergraduate students discussing introductory physics to show how certain student-generated, vexing questions both initiate and sustain students' sensemaking processes. We examine affective and linguistic markers in student discourse in paired-clinical interviews to demonstrate both of these functions of vexing questions and detail their role in the explanations students construct. We conclude by discussing the implications of this analysis both for supporting sensemaking in classrooms and for studying it in research.     

Teacher capabilities in a multicultural educational environment: an analysis of the impact of a professional development project

With more programmes being taught through English in non-Anglophone contexts, higher education lecturers are faced with new challenges. This article briefly presents a professional development initiative carried out at departmental level as an intervention for all English Medium Instruction lecturers. In order to assess the effect of such an intervention, a mix of different data sets are used, moving from self-assessment by participants to observations of individual teaching practices in the classrooms. It is shown how corroboration of surveys and observation reports in an explicit feedback template can be used to evidence the value of the intervention in context.     

Presumed Media Influences and Demands for Restrictions: Using Panel Data to Examine the Causal Direction

In line with theoretical approaches, such as the influence of presumed influence approach, many studies have shown that the stronger individuals perceive the media’s influence to be on others, the more the individuals demand restrictions on the media and its influence. However, these studies provided information only about the correlation between the two constructs and did not test the direction of their causal relationship. To close this research gap, a two-wave panel study among German citizens was conducted. The results show that, rather than being the other way around, it is the presumed strength of online media’s political influence on others that affects demands for restrictions. Moreover, the findings indicate that the presumed political influence of online media on others also affects the presumed reach of online media.     

Organization of staff development—strategies and experiences

This article describes a number of staff development organizations, along with their strategies and experiences. The organization of staff development varies greatly and is dependent on the interaction between the formal requirements of the university teaching qualifications, the institutions themselves and their course culture, the size and organization of the teaching units, and the institutions' management strategies and teaching methods. Based on examples from Denmark, Sweden and Belgium, the advantages and disadvantages of a number of these strategies are analysed in order to provide inspiration for future implementation of the various methods.     

Mathematical education versus critical education

This paper concentrates upon the relationship between mathematical education (ME) and critical education (CE) connected with the Frankfurt School and Critical Theory. To make the discussion as precise as possible a distinction is made between three alternatives in ME: Structuralism, pragmatism, and process-orientation. These alternatives are related to the key terms of CE in order to show the extent to which ME and CE contradict each other. The conclusion is that there does not exist any integration — nor even any close relationship-between ME and CE. Finally, this result is discussed in the light of the following two theses:

1. It is necessary to increase the interaction between ME and CE, if ME is not to degenerate into one of the most important ways of socializing students into the technological society and at the same time destroying the possibilities for developing a critical attitude towards precisely this technological society.
2. It is important for CE to interact with subjects from the technical sciences, and among these ME, if CE is not to be taken over by the technological development and fade away into an unimportant and uncritical educational theory.