Bridging the Divide — Seeing Mathematics in the World Through Dynamic Geometry
Teaching Mathematics and Its Applications
Volume 30 Issue 1
Abstract:
In TMA, Oldknow (2009, TEAMAT, 28, 180–195) called for ways to unlock students’ skills so that they increase learning about the world of mathematics and the objects in the world around them. This article examines one way in which we may unlock the student skills. We are currently exploring the potential for students to ‘see’ mathematics in the real world through ‘marking’ mathematical features of digital images using a dynamic geometry system (GeoGebra). In this article we present, as a partial response to Oldknow, preliminary results.
This article concerns seeing mathematics in the everyday world. While mathematicians are likely to see mathematical objects everywhere, the researchers suspected that this would not be the case for many individuals. They showed a group of secondary students a collection of pictures and asked them to describe the mathematical ideas they saw. After this initial interview process they trained the students to use a piece of interactive geometry software, allowed them to work with it for several weeks, then interviewed them again, showing them a similar but different collection of photographs. They also asked the students to describe what they thought and how they felt about the activity.
The article provides some of the results of one of the students interviewed and it is immediately clear that the student’s ability to see certain mathematical relationships in the world increased substantially from the start of the experiment to the end.
I found the research interesting, and am curious to know what learning sequence they used and how their software works. They allude to a possible testing bias wherein the students might describe a shape as semicircular rather than parabolic because of the relative difficulty of constructing one over the other with their software. I would be interested to see how they plan on testing for this phenomenon and how they will attempt to eliminate it.
An interesting article, though not something I will be able to readily apply in my own teaching practice.
