Sabbatical Fall 2006 © Jack Rotman, Lansing Community College
This sabbatical focused on cognitive psychology, especially as applied to mathematics education; other issues in mathematics education were also studied. Over 100 sources were read in detail. As a result, 12 mini-reports were written for general use; a 13th report was specifically about the curriculum within the Department of Mathematical Skills at Lansing Community College. Only the 12 general reports are available here.
All documents are in "Acrobat Reader" (PDF) format!
1 Variable Understanding and Procedural Skills (they can 'solve', but do they know what variables are?)
2 Here's a Story, Ignore the Story (word problems ... a good thing?)
3 Life in The Grey Zone (practice: amount, variety -- related to quality of learning)
4 Metaphors, Mnemonics and Learning Mathematics (are we visual learners? what does that mean?)
5 Technology and Learning (issues related to improving learning; new technologies)
6 Learning Theories Overview (references with annotations)
7 Constructivism and Telling (philosophy versus learning theory; what research says about 'telling')
8 Telling, Explaining, and Learning (more on telling; what research says about explaining)
9 Situated Learning (is "learning in a context" a good thing?)
10 Race and Culture in Mathematics Education (critical race theory; stereotype threat; other concepts)
11 Standards and Reform (sources of standards in mathematics education; what research says about 'reform' curriculum)
12 Connections - Science, High School, and College (general connections between math & science; local high school & colleges)
Each of these reports has references appropriate. If you want to see all of the references in one "place", look at these links (one for each type of source document, alphabetical within each type):
Online Sources Sabbatical 2006
Journal Articles Sabbatical 2006
Last modified on January 19, 2007 by Jack Rotman Count
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