Mathematics Dump

Equal Education urgently seeking part-time Maths and English teachers

2012-01-26T02:40:00.001-08:00

Equal Education (EE) is a social movement campaigning for quality and equal education in South Africa. Our head office is based in Khayelitsha.

EE runs a post-matric programme for 20 of its members, known as the Community Leadership Programme. The programme combines academic tutoring with political leadership and training. The aim of the programme is to build a cohesive group of young activists committed to the ideals and work of Equal Education, and to their place in it, and equipped with the academic capability needed to progress individually and collectively. At the end of the academic year, participants re-write a number of their subjects.

We are urgently seeking motivated and dedicated individuals to teach Mathematics (Maths and Maths Lit) and English (Home Language and First Additional). The positions are part-time and remunerated. Classes run in the mornings from 8h30 to 13h00. The academic component of the programme is based at 6 Spin Street, Cape Town.

In addition to the minimum contact time required for each subject (plus-minus 4-5 hours a week), teachers are expected to submit teaching plans (in line with curriculum and WCED requirements), and set and grade tests, exams and assignments. Given that participants submit new School Based Assessment (SBA) marks, teachers will also need to ensure that portfolios and mark sheets are compiled for the purposes of external moderation. Applicants should preferably have 2-3 years teaching experience. Retired teachers are encouraged to apply.

Please send cover letter, CV and contactable references to Gina Fourie (gina@equaleducation.org.za).

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-12-10T16:33:00.001-08:00

Khan Academy Is Not The Progressive Model You Are Looking For

tags: khan videos mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

FullMarks/siyavula November 2011 Newsletter

2011-12-09T00:06:00.001-08:00

Siyavula is very excited and proud to announce that the Department of
Basic Education <http://www.education.gov.za/>
is printing their openly-licensed textbooks for all learners taking
Physical Science and/or Mathematics in Grades 10-12, for the whole
country for 2012! A total of 2.5 million Siyavula textbooks (titled
"Everything Maths" and "Everything Science") will be printed
and distributed across the country!

Ensuring that this was possible became the exclusive focus of the
Siyavula team for the last 4 months, which was an all-consuming
exercise. We expanded our team and worked incredibly hard (each member
of the book team clocked almost 2 man months per calendar month since
mid-September!). We had to revamp our pipeline, develop new layouts
for the books, undergo multiple review iterations with DBE reviewers,
edit, edit, edit and then turn everyone into a translator in some
capacity. It has been incredibly hectic but worth all the effort, as
we proudly await the delivery of our open textbooks to schools across
the country.

This is a great milestone for both Siyavula and the OER movement in
South Africa, and will raise significant exposure of the issues around
access to materials and awareness of open licensing. For more
information on this please visit Mark Horner's blog
<http://www.markhorner.net/2011/12/05/what-happened-to-the-last-5-months/>
. To download our new books please visit our website by clicking here
<http://www.siyavula.com/books>
.

As a result of this we had to put new developments for FullMarks
<http://www.fullmarks.org.za/>
on hold for a little while, but we will send out notification next
week on the changes that have been implemented in the last while, as
well as where we stand on future developments.

We are closing for Christmas on Thursday 15 December, with most of the
team back in the office on Tuesday 3 January.

We hope that everyone has a wonderful holiday and a good break over
the Festive season!

African Institute for Mathematical Sciences: Postgraduate Diploma in Mathematical Sciences

2011-12-07T02:58:00.000-08:00

The African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS) is a centre for education and research in Cape Town, South Africa. AIMS was established in 2003 as a partnership project of the following six universities - Cambridge, Cape Town, Oxford, Paris Sud XI, Stellenbosch, and Western Cape. The goals of AIMS are to promote mathematics and science in Africa, to recruit and train talented students and teachers, and to build capacity for African initiatives in education, research, and technology.

AIMS offers an intensive graduate-level course over 10 months leading to a master's-level Postgraduate Diploma (PGD) in Mathematical Sciences, formally accredited by the Universities of Cape Town, Stellenbosch, and the Western Cape.

The programme is taught in association with the Faculty of Mathematics of the University of Cambridge, and the Division of Physical Sciences at the University of Oxford.

The course provides both a broad overview of cutting-edge sciences and strong mathematical and computing research skills. The course is unique, offering students exposure to a range of topics, thereby allowing them to make an informed choice as to their future specialisation. The goal is to develop well-rounded scientists, with excellent problem-solving skills, capable of creative thinking and genuine innovation. There is a strong grounding in end-to-end skills, from problem formulation, estimation, prioritisation, and generally applicable mathematical and computing methods, through to clear and concise scientific report writing. The aim is to equip students with the necessary tools and confidence for decision making and policy analysis. A number of modules which also make the course interesting and relevant to prospective mathematics and science teachers, have been included in the programme for South African students commencing in January 2012.

Faculties from the nearby Universities of the Western Cape, Cape Town and Stellenbosch have been intimately involved in developing the AIMS course, ensuring it is well integrated with local undergraduate and master’s courses, and with local postgraduate research opportunities. World-leading scientists and educators have volunteered to teach at AIMS. Their participation ensures an education of the highest international quality. Tutors (often including PGD alumni) provide teaching and administrative assistance, assistance to foreign language speakers, and continuity across the visiting lecturers.

Students are registered at one of the three local universities: Cape Town, Stellenbosch or Western Cape.
Prospective applicants

Completing a course of such scope and depth in just one academic year is possible only if it is highly intensive, so students must come prepared to work hard and focus. The residential nature of AIMS allows far greater contact time between lecturers and students than normally available in a university setting. Courses are student-centred but very demanding. Students study two subjects at a time every three weeks, with morning lectures and related afternoon problem solving and computing sessions. Each course consists of 30 hours contact time (10 per week). Additional tutorials and special lectures are often held in the evenings, when students complete their assignments.

No special preparation for the course is needed on a student's part. However, the working language is English and foreign students are advised to take an English language course before arrival. The course also carries a large component of scientific computing, and many hours are spent in the computer laboratory; students who have improved their touch typing skills before the programme will have a distinct advantage.

To apply for admission go to the Apply section www.aims.ac.za/en/apply/postgraduate-diploma for the required forms.

Students are strongly advised to apply by 31 March 2012 to qualify for the first round selection which takes place during March. Applicants who are accepted on to the programme will be notified by the end of March 2012. Late applications received may be considered in exceptional cases and where places are still vacant.

For more about the Postgraduate Diploma in Mathematical Sciences, refer to www.aims.ac.za/en/programmes/postgraduate-diploma.

For more about the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences, refer to www.aims.ac.za.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-12-03T16:33:00.001-08:00

Using bibliotherapy in mathematics teaching to prevent de-geniusing

Today the understanding of mathematics is critical in an increasingly technological age. Teachers must play an important role to ensure that all students display confidence in their ability to do mathematics. Often gifted students of mathematics can be made to feel bad by their peers just because they know mathematics and things come easily to them. Children’s and adolescent literature has now been recognised as a means of teaching mathematics to students through the use of stories to make the mathematics concepts relevant and meaningful.

tags: mathematics journalarticles Pythagoras
Frequency Distribution Table with Cumulative Frequency - MathsLinks

"For use by students, a Frequency Distribution Table with Cumulative Frequency column. Frequency is entered using +/- buttons, cumulative frequency is entered manually and the tool shows whether the entry is correct (green) or not (red)."

tags: simulations mathematics interactives 4IWB
Another handy mathematics sites for K12 students- studymaths.co.uk

tags: mathematics k12 interactive worksheets
Albanian students’ motives for preferring certain real-life situations for learning mathematics #mathslit

New article published: Albanian students’ motives for preferring certain real-life situations for learning mathematics"

tags: mathematics articles research matshlit
Maths Forum

tags: Mathematics sateachers sateacherscop

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-11-26T16:34:00.001-08:00

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-11-19T16:33:00.001-08:00

New article published: The interplay of language and mathematics

This article deals with an intervention unit which focused on the positive effect of integrating poems, stories and fables (the literary genre) for improving mathematical language, fostering the teaching of mathematics language, increasing satisfaction with the process and strengthening the relationship between use of daily language and mathematics language. The study was conducted amongst pre-service mathematics teachers, specialising in literacy activities designed to foster mathematics language.

tags: mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-11-05T17:33:00.001-07:00

MATHEMATICS ADVISORY SERVICES OVERBERG

Yeaah a new local find

tags: mathematics #sateachers
Trigonometry: Graphs: Sine and Cosine

tags: trigonometry sine cosine mathematics
The Maths behind the rainbow

When the great mathematician Isaac Newton explained the colours of the rainbow with refraction the poet John Keats was horrified. Keats complained (through poetry of course) that a mathematical explanation robbed these marvels of nature of their magic, conquering "all mysteries by rule and line". But as we will see, the mathematical explanation, requiring just the basic geometry of lines and circles, is just as elegant as the rainbows themselves.

tags: mathematics mathslit rainbows
Maths and Sport: Countdown to the 2012 Games

tags: mathematics mathslit context:Olympicgames
GeoGebra: Do The Math! - Download free content from Maine Department of Education on iTunes

GeoGebra: Do the Math is a series of screencast tutorials for teachers and/or students. The tutorials were initiated as a project to support Maine math teachers in the integration of technology in the classroom. What is GeoGebra provides an overview of the program and its capabilities. Several tutorials present the program’s menu options and tools in step-by-step format. Another group of tutorials provides examples of GeoGebra learning activities in major math content areas. These tutorials are intended as a visual supplement to printed guides and documentation. GeoGebra users can find a wealth of guidance and examples at www.geogebra.org. A web search such as “GeoGebra Pythagorean Theorem” will yield hundreds of additional articles, examples, and applets.

tags: mathematics Podcasts school2.0

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-10-29T17:33:00.001-07:00

Math: Getting in step with rest of country. Was this fling with integrated math doomed from the start? | Get Schooled

Interesting article- applicable to us?

tags: integration mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-10-22T17:33:00.001-07:00

Fraction stuff

Resources hand picked to help students come to terms with fractions

tags: mathematics fractions
Funny Math Test Exam Answers, Possible Math Homework Help Needed

tags: Mathematics funny jokes answers student
Praetor Education Technology #mathslit resource downloads

tags: sateachers mathematics mathslit websites
Praetor Education mathematics downloads

Some investigations and projects and lessonplans here

tags: sateachers mathematics
Estimation and Your TV Diet

Putting this here so that I will rememember to create a create a mathslit a lesson from this.

tags: mathslit estimation lessonplanidea mathematics lessonplan gr3-5 primaryschools

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Invitation to a Russian professor's talk on Olympiads

2011-10-20T05:54:00.001-07:00

Dear colleagues

You are kindly invited to attend a lecture by a visiting Mathematics and Statistics professor from Russia.

Professor Ivan Vysotski

He will give us an insight into the Mathematics Olympiads conducted in Russian schools.

Date: Monday: 24 October 2011

Venue: AJH van der Walt Building, Muckleneuk Campus, UNISA, Room 6-36

Time: 12:30 for 13:00 to 14:00

Please RSVP for catering purposes (by Friday, 21 October):

paulsr@unisa.ac.za

Calling South African teachers to start twittering: Online un-workshop

2011-10-17T07:37:00.001-07:00

Twitter has great potential as a creative and collaborative learning and teaching tool in the classroom. It has been chosen as the number 1 learning & teaching tool for the last 4 (going on 5) years globally, which shows that it is tool that has to be taken seriously.

Some of the reasons for using twitter as a teacher and in your classroom:

You can create a personal learning network on the fly
You can learn from others and get instant support
You can use this tool to teach your learners how to use social media responsibly
You can share resources, events, thoughts, lesson ideas... quick as lightning!
You can have discussions on topical issues in your classroom and in education in general.
You can use it to connect your class to other global classrooms and experts
.................

Obviously it is just a tool and learning and teaching only takes place if we use a tool effectively! My mission is to get at least 500 South African teachers to do just that! So this online un-workshop will guide newbie twitter teachers or those wanting to learn about how to use twitter for teaching and learning through some of the steps- from getting started, to creating a learning networks- to using the tool more effectively- to using it as a classroom tool- to sharing resources- to embedding it your school website, LMS, or your blog- to managing it -to using it as an on demand assessment and feedback tool-to......

The (.....) parts is where the UN part of the un-workshop comes in. Even though I, and hopefully others, will be providing structure as far as making sure that everybody will be getting some of the basic information and providing learning objects and references along the way, this workshop will be dependent on the input, direction and needs of all who participate. I will also invite my learning network to interact, support and share best practices with you and I am sure we will ALL be able to add value and direction to this unworkshop. So if you are part of my amazing twitter PLN, please let me know if you will be able to mentor a few new teacher twits and get them to understand why we are a-twitter about twitter!
It will also entail some online ad hoc webinars (which will be hosted by Schoolnet) to help you connect and we even may want to meet face to face and have edu-tweetups all around the country?!!

The whole workshop will be run via Facebook (www.ict4champions.co.za) and my blog (www.school2.co.za) for those without faces ;-). So, you can either RSVP as a comment on the event blogpost here, or on my Facebook events page.

Looking forward to interacting with you all! If you are a South African teacher please add #sateachers to your tweet. Our hashtag for this unworkshop is #ict4champions.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-10-15T17:33:00.001-07:00

Quizmax: a local cellphone based curriculum tool (maths Science, Life sciences)

Maths, Physical Science and Life Sciences revision quizzes directly on your cell phone or PC. Preparation tool for all your tests and exams. Immediate feedback: answers plus reasons for the correct answers. Wide range of exam-level questions. Developed by experienced Maths, Physical Science and Life Sciences educators
Complies with National Curriculum Statement. Compliant with current Examination Guidelines

tags: mathematics cellphones mlearning mxit school2.0
MIT BLOSSOMS-maths and science video classes 4 high school

"The open repository of interactive high school lesson video modules sponsored by MIT's Learning International Networks Consortium (LINC) has unveiled an updated website.
Every lesson, filmed in high school classrooms from Brooklyn to Beirut to Bangalore, is still a complete resource that includes video segments, a teacher's guide, downloadable hand-outs, and a list of additional online resources relevant to the topic.
Since first appearing in these pages six months ago, the library of videos has grown to over 50 math and science lessons, all freely available to teachers as streaming video, Internet downloads, DVDs, and videotapes."

tags: videos mathematics science highschool opencourseware mit
Matheatics games and interactives

tags: mathematics games interactive
Maximum Capacity Game

In Maximum Capacity, you play the role of an elevator attendant who must bring as many gorillas as possible to the eighth floor for the annual Gorilla's Ball at the Jungle Hotel! The only problem is, the doors to the ball close in three minutes, and there are still hundreds of anxious gorillas waiting. Bring as many as you can to the eighth floor in three minutes.

tags: mathematics primarychool estimation weight games interactive
NBHS maths resources

Lots of mathematics resources here for schools. THe bookmark collection of @jonesieboy

tags: mathematics
Purple Mash: Projects math games software

tags: mathematics school2.0 interactive software
Math at Work Monday: Jennifer the retail buyer

tags: mathematics
More maths Web Links

tags: mathematics sateachers
Malati mathematics materials

All the materials developed by MALATI are in the public domain. They may be freely used and adapted, with acknowledgement to MALATI and the Open Society Foundation for South Africa.

The documents provided here are the teacher documents, consisting of the learner activities and accompanying teacher notes. We also include the rationale document for each content area, giving background on the underlying philosophy and design principles.

tags: mathematics mathslit sateachers malati
Learn Xra Grade 12 Saturday School #mathslit Lessons from @Mindset

tags: mathematics mathslit sateachers videos
Statistics South Africa

tags: mathematics statistics data datasets mathslit sateachers
Maths Excellence > Resources > Maths

tags: mathematics maths sateachers
Maths Excellence > Resources > Maths Lit

tags: mathslit mathematics sateachers pacesetters
Great mathematics and #mathslit downloads from Brombacher & Associates

tags: mathslit aarnout brombacher mathematics numeracy
How-To Articles for Mathematics/mathslit

tags: mathematics howtos
Pythagoras Vol 32, No 1 (2011) is now available

tags: mathematical literacy mathslit sateachers Research journals Mathematics
Thutong:Caps documents for Mathematics Grades 10-12

tags: mathematics caps Gr10 Gr11 Gr12 curriculum currdocs&policies DBE
Thutong: South African Education Portal mathematics space

tags: sateachers mathematics
Maths Excellence: lots of resources here!

Lots of local and global mathematics resources for learners

tags: mathematics sateachers
SmartLearner is a mobi site across all the SA subject areas.

tags: school2.0 mleanring mobi science mathematics sateachers mathslit lifesciences
What is FHSST?

tags: mathematics sateachers textbooks ebooks library2.0 sciences
Download the free and open mathematics text books from FHSST

tags: mathematics sateachers textbooks ebooks library2.0
Mathematics Dump: 11 ideas for what and how to share for mathematics teachers

tags: mathematics sateachers sharing school2.0 Maggie
Mathematics questions across all phases from Fullmarks

Fullmarks s a local assessment bank tool for south african learners and ther teachers. You can set tests on the fly. and ad questions to the database It also have the anwers. Very handy

tags: mathematics sateachers
Connexions - Siyavula (South African school resources)

tags: mathematics sateachers resources
Maggie's Mathematics Dump

This is my mathematics blog where all my mathematics resources, events and titbits are auto send.

tags: mathematics sateachers resources

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Great maths book review by Charles Smith

2011-10-11T08:09:00.000-07:00

Book review by I have just bought a book at Exclusive Books which I would highly recommend for all Maths teachers. It's called Maths 1001 by Richard Elves. I covers "Absolutely everything you need to know about Mathematics in 1001 bite-sized explanations." It cost R221 but it is worth every cent. It's going to take a long time to get through it all but the presentation and the content make it something I'm going to want to jump into on a regular basis. The explanations cover topics from "Factors & Multiples" to "Game Theory" to "Combinatorics" and "Cryptography." Most explanations are completed in less than 20 lines.

A great source for interesting lesson starters or challenges for inquiring minds. If your school has a "reading" period then this is the ideal book.

Get it - if you love maths...it's worth it.

Here's a link to view the table of contents.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/toc/1848660634/ref=dp_toc?ie=UTF8&n=266239

11 ideas for what and how to share for mathematics teachers

2011-10-10T03:06:00.000-07:00

I came upon a request for teachers in our closed South Africam FET mathematics group to share local maths classroom resources. I have been on a personal mission to get teachers (especially maths and mathslit teachers) to share for donkie years so this request did create a flutter of excitement! I have found that despite our country being credited with the spirit of UBUNTU, it does not really happen down on the ground. There are the few sharing individuals that will always share and then there are the USERS. They want stuff, and they want it now, and please don't ask them to give anything in return. Most of the time they don't even bother saying thank you.

So this post is dedicated to the sharer bees...those who unselfishly share the fruit of their classrooms, their tests,exams, their lesson plans, and most of all- their wisdom, allowing us to look over their shoulders and learn from them- not only from their successes but also from their failures!! Bravo to your braveness!!

Which bring me to the whole thing of sharing. Quite a "complicated" concept. Firstly I want to look at what we can share.

When talking to teachers, their idea of the "what"is mostly restricted to actual sharing of set papers and tests. We are working under severe time pressure and have to get students to "pass" and "excel" as dictated by current assessment standards, which may or may not be of the highest standard. This make the sharing of assessment items a priority in order to set tests, exams as well fast drill- and- practice kind of exercises. We do not even get to the sharing of useful inspiring articles and ideas that could support and underpin creating 21st a century problem solving, critical thinking breed of citizens. We do not look at sharing of materials to include sharing of wisdom, what- worked- and- did- not- in- my- classroom- stories. We do not share stuff that could help us develop in our own lifelong learning pathways. We simply do not have time. Then we wonder why we feel disenchanted, uninspired and isolated.

So if we look at the WHAT to share:

Lesson plans, work schedules, tests, exam papers, curriculum documents and briefs as not all teachers in districts always get it it. (the basics)
Teaching ideas (e.g. I am thinking of doing a twitter project with my students to harvest real time statistical data- any ideas?)
What works and what does not work in my classroom.
How I teach.
Internet articles of value (this is a great way to filter relevant knowledge for your colleagues and learning network)
Online simulations and interactive material that can be used on whiteboards.
New technology (ICT) tools (e.g. facebook, twitter, edmodo, animoto, google+, diigo...) and how you use them in your classroom.
Tutorials- learn something new that you can use in your classroom and for your won professional development.
News of professional development opportunities, events, conferences and seminars. (locally and globally, online and face to face)

How can we share. (My bandwagon- hop on please)

If you want to share any of the above QUICKLY, twitter is your answer. Just add the URL (web address) to your tweet with a short what it is about (you have 140 characters to do so) and add a hashtag so that interested people can find it quickly. (e.g. #mathematics, #mathchat, #mathslit #sateachers). If we then search for #mathchat we can find "fresh" cutting edge resources. Example: See the #mathchat twitter stream http://twitter.com/#!/search/%23mathchat
We need a database to store all these wonderful resources that we were talking about and here I want to scream DIIGO. This great tool allows you to, not only bookmark relevant resources, but have discussion about a resource, annotate resources, share it to twitter, create automated blog posts, embed automated feeds in your school's Learner Management System or website, create reading lists, and share with other interested colleagues or students in groups. It is also cross platform and you can access and share your bookmarks from any computer, operating system browser, cellphone, ipad or tablet. My mathematics sharing group is here: http://groups.diigo.com/group/classroommathematics
File sharing tools. There are many to choose from, see my database here: http://www.diigo.com/user/maggiev/filesharing My favourite file sharing tool is Dropbox as it gives you 2GB free to start off with (you can get extra GB's by getting your friends to join), fully integrates with your computer filing system and not only syncs all you files across all your devices but also syncs automatically with your colleagues' devices the moment you save a file in a shared folder on your device/PC . I have written a howto tutorial on how to get started with Dropbox that you can download from here: http://bit.ly/p9u2wb

So let's get going and start sharing!! If you are a maths teacher and want to start sharing with me and other maths sharer bees, please go and join my maths group here: http://groups.diigo.com/group/classroommathematics

My local South African mathematics websites and resources can be found under the tag's Mathematics+sateachers here: http://www.diigo.com/user/maggiev/sateachers%20mathematics

Photo credits:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/daveduarte/2817722169/

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-10-08T17:33:00.001-07:00

Tweeting using the Golden Ratio - Great Maths Teaching Ideas

tags: mathematics goldenratio twitter mathslit ratios LO1 functionalrelationships
Five Lessons On Teaching From Angry Birds That Have Nothing Whatsoever To Do With Parabolas

COnnecting the game angry birds to parabolas

tags: mathematics parabola algebra maths games angrybirds
2011 Grade 12 Maths + Maths Lit Exam Papers

tags: mathematics mathematical literacy mathslit

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-09-24T17:33:00.001-07:00

Mathematics Dump: "I hate maths" seminar at Wits

tags: mathematics seminar wshops

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

"I hate maths" seminar at Wits

2011-09-20T01:30:00.001-07:00

The SA Numeracy Chair project at Wits School of Education, in collaboration with the Wits B Ed Concepts and Literacies in Mathematics course, is proud to host its inaugural: I Hate Maths seminar, presented by Professor Mike Askew, Claude-Leon Distinguished Scholar, Monash University, Melbourne.

Professor Askew will introduce some of the issues relating to primary teacher mathematics content knowledge and pedagogy in the international landscape. The central part of the session is focused on the presentation, working through and discussion of some mathematics problems with the audience – problems based on primary mathematics concepts which require some thinking, representing and explaining – all critical features of the 'connected' repertoire of understanding and skills needed for good primary mathematics teaching.

The aim of the seminar is, in particular, to attract an audience of primary teachers and parents, as well as primary teacher educators and other academics – many of whom freely express the 'I hate mathematics' sentiment, to engage in some fun and communal problem solving and discussion! And hopefully to leave the seminar entertaining the possibility that you do not maybe need to hate maths as much as you might have thought! Bring pencil, paper and willingness to engage!

Date: Wednesday 2^nd November

Time: 15:00 for 15:30-17:30

Venue: Staff Lounge

RSVP for catering purposes: Nomonde Mda: nomonde.mda@wits.ac.za (011) 717 3412

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-09-17T17:33:00.001-07:00

Teacher package: Game theory

tags: Mathematics gametheory
Born to count?

People as well as animals are born with a sense for numbers. But is this inborn number sense related to mathematical ability? A new study suggests that it is.

tags: Mathematics counting

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-09-10T17:33:00.001-07:00

The 50 Best Twitter Feeds for Math Geeks

tags: twitter mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-08-27T17:33:00.001-07:00

Statistics - Learn About Statistics

tags: statistics mathematics
Extra maths lessons on MXit -extended by Nokia

tags: MXit maths mathematics momaths projects southafrican education school2.0
MathX is a mxit maths game to hone those basic skills

"MathX is a mathematical game where the player is given 4 single digit numbers (0-9). The player must apply the basic operators (addition, subtraction, multiplication and division) to each of these numbers, using all the numbers once only, to get to the answer 24."

tags: mxit games educational school2.0 mathematics
A Paperless Math Activity

tags: mathematics lessonplanidea
Sum up today's lesson in a tweet

How a maths teacher is using twitter in his classroom.

tags: mathematics twitter examples school2.0
Mathematics Education: A Way Forward

The objective of good math teaching should not be to "cover the curriculum" but to show students how to explore our fascinating and beautiful world through the lens of mathematics. We must change our focus in math education from a focus on a largely irrelevant and uninteresting set of learning objectives to a focus on making math relevant and engaging for students.

tags: mathematics mathchat numeracy mathslit
Free Math Resources for K-12 from Curriki.org

tags: mathematics websites resources K-12 math
Interactive maths websites

tags: mathematics websites resources
Math & Science Apps - Google Docs

Seems ipad geared but quite a lot of these are available on android as well

tags: apps mathematics maths math ipad android teachers
13-Year-Old Designs Efficient Solar Array Inspired By Oak Trees

This is the kind of thinking we should stimulate in our students

tags: school2.0 mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-08-20T17:34:00.001-07:00

Fighting Crime with Math: Scientific American Podcast

tags: mathematics context:crime mathematicalmodelling
Dazzle your data handling class with an infographic project #mathematics

tags: mathematics Datahandling LO4 infographics
A few more mathematics ebook stuff

tags: mathematics ebooks
PlanetMath is a virtual community which aims to help make mathematical knowledge more accessible.

"PlanetMath is a virtual community which aims to help make mathematical knowledge more accessible. PlanetMath's content is created collaboratively: the main feature is the mathematics encyclopedia with entries written and reviewed by members."

tags: mathematics encyclopedia
Mathematics - more Free E-Books

"E-Books for free online viewing and/or download"

tags: mathematics ebooks
Mathematics ebooks for all levels it looks like

tags: mathematics ebooks pdfbooks

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-08-13T17:34:00.001-07:00

The Cinemath Project: Teaching math through video

tags: mathematics school2.0 maths

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-08-06T17:33:00.001-07:00

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-07-30T17:33:00.001-07:00

Microsoft Mathematics 4.0 in the classroom A guide

"From basic math to pre-calculus, Microsoft Mathematics 4.0 helps you visualize and see mathematical concepts as you’ve never seen them before."

tags: mathematics software school2.0
The 10 Best Maths Teaching Resource Websites

tags: math mathematics resources

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Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-07-23T17:33:00.001-07:00

AMESA 2011 Proceedings

tags: amesa11 amesa proceedings mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Prof Michael's July 2011 Math e-Newsletter

2011-07-18T09:55:00.001-07:00

Dear Colleagues & friends

Happy Madiba day, 18 July! Hope you all spent a little time in service to others in recognition of the great man. This newsletter is my own modest contribution.

1. HOMEPAGE UPDATE

My homepage at http://mysite.mweb.co.za/residents/profmd/homepage4.html has been updated with the following new items:
1)      "Equi-angled cyclic and equilateral circumscribed polygons", PDF (2011)
2)      2010 "Reflections on Van Hiele" paper now available in Portuguese & Croatian
3)      mathematical/mathematics education quote
4)      mathematics/science cartoon.

My dynamic geometry sketches Link at http://math.kennesaw.edu/~mdevilli/JavaGSPLinks.htm has been updated with the following (new & revised) sketches:
             1) Fermat-Torricelli point generalizations (updated)
             2) Semi-regular angle-gons and side-gons (new)
             3) Some parallelo-hexagon areas (updated)
             4) Some unproved conjectures (updated)

and the Student Explorations section with:
             1) Collinear conjecture (new)
             2) Gielis Super-shape formula (new)
             3) Napoleon variation problem (new)
             4) Paul Yiu's problem and a generalization (new)
             5) Varsity Readiness Test (new)


Please REFRESH pages if they don't load properly the first time.

2. NEW SOFTWARE

Tinkerplots 2, the innovative data handling software for younger learners (and quite adequate for Math Literacy in the South African Curriculum) not only has some great new features, but is now available as a download. Hence, it is available at a lower cost than before, e.g. currently at about R150 for a student license and about R370 for a Single User (and even lower for bulk orders). For more information and to download a free demo go to http://www.keypress.com/x5715.xml Please contact dynamiclearn@mweb.co.za for more information and to order.

3. BOOKS/PROCEEDINGS

The books below might be valuable additions to add to your university, school or personal libraries.

a) Exploring Number and Operations in Grades 3–5 with Sketchpad 5
b) Exploring Geometry and Measurement in Grades 3–5 with Sketchpad 5
c) Exploring Ratio, Proportion, and Probability in Grades 6–8 with Sketchpad 5
(For more info about the above 3 books or to order please contact dynamiclearn@mweb.co.za )

d) The Preparation of Teachers of Mathematics: Considerations and Challenges, download FREE PDF fromhttp://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=10055

e) Statistics for People Who (Think they) Hate Statistics, 2nd Edition Excel 2007 Edition by Neil J Salkind from University of Kansas, SAGE publishers. 2010.

f) Sweet Reason: A field guide to modern logic. 1995, By Thomas Tymoczko, James M. Henle. (For more info or to order please contactdynamiclearn@mweb.co.za )

g) AMESA (Assoc. Math. Ed. of South Africa) Congress 2011 Proceedings are now available online athttp://www.amesa.org.za/amesa2011/Proceedings.htm )

4. WEBSITES & MORE DOWNLOADS

a) Useful free book for Math Competition & Olympiad Enthusiasts on "Elementary Number Theory" athttp://www.scribd.com/doc/26455476/Math-Elementary-Number-Theory

b) View a video clip or read the transcript of Conrad Wolfram's 2010 talk "Stop teaching calculating; start teaching math" athttp://www.computerbasedmath.org/resources/reforming-math-curriculum-with-computers.html

c) Free Interactive Math Crossword Puzzles Online at http://www.mathgoodies.com/puzzles/crosswords/icircle1.html

d) PROJECT MATHEMATICS by Tom Apostel at http://www.projectmathematics.com/ has several wonderful short video clips on topics for classroom use such as Similarity, Pythagoras, Pi, Sine and Cosine, History of Math, Polynomials, etc.

e) SAGE- Viable free open source alternative to Magma, Maple, Mathematica, and Matlab Sage is free open source math software that supports research and teaching in algebra, geometry, calculus, elementary to very advanced number theory, cryptography, numerical computation, commutative algebra, group theory, combinatorics, graph theory, and exact linear algebra. Download for Win, Linux and Mac athttp://www.sagemath.org/

f) The Community for Undergraduate Learning in the Mathematical Sciences Newsletter is available online atwww.math.auckland.ac.nz/CULMS/newsletters

g) International lists of Mathematics Educations journals are available at http://mathedjournals.wikispaces.com/ andhttp://www.crme.soton.ac.uk/links/journals.html

h) Download a number of great articles for free from NCTM's three journals, "Teaching Children Mathematics", "Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School" and "Mathematics Teacher" at http://iem.nctm.org/display.php?M=1333613&C=e1230c7d7a5c78229b97f9bb794d9c51&S=955&L=36&N=963

i) Curriki is an online environment created to support the development and free distribution of world-class educational materials to anyone who needs them. It is a great place to find and post classroom activities and course curriculum. Go tohttp://www.curriki.org/xwiki/bin/view/Main/WebHome

j) A list of articles and their abstracts from the Far East Journal of Mathematical Education, May 2011, is available athttp://pphmj.com/journals/articles/761.htm

5. CONFERENCES

a) BRIDGES 2011 Conference: Connections between Mathematics, Music, Art, Architecture, Culture, Univ of Coimbra, Portugal, July 27-31, 2011. URL: http://bridgesmathart.org/bridges-2011/

b) 11th International Conference of The Mathematics Education into the 21st Century Project: 'Turning Dreams into Reality: Transformations and Paradigm Shifts in Mathematics Education', 10-16 September 2011, Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa. Download the First Announcement and Call for Papers at: http://math.unipa.it/~grim/21project.htm E-mail, Alan Rogerson, Programme Chair atalan@rogerson.pol.pl

c) The ATCM and Chinese Association of Mathematics Education is launching the ATCM-China chapter (http://atcm.mathandtech.org/China) and its first meeting is to be held at Xi'an, China during August 3-6, 2011. The ATCM local chapter is meant to promote the exchanges of students-centered projects where technological tools are being implemented creatively in solving real-life problems.

d) The 16th Asian Technology Conference in Mathematics (ATCM 2011 http://atcm.mathandtech.org), which is going to be hosted by the Abantzzet Baysal University, Bolu, Turkey at the beautiful five star B√Ç¬üy√Ç¬ük Abant hotel, September 19-23 of 2011.

e) ICMI Study 21 entitled "Mathematics Education and Language diversity". The two co-chairs are Mamokgethi Setati, University of South Africa, and Maria Do Carmo Domite, Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil. The Discussion Document may be found at the study website athttp://www.icmi-21.com/index.php?page_id=140 and the Study Conference will be held on 16 - 20 September 2011 in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

f) The 2011 International Conference on School Mathematics Textbooks (ICSMT 2011) will be held during October 12-14, 2011 in Shanghai, China and hosted by East China Normal University (ECNU). The theme of ICSMT 2011 is to explore trends and characteristics of school mathematics textbooks around the world. Official website of ICSMT 2011 at: http://math.ecnu.edu.cn/academia/icsmt/mainpage.html

g) The ISTE International Conference on Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, Kruger Park, South Africa, 17-20 October 2011. Theme: "Towards Effective Teaching and Meaningful Learning in Mathematics, Science and Technology Education". URL:http://www.unisa.ac.za/iste-conference

h) CARN Conference 2011 (Collaborative Action Research Network) at http://ius.uni-klu.ac.at/misc/carn/
Bringing a different world into existence: Action research as a trigger for innovations, 4th - 6th November, 2011
Vienna.

i) 1st Computer-Based Math Education Summit. Organised by http://computerbasedmath.org in association with Wolfram Research at The Royal Institution, London, 10-11 November 2011. Visit:
http://www.computerbasedmath.org/events/londonsummit2011/

j) Volcanic Delta 2011, the Eighth Southern Hemisphere Conference on the Teaching and Learning of Undergraduate Mathematics and Statistics, will be held in Rotorua, NZ from 27th November to 2nd December 2011. To express your interest in the conference or find further information please visit www.delta2011.co.nz

k) Joint Mathematics Meeting of the South African Mathematical Society (SAMS) and the American Mathematical Society (AMS) at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Port Elizabeth, 29 November – 3 December 2011 at http://www.nmmu.ac.za/sams-ams2011/ssprop.htm

l) The annual meeting of the Southern African Association for Research in Mathematics, Science & Technology Education (SAARMSTE), 16-19 January 2012, University of Malawi. Theme: "Mathematics, Science & Technology Education : A key to sustainable development". Go to: 1st Announcement

m) The didactics of mathematics: approaches and issues. International colloquium in honour of Michele Artigue (Professor Universit¬é Paris Diderot, ex-president of ICMI), Paris 31 May – 2 June 2012. First Announcement with a description of Scientific Activities of Plenary Lectures, Panels, Workshops, Poster Session is available in French, English and Spanish at http://www.lar.univ-paris-diderot.fr/colloque/artigue

n) 12th International Congress on Mathematics Education, ICME-12, July 8-15, 2012, Seoul, Korea. The 2nd Announcement has been uploaded on the ICME-12 website (http://www.icme12.org ). Calls for papers for different topic groups have also been posted.

6. QUOTES & POINTS TO PONDER

"Moreover, there is a growing consensus that human minds are fundamentally not very good at mathematics, and must be trained ... Given this fact, the computer can be seen as a perfect complement to humans - we can intuit but not reliably calculate or manipulate; computers are not yet very good at intuition, but are great at calculations and manipulations."        – Dave Baily in e-mail discussion with experimental mathematician Jonathan Borwein (during 2010)

"The art is not in the 'truth' but in the explanation, the argument. It is the argument itself which gives the truth its context, and determines what is really being said and meant. Mathematics is the art of explanation. If you deny students the opportunity to engage in this activity— to pose their own problems, make their own conjectures and discoveries, to be wrong, to be creatively frustrated, to have an inspiration, and to cobble together their own explanations and proofs — you deny them mathematics itself. "    - Paul Lockhart in A Mathematician's Lament

"Often the key to answering a mathematical riddle is not to focus on fine details, but to look at broad details. Less can mean more. When it works, this trick is spectacular ..." - Ian Stewart in Taming the Infinite, Quercus Publishing, 2008, p. 236.

7. HUMOUR IN MATH & SCIENCE

Martin's Law of Committees: "A committee is a group of people who, individually, can do nothing, but collectively can meet and decide that nothing can be done."

"Photons have mass? I didn't even know they were Catholic." - Woody Allen

A wife asks her husband, "Could you please go shopping for me and buy one carton of milk, and if they have eggs, get 6." A short time later the husband comes back with 6 cartons of milk. The wife asks him, "Why the hell did you buy 6 cartons of milk?" He replied, "They had eggs."

8. PROBLEM PUZZLER

Solve the problem at: http://math.kennesaw.edu/~mdevilli/paul-yiu-theorem.html
(Use a free, Java enabled web browser like Firefox or Safari or download & install Java for Internet Explorer).

9. FEEDBACK

I'm always grateful for any feedback I receive. Humberto Bortolossi from Brazil kindly wrote to point out that
the video clip mentioned in the previous e-newsletter "Fibonacci Numbers - The Fingerprint of God" at www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9MwNm0gXd8&feature=player_embedded has some popular misconceptions.

The following article by George Markowsky. "Misconceptions About The Golden Ratio". College Mathematics Journal, vol. 23, n. 1, pp. 2-19, 1992 at http://www.umcs.maine.edu/~markov/GoldenRatio.pdf discusses this and other misconceptions.

Humberto has also implemented a Java Applet (in Portuguese) where it's possible to experiment and to see that the shape of the nautilus shell is actually not well described by a golden spiral as often popularly claimed: http://www.uff.br/cdme/rza/rza-html/rza-spirals-br.html

Geometrically yours
Michael
---

"With the aid of dynamic geometry, my ability to discover new conjectures exceeds the available time to prove them and sometimes even my mathematical background and ability."
----

Prof Michael de Villiers
(Dynamic Math Learning)
8 Cameron Rd
3615 SARNIA (Pinetown)
South Africa
Tel: 027-(0)31-7083709 (h)
Fax: 0866726536 (w): Cell: 0836561396
Skype: michaeldevilliersksu
Homepage: http://mysite.mweb.co.za/residents/profmd/homepage.html
Dynamic Geometry Sketches: http://math.kennesaw.edu/~mdevilli/JavaGSPLinks.htm
Dynamic Mathematics Learning Online Store: http://www.FreeWebStore.org/DynamicMathematicsLearning
---
Official SA Supplier of Key Curriculum Press at http://www.keypress.com
---
Visit the SA Mathematics Olympiad at http://www.samf.ac.za/Default2.aspx

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-07-16T17:33:00.001-07:00

Mbeki Maths Development Unit

Lots of FET maths stuff here

tags: mathematics fet amesa11

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-07-09T17:33:00.001-07:00

Many Eyes : create visualization from datasets

tags: visualization infographics school2.0 tools web2tools statistics datasets mathematics data LO4
Math4Mobile: Design & Implementation Challenges

"Calls are frequently heard for improving schooling by closing the gap between children’s life out-of-school and traditional learning styles, and by broadening the space and span for life-long learning opportunities. The Math4Mobile development endeavors to engage all students with mathematical ideas. It provides a collection of tools that could be included in a variety of activities to support students’ mathematical skills, conceptual understanding, and creative mathematical thinking. "

tags: math Mathematics Math4Mobile mlearning

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Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-07-02T17:33:00.001-07:00

Watch Your Spending & Control Your Budget With These 8 Free Budget Calculators

tags: mathematics financialliteracy calculators spending budgets lo1 LO2

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-06-25T17:33:00.001-07:00

Desmos - A Graphing Calculator in Your Browser

created a fully functional, browser-based graphing calculator. The calculator performs all of the functions you would expect to see in a graphing calculator with a couple of extras that you don't find in typical graphing calculators. Desmos allows you to share your equations and graphs through a Bit.ly link. Desmos graphs your equations as you type them and redraws them as you alter your equations.

tags: Mathematics web2tools learningtools graphing calculator education
Views from higher ed: Teach Financial Literacy

As a college president, I ask students and graduates what are we doing correctly and what can we improve upon. The typical responses to how we can improve are not surprising — more parking and more financial aid (often in that order). Lately the most common answer from recent graduates as to how we can improve has been surprising — more education about financial literacy and the practical aspects of living in today’s world.

tags: financialmathematics financialliteracy Mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-06-18T17:34:00.001-07:00

Exploring the Impact of Web-Based Learning Tools in Middle School Mathematics and Science Classrooms

tags: journals Articles Mathematics webbasedlearning school2.0

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Journal of Computers in Mathematics and Science Teaching Vol. 30, No. 2 now available

2011-06-15T01:04:00.001-07:00

The latest issue of Journal of Computers in Mathematics and Science Teaching is now available on the Ed/ITLib Digital Library.

Journal of Computers in Mathematics and Science Teaching Vol. 30, No.
2 (April 2011) [http://go.editlib.org/j/JCMST/v/30/n/2]

Table of Contents
Exploring the Impact of Web-Based Learning Tools in Middle School Mathematics and Science Classrooms
Robin Kay, UOIT, Canada
Abstract: http://www.editlib.org/p/33254
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Impact of Self-Efficacy and Peer Support on Student Participation with Interactive White Boards in the Middle School Math Class
Angie Olsen, Wachter Middle School, USA; Steven LeMire & Mary Baker,
University of North Dakota, USA
Abstract: http://www.editlib.org/p/33208
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Classroom Network Technology as a Support for Systemic Mathematics Reform: Examining the Effects of Texas Instruments' MathForward Program on Student Achievement in a Large, Diverse District
William Penuel, Corinne Singleton & Jeremy Roschelle, SRI International, USA
Abstract: http://www.editlib.org/p/33242
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Pupil Science Learning in Resource-Based e-Learning Environments
Wing-mui Winnie So & Ngai-ying Fiona Ching, The Hong Kong Institute of
Education, Hong Kong
Abstract: http://www.editlib.org/p/36224
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-06-11T17:34:00.001-07:00

#mathchat discussions on twitter

tags: mathchat mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-06-04T17:34:00.001-07:00

School Math(s)

A great site for maths teachers. Lots of interactive applets and resources for teachers.

tags: mathematics math applets
The Financial Literacy Toolkit

tags: Finance financialmathematics mathematics budgeting
A GREAT interactive manipulative site: skoool.co.za

tags: education localislekker manipulatives mathematics
YouTube - Conrad Wolfram: Teaching kids real math with computers

tags: mathematics computers education

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-05-28T17:34:00.001-07:00

Cinderella-Experience Geometry on your desktop and on the web

Experience Geometry on your desktop and on the web
Easily create startling geometric constructions! Starting from simple triangle relations, continuing with trigonometric theorems up to fractals and transformation groups Cinderella lets you create and manipulate visualizations in an intuitive, yet powerful way. Using Java® technologies, constructions are seamlessly exported to the WWW. And even better: you can get this for free!

tags: geometry software math mathematics interactive
Mathematics ipad applications wiki

Math apps can rang from flash cards to calculators to graphing. One day an iPAD can be a textbook, a calculator, and a review sheets. Lately, there has been several reference apps released that contain formulas and other reference materials.

tags: mathematics ipads applications

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Teaching and Learning of Mathematics using technology:opportunities and pitfalls

2011-05-27T09:24:00.000-07:00

Click on the full view button at the bottom or download the document. Remember to RSVP!!
Using Technology in Mathematics 3-4 June 2011

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-05-21T17:34:00.001-07:00

Behartig jou geldsake

"This is a financial literacy resource, developed with the support of the FSB and SAIA, for Mathematical Literacy classrooms Grade 10, 11 and 12"

tags: Afr financialmathematics mathematics LO2 budgets
See article on digital animation in the maths and science classroom

tags: mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-05-14T17:34:00.001-07:00

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2011-05-07T17:34:00.001-07:00

Supercomputer cracks sixty-trillionth binary digit of Pi-squared, gets beaten up by normal computers -- Engadget

tags: mathematics pi computers
MathsLinks - A directory of useful objects found on the web for teaching Maths.

"Looking for an online activity to engage your maths class today? Or an online widget to consolidate what you learnt yesterday?

MathsLinks is a directory of 300+ useful objects found on the web for teaching Maths. This site aims to not only collate the best maths activities on the web, but present them in a meaningful way."

tags: math mathematics school2.0 interactive directory resources

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Grade 12 Maths Educator Workshop

2011-02-10T02:11:00.001-08:00

Dear Colleagues and Friends

The Community Education Computer Society (CECS), would like to invite computer literate Grade 12 Mathematics Educators based in Gauteng and the Eastern Cape to apply for a place to attend a 2-day ICT training workshop. The workshops will take place as follows:

Johannesburg: 26 & 27 February 2011
East London: 5 & 6 March 2011 and 12 & 13 March 2011

The closing date for applications is Friday, 18 February 2011. Applications forms can be downloaded from the CECS website.

CECS is an ICT training NGO which was established in April 1985 in the Western Cape and has provided relevant ICT training for a range of sectors for over 20 years. CECS recently received support from the S A Finnish Partnership (SAFIPA) for a project which aims to empower Mathematics Educators to use ICTs for resource development.

The aim of the workshop is to equip computer literate Grade 12 Mathematics Educators with the knowledge and skills to use a word-processing program to type maths question and test papers which incorporates equations, functions, and geometric drawings. We want Educators to take charge of typing their own question papers.

We are hereby requesting you to invite computer literate Grade 12 Mathematics Educators to apply for a place to participate in the workshop or if you will be so kind to circulate this note amongst relevant stakeholders. There is no cost for attending the workshop but unfortunately, CECS will not be able to cover travelling and accommodation expenses for selected Educators.

CECS will also be conducting workshops in the other 7 provinces. Thus, if you are not in the mentioned provinces, then do go to our website to register your interest.

Thanking you.

ARNOLD PIETERSEN
Community Education Computer Society
Tel: 011-333-0187
Fax: 0865-377-172
E-mail: info@cecs.org.za
Website: www.cecs.org.za

The Sci-Bono Discovery centre Teacher Development Unit is looking for Mathematics Material developers.

2011-02-07T01:11:00.000-08:00

Prof Michael's newsletter: Feb 2011, Math e-Newsletter

2011-01-31T07:43:00.001-08:00

PLEASE FORWARD TO ALL INTERESTED IN MATHEMATICS & SCIENCE EDUCATION

Dear Colleagues & friends

Wishing you all a very Happy New Math Year!

1. HOMEPAGE UPDATE

My homepage at http://mysite.mweb.co.za/residents/profmd/homepage4.html has been updated with the following new items:
1)      PME (1989) paper "A comparative study of two Van Hiele testing instruments"
2)      mathematical/mathematics education quote
3)      mathematics/science cartoon.

My dynamic geometry sketches Link at http://math.kennesaw.edu/~mdevilli/JavaGSPLinks.htm has been updated with the following (new & revised) sketches:
             1) De Villiers points & Hyperbola of a triangle (updated)
             2) A generalization of Neuberg & Simson line (updated)
             3) Interior Angle Sum of Polygons: A general formula (new)
             4) Some unproved conjectures (updated)

and the Student Explorations section with:
             1) Cyclic quadrilateral rectangle result (new)
             2) Interior Angle Sum of Polygons: A general formula (new)
             3) Quadrilateral Inequality involving Perimeter & Diagonals (updated)
             4) Added links to 'Mathematical Digest' and 'School Maths'


Please REFRESH pages if they don't load properly the first time.

2. SOUTH AFRICAN MATHEMATICS OLYMPIAD

Please remember the dates for this year's Olympiad:
Closing date for entries: 4 Feb
1st round: 16 March
2nd round: 17 May
3rd round: 7 Sep

For more info about entering this prestige competition, past papers and answers, go to:
http://www.samf.ac.za/samo/

Download the free e-Book, "Geometry Unbound" at http://www.scribd.com/doc/18935265/Geometry-Unbound

It provides great training and reference for students to prepare for the Senior 3rd Round of SA Mathematics Olympiad (SAMO) and the International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO)

3. AMESA CONGRESS 2011 DATES

Please note the change of dates to 11-15 July 2011 (see more info further down).

4. NEW or RECENT BOOKS

The books below might be valuable additions to add to your university, school or personal libraries.

a) The Computer as Crucible: An Introduction to Experimental Mathematics
Jonathan Borwein; Keith Devlin, ISBN 9781568813431 URL: http://www.crcpress.com/ecommerce_product/product_detail.jsf?isbn=9781568813431
(Also available in German now)

b) Interdisciplinarity for the 21st Century: Proceedings of the 3rd International Symposium on Mathematics and its connections to the Arts and Sciences, Moncton 2009. Edited by Bharath Sriraman; Viktor Freiman, Paperback 978-1-61735-218-8, Hardcover 978-1-61735-219-5, URL: http://infoagepub.com/products/Interdisciplinarity-for-the-21st-Century

c) Creativity in mathematics and the education of gifted students, Edited by Roza Leikin, Abraham Berman and Boris Koichu URL: https://www.sensepublishers.com/product_info.php?products_id=853&osCsid=f66cb52b2eb4f1f5e196160ff0ebf18b

d) Proof in Mathematics Education: Research, Learning and Teaching by David Reid and Christine Knipping, URL: https://www.sensepublishers.com/product_info.php?products_id=1094&osCsid=f66cb52b2eb4f1f5e196160ff0ebf18b

e) Republished Boolean Algebra at School, Vol. 1 & Vol. 2 by Michael de Villiers, available as PDF or printed book, URL√ïs: http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/boolean-algebra-at-school-vol-1/14244188 and http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/boolean-algebra-at-school-vol-2/14244227

5. OBITUARIES

With sadness, three friends & colleagues I personally knew passed away.

Pierre van Hiele on 1 November 2010 at the age of 101. He is famous for the Van Hiele theory of learning geometry, which is used in many countries. He was given a Honorary Award at UNISA in 2001 for his influential work.

Tom O'Brien on 6 December 2010. He worked with Polya and Freudenthal. His websites at http://www.mathplace.net/ and http://www.professortobbs.com/ contain several of his books and papers, including a Personal Memory of George Polya at http://www.professortobbs.com/articles/Memories_of_George_Polya.pdf

Peter Hilton, renowned algebraic topologist, on 6 November 2010. Worked on the Enigma project during World War II and visited South Africa several times together with Jean Pedersen. Go to http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/dec/02/peter-hilton-obituary He also had harsh, critical views about the traditional emphasis on √îcomputational expertise√ï at school – see for example: http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2010/dec/07/letter-peter-hilton-obituary

6. NEWSFLASH

Key Curriculum Press has been honored with two 2010 BESSIE Awards for The Geometer's Sketchpad¬® and Tinkerplots¬® Dynamic Data Exploration. For 16 years, the Best Educational Software (BESSIE) Awards have been presented by ComputED Learning Center, targeting content-rich programs and Web sites that provide teachers with the technology to foster educational excellence. For more info about these programmes or to order in Southern Africa, please contact: dynamiclearn@mweb.co.za

7. WEBSITES

a) Join Sketchpad Exchange for free at http://sketchexchange.keypress.com/, a new online community where you can share ideas and connect with your peers: share & download Sketchpad sketches and activities for use in your classroom, post links to your website and videos, participate in the community forum, browse the site by grade levels, topics, and tags, etc.

b) The online group MathFuture have been holding a series of "forward-thinking" discussions using Elluminate, an online conferencing software program. Here's a link to the group wiki page that shows the past and future online discussions:
http://mathfuture.wikispaces.com/events

c) The full 2010 Psychology of Mathematics Education of North America (PME-NA) Proceedings in Columbus, Ohio, of 1600 pages of research papers on mathematics education is available at the website http://pmena.org/2010/ This is a valuable resource for students, teachers & researchers.

d) Worksheets to experimentally explore the Triangle & Parallelogram Law of Forces at http://www.tutornext.com/help/triangle-law-of-forces

e) Virtual Mathematics Marathon at http://www8.umoncton.ca/umcm-mmv/index.php

f) Free   online access to the journal Creative Education at: http://www.scirp.org/journal/ce Contains some math papers, for example, Vol 1, no 3 Dec 2010 has a nice, downloadable article on 'Language and Mathematics: Bridging between Natural Language and Mathematical Language in Solving Problems in Mathematics' by Bat-Sheva Ilany, Bruria Margolin

g) Bernhard Kutzler has retired, but has generously made available a summary of his research work on technology in mathematics education in a free e-book Technology and the Yin & Yang of Teaching and Learning at: http://b.kutzler.com/downloads/YinYang_E.pdf

h) 'Calculus Lectures' in Videos at http://www.onlinemathlearning.com/calculus.html
A series of free, short Calculus Video Lessons from UMKC - The University of Missouri-Kansas City.

i) Gerrit Stols' website http://school-maths.com/ has interactive applets, links, books and other materials directly related to the South African mathematics curriculum.

j) TenMarks has launched a math practice and learning program for grades 3 - High School and as of today, it's FREE for teachers to use in class or for their students to use at home. Check it out at http://www.tenmarks.com/teachers

k) For all mathematics-teacher educators, an article "Mathematics for Teaching" by Al Cuoco, Notices of the AMS 48 #2 (February 2001), 168-174 at:
http://www.ams.org/notices/200102/fea-cuoco.pdf

l) For a variety of Mathematical Challenges on probability and statistics, conic sections, secondary geometry, middle-school and elementary mathematics visit: http://www.odysseys2sense.com

m) Problem-based Learning: PBL is any learning environment in which the problem drives the learning. That is, before students learn some knowledge they are given a problem. The problem is posed so that the students discover that they need to learn some new knowledge before they can solve the problem. This site has some valuable resources and materials to promote problem-based learning: http://www.chemeng.mcmaster.ca/pbl/PBL.HTM

n) Apple iTunes U - http://www.apple.com/education/itunes-u/whats-on.html There are over 600 universities with active iTunes U sites. About half of these institutions — including Stanford, Yale, MIT, Oxford, and UC Berkeley — distribute their content publicly and for FREE on the iTunes - including Mathematics & Science - click on the links for movies, mp3's, pdf's, etc.

o) Jeff Weeks' free Topology & Geometry Games for Win, Mac at: http://www.geometrygames.org/

p) Learning Theory: Constructivism website at: http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~mryder/itc_data/constructivism.html

q) This site http://homepage.mac.com/efithian/geometry.html has nice geometry worksheets and ideas for teaching on topics like tangrams, tilings, the golden ratio, symmetry, etc.

8. CONFERENCES

a) The 7th Congress of CERME, the European Society for Research in Mathematics Education will be held in Rzesz√Ç¬óow, Poland, from 9-13 February 2011. Papers and poster proposals should use the CERME7 WORD template, and conform to the guidelines at www.cerme7.univ.rzeszow.pl/?id=cerme-guidelines-for-authors

b) The 14th Connected Mathematics Project (CMP) Users' Conference, February 25-26, 2011, Kellogg Center on the Campus of Michigan State University in East Lansing, MI.
For more information please visit: http://www.connectedmath.msu.edu/conferences/overview.shtml

c) Conference on Creative Education (CCE 2011) will be held from April 8-10, 2011 in Wuhan, China. For more info go to: http://www.creativedu.org/2011/

d) The Annual Conference of the Mathematical Association, 14-16 April 2011, Univ. of Loughborough at http://www.m-a.org.uk/jsp/index.jsp?lnk=100

e) ATM Conference 2011, 'Celebrating Gattegno', 18 - 21 Apr 2011, Univ. of Wolverhampton, Telford Campus at http://www.atm.org.uk/events/conferences/

f) NCTM 2011 Annual Meeting & Exposition, Indianapolis, IN, April 13-16, 2011 - Geometry: Constructing and Transforming Perspectives – more info at http://www.nctm.org/conferences/content.aspx?id=25947

g) The Mathematics & Statistics Research Unit in collaboration with the Education Research Unit of the Athens Institute for Education and Research (ATINER) will hold its 5th Annual International Conference in Athens, Greece, 13-16 June, 2011. The conference website is www.atiner.gr/mathematics.htm

h) A combined conference of The Australian Association of Mathematics Teachers (AAMT) and the Mathematics Education Research Group of Australasia (MERGA) will be held in Alice-Springs, 3-7 July 2011. For more info go to: http://www.aamt.edu.au/Conferences/AAMT-MERGA-conference

i) 35th Conference of the Psychology of Mathematics Education (PME), Ankara, Turkey, 10-15 July 2011 at http://www.arber.com.tr/pme35.org/index.php/page,48,general_information

j) 17th National Congress of AMESA, Theme: "Mathematics in a globalised world", 11-15 July 2011, Johannesburg, Congress Director: Lerato Mathenjwa, leratojd@yahoo.com or lerato@amesa.org.za ; Academic Coordinator: Hamsa.Venkatakrishnan@wits.ac.za

k) TSM 3-day Residential workshop for ICT and Mathematics, Oundle school (near Cambridge) England 11-14 July 2011, www.tsm-resources.com

l) TIME-2012 will be held July 10-14, 2010 in Tartu in Estonia. The conference web site is: http://time2012.ut.ee/

m) The 15th ICTMA Conference (International Conference on the Teaching of Mathematical Modeling and Applications) will be hosted by the Australian Catholic University, Melbourne, 14-19 J u l y 2 0 1 1. Visit: http://dlibrary.acu.edu.au/staffhome/jibrown/ictma.html or contact: Gloria.Stillman@acu.edu.au

n) BRIDGES 2011 Conference: Connections between Mathematics, Music, Art, Architecture, Culture, Univ of Coimbra, Portugal, July 27-31, 2011. URL: http://bridgesmathart.org/bridges-2011/

o) 11th International Conference of The Mathematics Education into the 21st Century Project: 'Turning Dreams into Reality: Transformations and Paradigm Shifts in Mathematics Education', 10-16 September 2011, Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa. Download the First Announcement and Call for Papers at: http://math.unipa.it/~grim/21project.htm E-mail, Alan Rogerson, Programme Chair at alan@rogerson.pol.pl

p) ICMI Study 21 entitled "Mathematics Education and Language diversity". The two co-chairs are Mamokgethi Setati University of South Africa, and Maria Do Carmo Domite Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil. The Discussion Document may be found at the study website at http://www.icmi-21.com/index.php?page_id=140 and the Study Conference will be held on 16 - 20 September 2011 in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

q) Volcanic Delta 2011, the Eighth Southern Hemisphere Conference on the Teaching and Learning of Undergraduate Mathematics and Statistics, will be held in Rotorua, NZ from 27th November to 2nd December 2011. To express your interest in the conference or find further information please visit www.delta2011.co.nz

9. QUOTES & POINTS TO PONDER

"Zu glauben, es g¬äbe nur eine Wahrheit, ist von allen Illusionen die gef¬ährtlichste."
                      - Paul Watzlawick, Austrian-American psychologist and philosopher
Translation: "To believe that only one truth exists, is the most dangerous of all illusions."

"The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education." - Albert Einstein

'I invent nothing, I rediscover.' - Famous artist, Auguste Rodin

10. HUMOUR IN MATH & SCIENCE

"The shortest distance between two points is under construction." - Bill Sanderson

"Geometry is just plane fun."

Math Joke: An infinite crowd of mathematicians enters a bar. The first one orders a pint, the second one a half pint, the third one a quarter pint ... . "I understand", says the bartender - and pours two pints.

Math Joke: Teacher: What is 2k + k?   Student: 3000.

An internet user's signature seen recently:
'Integrate me. Differentiate me.
You can't hurt me. I'm e^x. Ha ha ha!'

11. PROBLEM PUZZLER

Solve the cyclic quadrilateral problem at: http://math.kennesaw.edu/~mdevilli/cyclic-quad-rectangle-result.html
(Use a free, Java enabled web browser like Firefox or Safari or download & install Java for Internet Explorer).

Mathematically yours
Michael
---

"Pablo Picasso once said that 'every child is an artist - the problem is how to have him/her remain an artist once s/he grows up'. Mathematics is no different from art in this respect."
----

Prof Michael de Villiers
(Dynamic Math Learning)
8 Cameron Rd
3615 SARNIA (Pinetown)
South Africa
Tel: 027-(0)31-7083709 (h)
Fax: 0866726536 (w): Cell: 0836561396
Skype: michaeldevilliersksu
Homepage: http://mysite.mweb.co.za/residents/profmd/homepage.html
Dynamic Geometry Sketches: http://math.kennesaw.edu/~mdevilli/JavaGSPLinks.htm
Dynamic Mathematics Learning Online Store: http://www.FreeWebStore.org/DynamicMathematicsLearning
---
Official SA Supplier of Key Curriculum Press at http://www.keypress.com
---
Visit the SA Mathematics Olympiad at http://www.samf.ac.za/samo/

The maths track of the online global education conference

2010-11-15T07:53:00.000-08:00

This week is Global education week. To celebrate the Global Education Conference, an free online conference, is hosted online. I have extracted all the maths related sessions here, but the full schedule for South African time can be found here: http://www.globaleducationconference.com/schedule-gmt2.html

Click once on the session to see a description and a link to the virtual room. All the sessions will be archived so that you can listen and watch them afterwards. No registration is needed, but check in about 10 minutes prior to a session starting so that can make sure that everything is working.

Michael De Villier's Nov 2010 Math e-Newsletter

2010-11-05T07:46:00.001-07:00

Dear Colleagues, friends

Most of you are already busy or almost in final year-end examination mode. So hang in there, the summer holidays are just around the corner (for those of us in the Southern Hemisphere), and time to kick back & relax a bit, preferably at the beach!

1. HOMEPAGE UPDATE

My homepage at http://mysite.mweb.co.za/residents/profmd/homepage4.html has been updated with the following:

1) AMESA (2009) paper "From the Fermat points to the De Villiers points of a triangle"

2) SA Tydskrif vir Wet & Tegnologie (2010) "Vanaf die Fermat punte na die De Villiers punte van 'n driehoek"

3) mathematical/mathematics education quote

4) mathematics/science cartoon.

My dynamic geometry sketches Link at http://math.kennesaw.edu/~mdevilli/JavaGSPLinks.htm has been updated with the following (new & revised) sketches:

1) Affine invariance of conics

2) British Mathematics Olympiad problem & its dual

3) De Villiers points & Hyperbola of a triangle (updated)

4) Pirate Treasure Hunt and some generalizations

5) Some unproved conjectures (updated)

and the Student Explorations sections with:

1) Bride's Chair Concurrency and locus (updated)

2) British Mathematics Olympiad Concurrency Problems

3) Cosine-Sine Angle Rule (updated)

4) Desargues' theorem

5) Links to 'SA Math Olympiad Questions and Problems' and 'Cut the Knot'

Please REFRESH pages if they don't load properly the first time.

2. SOUTH AFRICAN MATHEMATICS OLYMPIAD

About 50000 learners participated in this year's competition. The dates for next year√ïs Olympiad are:

Closing date for entries: 4 Feb

1st round: 16 March

2nd round: 17 May

3rd round: 7 Sep

For more info about entering this prestige competition, past papers and answers, go to:

http://www.samf.ac.za/samo/

Download the free e-Book, "Geometry Unbound" at http://www.scribd.com/doc/18935265/Geometry-Unbound

It provides great training and reference for students to prepare for the Senior 3rd Round of SA Mathematics Olympiad (SAMO) and the International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO)

3. NEW BOOKS

Due to some past Math e-newsletters that people did not receive the following is reposted. The books below might be valuable additions to add to your university, school or personal libraries.

a) Explanation and Proof in Mathematics

Philosophical and Educational Perspectives by Hanna, Gila; Jahnke, Hans Niels; Pulte, Helmut (Eds.) 2010, VIII, 296 p., Hardcover, ISBN: 978-1-4419-0575-8 URL: http://www.springer.com/education/mathematics+education/book/978-1-4419-0575-8

b) Some Adventures in Euclidean Geometry

Christmas holiday season special: this book in bound form is discounted by 15%. For more info go tohttp://www.lulu.com/content/7622884

c) The book TINHLELO, Interweaving Art and Mathematics: Colourful Basket Trays from the South of Mozambique exhibits and analyses coloured circular winnowing baskets collected since the end of the 1970s (Lulu, 2010, 132 pp. colour). Available from http://stores.lulu.com/pgerdes

4. OBITUARIES

Benoit Mandelbrot, who developed the field of fractal geometry and applied it to physics, biology, finance and many other fields, died on 14 Oct 2010 in Cambridge, Mass. He was 85. For more info, see: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/us/17mandelbrot.html?_r=2

5. WEBSITES

a) Free Webinars on Discovering Algebra, Discovering Geometry, Sketchpad and other Key Curriculum Press products are available at: www.keypress.com/pd Click on the webinar link to find a list of past webinars, each of which has a link for the recording of the webinar itself and a link to the materials.

b) The November 2010 issue of the ATM's Mathematics Teaching journal is available online at: http://www.atm.org.uk/journal/

c) Go to http://mathonline.missouri.edu for free online testing and evaluation components in Algebra, Geometry, Trigonometry, Calculus readiness, and Calculus I and III with links to other sites with Online Drills and Quizzes.

d) Read the Math Forum Internet Weekly Newsletter at http://mathforum.org/electronic.newsletter/mf.intnews15.43.html with latest news, links, etc.

Past issues of the Newsletter are archived at http://mathforum.org/electronic.newsletter/ The Math Forum is also home to Ask Dr. Math, Problems of the Week, MathTools, Teacher2Teacher, the Internet Math Library, Math Discussion groups, and over 1,000,000 pages of mathematics information and discussions (links are at the bottom of the page).

e) Be dazzled, perplexed and amazed by the Optical Illusions at http://videogames.yahoo.com/events/brain-teasers/brain-teasers-and-optical-illusions/1400154

f) Visit the Dynamic Geometry Gallery Geometrikon at http://www.math.uoc.gr/~pamfilos/eGallery/Gallery.html for a fascinating alphabetically arranged collection of Topics in Geometry and geometric examples from Geometry: Euclidean, Affine, and Projective.

g) Download one of the opening lectures at the Faulkes Institute for Geometry, University of Cambridge, 2002, 'Why study geometry?' at http://www.dpmms.cam.ac.uk/~piers/F-I-G_opening_ppr.pdf

h) MATH PLACE is a new on-line on-demand distributor of mathematics e-books and software, MATH PLACE, influenced by the thinking of George Polya (Mathematics is not a spectator sport) and Jean Piaget (Learning is provoked adaptation) Age range: 4-adult. Book prices: US$8.95-$9.95. Visit http://www.mathplace.net/

i) STATISTICAL DICTIONARIES in Afrikaans-English or English-Afrikaans can be downloaded as free PDF's fromhttp://www.sastat.org.za/diction.htm

j) A lovely TILING SLIDE SHOW with many examples is available at http://www.spsu.edu/math/tiling/index.html

k) Have a look at and download for free YACAS (Yet Another Computer Algebra System) - runs on many platforms. Go to the homepage at http://yacas.sourceforge.net/homepage.html and look at the Tutorial and My Yacas tabs for examples of its algebraic computational power.

l) Read the Notices of the American Mathematical Society for free online at http://www.ams.org/notices/201009/ Contains many mathematical articles of general interest, as well as some mathematics education articles.

m) Some nice lesson plans and teaching ideas from Grades 3-8 on Patterns, Tiling, Graphs, Bridges, etc. are available at the NCTM website at:

http://www.nctm.org/resources/content.aspx?menu_id=598&id=12134

n) Some interactive animations and interesting facts of TETRAHEDRA at http://www.ac-noumea.nc/maths/polyhedr/tetra_.htm

o) For learners 5-19 visit Cambridge University's NRICH for a wide variety of problems, activities and investigations.http://nrich.maths.org/public/

p) Dancing with Geometry: A professional dancer and an orthopedic surgeon demonstrate the fundamental role geometry and technology play in keeping dancers performing at the highest level. Watch the movie:http://www.thefutureschannel.com/dockets/realworld/dancing/

q) The Simon Stevin Institute for Geometry www.geometryinstitute.org has some interesting information on the history of geometry and current research.

r) Read and discuss the article "Life After WolframAlpha: What You (and Your Students) Need to Know" about how this new computing technology can influence what we do in our math classrooms. Go to: http://mathdl.maa.org/mathDL/23/?pa=content&sa=viewDocument&nodeId=3365

6. CONFERENCES

a) Mathematical Art Exhibition will be held during the Joint Mathematics Meetings, New Orleans, January 6-9, 2011. More info:http://www.ams.org/meetings/national/jmm/2125_intro.html

b) SAARMSTE 2011 Conference. 18 – 21 January 2011. Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, North-West University, Mafikeng Campus. More info athttp://www.nwu.ac.za/export/sites/default/nwu/mc/documents/SAARMSTE_CONFERENCE_HOME_PAGE.pdf

c) The 7th Congress of CERME, the European Society for Research in Mathematics Education will be held in Rzesz¬óow, Poland, from 9-13 February 2011. Papers and poster proposals should use the CERME7 WORD template, and conform to the guidelines atwww.cerme7.univ.rzeszow.pl/?id=cerme-guidelines-for-authors

d) The Annual Conference of the Mathematical Association, 14-16 April 2011, Univ. of Loughborough at http://www.m-a.org.uk/jsp/index.jsp?lnk=100

e) ATM Conference 2011, 'Celebrating Gattegno', 18 - 21 Apr 2011, Univ. of Wolverhampton, Telford Campus athttp://www.atm.org.uk/events/conferences/

f) NCTM 2011 Annual Meeting & Exposition, Indianapolis, IN, April 13-16, 2011 - Geometry: Constructing and Transforming Perspectives – more info at http://www.nctm.org/conferences/content.aspx?id=25947

g) 17^th National Congress of AMESA, Theme: "Mathematics in a globalised world", 27 June – 1 July 2011, Johannesburg, www.amesa.org.za

h) BRIDGES 2011 Conference: Connections between Mathematics, Music, Art, Architecture, Culture, Univ of Coimbra, Portugal, July 27-31, 2011. URL: http://bridgesmathart.org/bridges-2011/

h) The 15th ICTMA Conference (International Conference on the Teaching of Mathematical Modeling and Applications) will be hosted by the Australian Catholic University, Melbourne, 14-19 J u l y 2 0 1 1. Visit: http://dlibrary.acu.edu.au/staffhome/jibrown/ictma.html

i) 11th International Conference of The Mathematics Education into the 21st Century Project: Turning Dreams into Reality: Transformations and Paradigm Shifts in Mathematics Education, 10-16 September 2011, Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa. For ALL further conference

j) ICMI Study 21 entitled "Mathematics Education and Language diversity". The two co-chairs are Mamokgethi Setati University of South Africa, and Maria Do Carmo Domite Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil. The Discussion Document may be found at the study website at http://www.icmi-21.com/index.php?page_id=140 and the Study Conference will be held on 16 - 20 September 2011 in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

7. QUOTES & POINTS TO PONDER

"Formulation of a problem is often more essential than its solution which may be merely a matter of mathematical or experimental skill." - Albert Einstein

"The greatest scientific and philosophical breakthroughs by humanity's finest minds, from Darwin to Einstein, Socrates to Descartes, can usually be summed up in a few words. Only the mediocre dress up their 'genius' in long-winded lectures or heavy volumes. Extraneous complexity often conceals a lack of true substance." - Author, Hector Macdonald

"Anyone who conducts an argument by appealing to authority is not using his intelligence; he is just using his memory." - Leonardo da Vinci

8. HUMOUR IN MATH ; SCIENCE

Proof by insignificance: "Who really cares, anyway?"

Proof by mumbo-jumbo: " (B √Ø¬øΩ P ) , $ (C √Ø¬øΩ W )

Proof by profanity: (example omitted)

Proof by definition: "We define it to be true."

Proof by tautology: 'It's true because it's true."

9. PROBLEM PUZZLER

Challenge your FET learners with the two concurrency problems at: http://math.kennesaw.edu/~mdevilli/bmo-concurrency.html

(Use a free, Java enabled web browser like Firefox or Safari or download & install Java for Internet Explorer).

Geometrically yours

Michael

---

On being asked what ideal qualities the trustees should seek in a director of The Institute for Advanced Mathematical Studies at Princeton, Albert Einstein replied: "You should look for a very quiet man who will not disturb people who are trying to think."

----

Prof Michael de Villiers

(Dynamic Math Learning)

Homepage: http://mysite.mweb.co.za/residents/profmd/homepage.html

Dynamic Geometry Sketches: http://math.kennesaw.edu/~mdevilli/JavaGSPLinks.htm

Dynamic Mathematics Learning Online Store: http://www.FreeWebStore.org/DynamicMathematicsLearning

---

Official SA Supplier of Key Curriculum Press at http://www.keypress.com

---

Visit the SA Mathematics Olympiad at http://www.samf.ac.za/samo/

Maths curriculum review: Marang meeting

2010-09-15T14:06:00.000-07:00

If you do not know yet, we are in a desperate bid to canvass the government to extend the time limit on the call for comment on the new Caps documents outlining the Mathematics (and all other subjects) review. On Tuesday a meeting was held to discuss the changes that are proposed to the existing mathematics FET curriculum and Alison Kitto, who was the main person behind the review, gave a presentation to inform us of changes and the rationale behind it.

I was not there, but asked Lynn to record the proceedings and am posting it here now. I apologise for the sound recording effects here and there as I did not have time to edit it into a good podcast quality in view of publishing what went down as quickly as possible (Thank you to Elrieka my assistant who did the editing and cutting). We have broken it down into sections for easier listening. If you are on a slow connection, I suggest that you pause the podcast and wait for it to stream to the end before you listen to it (otherwise it will be jittery). If you want to save the sound file onto your computer, just right-click on the link and choose "Save link as" and a place on your computer where you will find it again.

Introduction (Hamsa)
Allison's talk (Minimise the audio and go through the powerpoint below to get a better understanding)

Alison On Caps Maths Fet

Helen then did a reply:

Click here to listen

Helen on caps maths fet

View more presentations from LynnBowie.

Then there where questions and answers:

Questions and anwers (oops seems that this audiocast was cut short- will fix tomorrow)

Request for comment: New Mathematical literacy curriculum

2010-09-10T03:33:00.000-07:00

Hi All,

I am sure that you are all aware that we are due for curriculum revision which will be implemented in 2012. The revision documents has been gazetted last Friday and can be downloaded from here:

Maths Lit CAPPS doc

At last Fridays Marang meeting, Mark North who was responsible for the revision of the Maths lit Curriculum, talked to us about how he went about compiling the new document which will basically replace all the other ML documents that we are currently working with. He was supported in this task by Arnot Brombacher as a critical reader. I am still waiting for Marc to send me his powerpoint, but in the mean time you can listen to his talk: (I will insert his PPT here when I get it).

Mark's talk

Lynn Bowie then did a response to Marc's presentation:

Ml response

View more presentations from LynnBowie.

You can listen to her response here (click on it, minimise the player and the follow along with her presentation)

Lynn

And there were of course lots of questions.....

Questions and answers

I have tried my best to edit the worst noise out, but in the interest of publishing it quickly, I apologise for bad sound quality here and there.

You can also go and leave comments on the LIVE document and see others comments here:
The live docs are here:

A.notate.com is a great tool for quick colloboration. Just sign in with your e-mail address and highlight or drag a box anywhere on the document. It will open a box where you can insert a comment note. You can even comment on other's notes. If you need any technical assistance please let me know and I will help you.

Dr Maths on Mxit in Tswana

2010-08-18T05:00:00.001-07:00

Are you worried about your learners and kids progress during the strike action. Don't fear, remember Dr Maths is on duty every afternoon till late at night and guess what? as from tomorrow, Dr Maths will be able to give maths assistance to all our Tswana speaking learners as well!!!

Meraka is launching their Tswana speaking maths support Mxit service as "Dr Dipalo" and you can either speak to the senior maths mentors Dr Dipalo (Monnye) by adding 0735450044 to your Mxit service or to the junior Dr Dipolo (Motona) (up to grades 9) on 0783374513.

So there you have it! Maths in Tswana on Mxit!!!

I am sure all the "good" teachers who are participating in the strike, would have given their learners plenty of work to go through. Now they will also have on-cell free and great maths and mathslit help to get them through all this!

For more info on how to set Dr Maths on Mxit up for yourself or your learners/kids, go to http://mathsliteracy.wordpress.com/dr-maths/

Well done to Laurie and her team who are always there for our learners on Mxit!!

AMESA Mathematics Challenge 2010

2010-07-27T23:38:00.000-07:00

Dear Regional Organiser, and others

I attach the 2010 AMESA Grade 4-7 Mathematics Challenge package comprising circular with forms, papers, answer sheet and memorandum.

Please distribute to all interested persons and encourage schools to participate in this National Mathematics Week activity?

The documents are in PDF format to safeguard formatting between different machines ...
If you really cannot print the PDFs you can ask me for the Word documents.

Schools can write the First Round during Mathematics Week 2-6 August, but may write later if they choose, provided they get their Final Round info to their Regional Organiser by 18 August.

The planned timeline for 2010 is:

- First Round written in school during Mathematics Week 2-6 August 2010, or later ...

- Schools should inform their Regional Organiser of learners participating in the Final Round by 18 August.

- The Regional Organiser will inform schools of arrangements for the Final Round by 1 September.

- Final Round written in the regions: Wednesday 8 September

- The Regional Organisers should communicate regional results to the Chief Organiser by 30 September.

- Certificates of Achievements distributed by 1 November.

Thank you very much for your valued involvement in the Challenge, I trust you and your pupils will enjoy participating!

Kind regards

Alwyn Olivier
Director: Research Unit for Mathematics Education
Faculty of Education
University of Stellenbosch
Private Bag X1
7602 Matieland

Tel: (021) 808 2299 (021) 808 2299 (021) 808 2299 (021) 808 2299 (021) 808 2299 (021) 808 2299 (021) 808 2299
E-mail: alwyn@amesa.org.za
Homepage: http://www.amesa.org.za/Challenge

Associate Professor post in Mathematics Education at the University of the Witwatersrand

2010-05-31T05:48:00.001-07:00

An Associate Professor post (4-5 year contract in the first instance) is available in Mathematics Education within the Marang Centre for Mathematics and Science Education at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg.

Mathematics Education at Wits has an international reputation for excellence. Current research thrusts are focused on:

- Mathematics knowledge for teaching

- Teaching and learning mathematics in multilingual classrooms

- Mathematical literacy

- Technology in the teaching and learning of mathematics

- Primary Mathematics

Interested applicants would need: a PhD in the mathematics education; a track record of effective teaching and supervision in the area, or strong potential to perform in these areas; an independent and innovative research record as evidenced by at least 6 publications obtained at the rate of at least one per year; an ability to take a leading role in curriculum innovation and design and in the implementation of new courses. A capacity to attract research funding, and a significant international publication record will be an advantage.

The Associate Professor role offers opportunities to provide intellectual leadership in the field, openings to lead the design, coordination and presentation of courses for post-graduate students, research supervision of students up to PhD level, and leadership in research activities.

Interested applicants can contact Prof Jill Adler ( jill.adler@wits.ac.za ) or Prof Hamsa Venkat ( hamsa.venkatakrishnan@wits.ac.za ) for further details and information.

To apply: Submit a letter of motivation, a detailed CV with names, addresses and contact numbers of 3 referees (including email addresses) as well as certified copies of degrees/diplomas and identity document to: Ms Maureen Pudikabekwa (ntwampe.pudikabekwa@wits.ac.za ), Human Resources Officer, Wits School of Education -Faculty of Humanities, University of the Witwatersrand, Private Bag 3, Wits 2050, Gauteng, South Africa.

Visit our website http://web.wits.ac.za/Academic/Humanities/Education/

Digital libraries

2010-05-05T05:58:00.001-07:00

Creating digital libraries in support of learning communities using free tools

View more presentations from Maggie Verster.

Empowering Maths Teachers to Use ICTs for Resource Development

2010-04-11T23:55:00.001-07:00

The Community Education Computer Society (CECS) is an ICT training NGO which was established in 1985 in Cape Town, South Africa.

CECS received a grant from the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA) to implement an ICT Literacy project in 7 Southern African countries. One of the deliverables was the development of an ICT training programme for teachers. After some investigations, CECS decided to develop an ICT training course for high-school mathematics teachers. A training manual was subsequently developed and piloted with 11 high school Mathematics teachers based in Gauteng, South Africa. Parts of the manual is available on our website as well as examples of the exercises, www.cecs.org.za.

The S A Finnish Partnership (SAFIPA) has provided CECS with support to undertake the following activities:

Convening a stakeholder workshop in Johannesburg and East London with teachers, organisations, individuals, government officials, funders, etc who are involved in the development of teacher training in general and Mathematics specifically
Conducting 2 two-day workshops with Grade 12 Mathematics teachers in Johannesburg and East London.
Development of a web application for Grade 12 Mathematics teachers to create and print question papers with its memorandum based on selections made from a question bank.
Develop a portal for Mathematics which will host the application and enable teachers to upload questions with answers they have produced.

The training offered by CECS is unique. There is nothing comparable in South Africa. This view was confirmed by reviewing materials on the Department of Education's Thutong portal, reviewing materials from a number of NGOs.

Teachers have to spend an inordinate amount of time preparing materials for class, thus reducing time that could be better spend on lesson planning and delivering. The training course rectify the situation.

The web application will make it easier for Grade 12 Mathematics teachers to create and print question papers. The question papers will be accompanied with the memorandum. This will be extended to Grade 10 & 11, funding permitted.

Thus, register on the CECS website if you want to:

Test the web application
Contribute Mathematics content
Attend the Mathematics Teacher workshop in Gauteng (Johannesburg) or Eastern Cape (East London). This offer applies to those who reside in Johannesburg or East London.
Quality control the questions and answers
If you want a copy of the training manual
Attend the stakeholder workshop in Gauteng (Johannesburg) or Eastern Cape (East London). This applies to those who reside in Johannesburg or East London.
Be kept up to date with developments or you want to participate in the project

We also intend to conduct workshops in other provinces once funding is secured. This do register in the meantime so that we are aware of you.

Click here to register your interest on the website.

CONTACT DETAILS
Arnold Pietersen
Tel: 011-834-3329

Fax: 011-834-9054
E-mail: info@cecs.org.za
Website: www.cecs.org.za

Upcoming Marang seminar

2010-03-09T23:43:00.000-08:00

Marang Language Thrust Seminar 2010

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2010-01-30T16:36:00.001-08:00

Cool Math Puzzles
Schlumberger Excellence in Educational Development, Inc. (SEED) offers creative math puzzles, with solutions. Puzzle categories include:

* Number Sense
* Arithmetic
* Probability
* Algebraic Thinking
* Geometry, Spatial Reasoning, and Visualization
* Topology
* Logic
* Combinatorics
* Miscellaneous
tags: mathematics, science
Math Open Reference Resources
tags: mathematics, geometry, Analytical Geometry

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2010-01-23T16:36:00.001-08:00

Mathematics and Multimedia Tutorials
A great list of tutorial about Geogebra, sketchpad and general maths
tags: mathematics
Natural Math- Lovely site Maria!
Lots of interesting projects, communities and resources in this user friendly maths site
tags: math, mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Job: CASME: Mathematics Facilitator

2010-01-19T00:03:00.001-08:00

Centre for the Advancement of
Science and Mathematics Education (CASME)

Mathematics Facilitator

CASME is a well-established, leading NGO working in the field of mathematics and science education development. The centre is an independent affiliate unit of the School of Science, Mathematics and Technology Education at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.

CASME seeks to fill the above position of Mathematics Facilitator, to be based at its offices on the Edgewood Campus in Pinetown, starting as soon as possible in 2010.

Minimum Requirements:

§ Honours/Masters degree in education

§ Thorough knowledge and understanding of the National Curriculum Statement for Mathematics

§ Excellent writing skills and computer literacy in Office applications, email and Internet

§ Driver's licence and own car as this position requires extensive travelling.

Description: The position entails development of teaching and learning training materials, facilitating workshops for educators and learners, and provision of school-based support to teachers and learners. The facilitator will be required to co-ordinate and report on project activities.

Other: Required to work well both as part of a dynamic, diverse team and independently. The position requires a dedicated individual who should be a progressive, innovative educationalist with a strong desire to assist educators and learners in under-served communities.

An advantage will be the ability to work at both GET and FET levels and within other learning areas, for example Physical Science or Life Sciences.

A fully inclusive package, negotiable depending on qualifications and experience, is offered on a 1-year contract basis with the possibility of renewal.

Please submit a one-page covering letter and your CV with at least two contactable references to:

benson@casme.org.za

by 22 January 2010

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted. CASME reserves the right not to fill this position. For more information on CASME please visit www.casme.org.za or contact us on Tel 031 2602508 or Fax 031 2608178.

__._,_.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2010-01-16T16:36:00.001-08:00

Mathcasts Library
tags: mathematics
Cool! Appetizers and Lessons for Mathematics and Reason
Lots of maths resourses here!
tags: mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

CASME Vacancy: Mathematics Facilitator

2010-01-11T08:12:00.001-08:00

Centre for the Advancement of
Science and Mathematics Education (CASME)

Mathematics Facilitator

CASME seeks to fill the above position of Mathematics Facilitator, to be based at its offices on the Edgewood Campus in Pinetown, starting as soon as possible in 2010.

Minimum Requirements:

§ Honours/Masters degree in education

§ Thorough knowledge and understanding of the National Curriculum Statements for Mathematics

§ Excellent writing skills and computer literacy in Office applications, email and Internet

§ Driver's licence and own car as this position requires extensive travelling.

An advantage will be the ability to work at both GET and FET levels and within other learning areas, for example Physical Science or Life Sciences.

A fully inclusive package, negotiable depending on qualifications and experience, is offered on a 1-year contract basis with the possibility of renewal.

Please submit a one-page covering letter and your CV with at least two contactable references to:

benson@casme.org.za

by 22 January 2010

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2010-01-09T16:36:00.001-08:00

Integrating the Internet into the Mathematics Classroom
tags: mathematics, ICT

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2010-01-02T16:36:00.001-08:00

"Free math lessons plans for elementary, middle school, and high school grade levels.
"
tags: mathematics, primaryschool

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-12-05T16:36:00.001-08:00

WorksheetWorks.com - Mathematics
Think of a computer program that generates educational worksheets, and mathematics is the kind that immediately comes to mind. The ones you find here we think are some of the best around. Try them out and see if you think so too.
tags: MATHEMATICS, worksheets

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-11-28T16:37:00.001-08:00

Numeracy: Crucial to Your Health
"it turns out that most people who consider themselves proficient at digesting number based health information, when called upon, often end up performing quite poorly on problems requiring numeracy." (thanx Johan 4 sharing this link)
tags: numeracy, mathematicalliteracy, context:health, health, mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Amesa Matric Maths/Mathslit and Grade 9 C.T.A Review

2009-11-27T01:33:00.001-08:00

Dear Maths Educators

The AMESA Matric Maths and Grade 9 CTA Review will take place next week.

Date: Tuesday 1st December 2009
Time: 14.30 hrs to 17.00 hrs

Venue: BISHOPS Memorial Theatre, Campground Road, Rondebosch

Please note that we will be discussing Maths Paper 1 and 2 and the Grade 9 CTA.

Maths Literacy teachers are welcome to attend and a venue will be provided for discussion of the ML papers but no formal presentation will be given.

Tea is kindly sponsored by Anne Eadie from the Answer Series

Please RSVP to bonnie@theanswerseries.co.za for catering purposes. Any queries to Sue Mc Petrie at smcpetrie@bishops.org.za

Mathematics olympiad 2010

2009-11-18T08:15:00.001-08:00

The final 2010 dates for the South African Mathematics Olympiad are as follows:

Closing date for entries: 5 Feb
First round: 17 March
Second round: 18 May
Third round: 8 September

The entry fee will be R20 for South African learners and R25 for learners outside South Africa. The entry forms will be posted early in 2010. If you need more information, you can contact Ellie Olivier at the SA Mathematics Foundation (www.samf.ac.za

Dr Math on Mxit

2009-11-18T07:04:00.000-08:00

Dr Math on Mxit is a mobile/cellphone/pc support system for learners to help them with their maths homework. When there are no tutors online/cell to assist them, they can play maths games to help them practise routine operations. They compete against one another and the top scorers get twittered here: http://www.twitter.com/dr_math_rsa

To get connected to Dr math, just add dr.math.rsa@gmail.com to your chat client (gtalk, jabber) or Mxit and and ask away.

To tell us more about the Dr math project, I chatted to Laurie Butgereit of the Meraka Institute about her baby....

Subscribe Free Add to my Page

Play soduku

2009-11-17T09:54:00.000-08:00

Sudoku Widget

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-11-14T16:36:00.001-08:00

Informal Geometry
Informal Geometry comes to us through MathMastery -- November's Featured Partner. This video-rich content provides students with the concepts and skills necessary for finding the perimeter, area, surface area and volume of common geometric figures; graphing equations on the coordinate system and deriving the equation for the third line from a pair of points; using the Pythagorean Theorem to solve problems involving right triangles; determining if triangles are similar and finding an unknown side in similar triangles; and determining unknown angles in figures by calculating the sum of the interior angles.
tags: mathematics, geometry, Gr3-10
Shapes and Angles video (from the classroom)
tags: bodymaths, mathematics, videos, school2.0, primaryschool
Super Easy Card Tricks to Amaze Your Friends
Figure out the maths
tags: mathematics, tricks, games, fun

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-11-07T16:37:00.001-08:00

Train your brain with these Online Puzzles & Brain Games
tags: puzzles, problemsolving, brain, extension, learning, mathematics
Welcome to Absurd Math
Absurd Math is an interactive mathematical problem solving game series. The player proceeds on missions in a strange world where the ultimate power consists of mathematical skill and knowledge. Many of the pages have hidden clues and areas. Anytime a player needs help, they may email our staff for assistance. We try to respond within two days. Teachers and parents, email us for answer keys.
tags: math, games, mathematics, algebra, simulations
Math Playground
Welcome to Math Playground, an action-packed site for elementary and middle school students. Practice your math skills, play a logic game and have some fun!
tags: math, interactive, problemsolving, mathematics, education
Mathematics podcasts
A collection of podcasts- you can compile your own selection or link to your own.
tags: mathematics, podcasts, podcasting, school2.0
Math: Illustrated Lessons for kids
"In this section, you will find some fun ways to learn about math. You can start out with Estimation of Length, Place Value and Weight and Capacity. If you want something more challenging, take a look at Line Symmetry, Patterns and Tangrams."
tags: mathematics, estimation, elementary, primaryschool, kids, education, interactive, lessons
How much does it cost to raise a puppy?
Have you ever thought about how much it will cost to raise a puppy?? Do some calculations of your own.....
tags: lessonplanidea, context:Puppycosts, learners, mathematics, ml, mathematicalliteracy

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-10-31T17:35:00.001-07:00

Why computers suck at maths
tags: mathematics
Demystifying maths using art and culture
"How can art or culture help to make mathematics, which most learners regard as "difficult" and "abstract", more user-friendly? Better still, how can Ndebele paintings be used to demystify the subject and make learning a pleasant experience? "
tags: mathematics, mathematics in the media
Maths podcast on stochasticity
How big a role does randomness play in our lives? Do we live in a world of magic and meaning or … is it all just chance and happenstance? To tackle this question, we look at the role chance and randomness play in sports, lottery tickets, and even the cells in our own body. Along the way, we talk to a woman suddenly consumed by a frenzied gambling addiction, two friends whose meeting seems purely providential, and some very noisy bacteria.
tags: podcasts, mathematics, probability, LO4, ML
Motion Chart of Internet Usage World Wide or fun with numbers
tags: graphs, education, numbers, mathematics, school2.0, statistics
My maths literacy research paper
My paper on the agonies and successes of creating an informal online community of practice /learning ecology for mathematical literacy teachers in South Africa. It also explains the tools I used and how it impact(ed) on the community.
tags: maggie, ict, edict, studies, research, school2.0, mathematics, teachers, ml

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-10-24T17:36:00.001-07:00

Read with me: The book of numbers
tags: mathematics, maggieposts
Loads of Maths eBooks for download
Wow, what a gem of a site where you can download great mathematics ebooks to enjoy
tags: ebooks, library2.0, school2.0, mathematics
Dr Maths on Mxit- a mobile phone learning experience
What is it how does it work and how to set it up
tags: mathematics, cellphones, AfricaIET09, education, mobilelearning, mobile
A Maths Dictionary for Kids
An animated, interactive dictionary for students which explains over 600 common mathematical terms in simple language."
"ANIMATED - definitions, examples, activities, practice, calculators - INTERACTIVE
tags: mathematics, kids, interactive, dictionary, reference, library2.0, primaryschool, math, maths

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

The book of numbers

2009-10-24T08:52:00.000-07:00

I am reading The book of numbers which I got from this wonderful site where you can download quite a lot of different mathematics books. Go ahead, read with me or hop on over to the XPmath site to download a few for your collection....

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-10-17T17:37:00.001-07:00

Government education 'better'
Thought about answering but then I would have had to stop laughing. But quite worrying as well if this is were we are at. Read through all the comments.
tags: mathematics, education, assessment, localislekker, teachers, saschools, school2.0
911 Mathematics support lessons for matrics
The DoE has made these available for matrics to help them with the upcoming exam. It covers all the topics within the mathematics curriculum
tags: mathematics, doe, thutong
Webcast - How To Save Math Education (And A Tiny Piece Of The World Along With It)
tags: education, mathematics
Interactive Mathematics - Learn math while you play with it!
Great directory of tutorial textbook style lessons to point your learners to.
tags: mathematics, math, school2.0, mathematicalliteracy, mathslit, ml123
How can we measure teaching and learning in mathematics?
"Did you know you can measure whether students have fragmented or cohesive conceptions of mathematics, or whether they learn at a surface- or deep-level? Did you know there are concept inventories available for research purposes at the level of prealgebra"
tags: mathematics
Singapore Math Sources
tags: singapore, mathematics
Algebraic Thinking: An Introduction to Mathematical Equivalence in Grades K - 8
The Final Report of the National Mathematics Advisory Panel noted that many middle school students have a weak understanding of mathematical equality and that this lack of understanding impedes their learning of algebra.
tags: education, mathematics

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Measuring teaching and learning in mathematics

2009-10-13T05:41:00.000-07:00

Following on from the symposium on Friday where we talked a lot about good and "not so good" maths learners and how we measure if they are good or "not so good", I stumbled on this lovely little presentation on "How can we measure teaching and learning in mathematics?". Just wait for it to load, then click on the screen to go through the prezzi or if you want to see it fullscreen, click on MORE on the bottom right of the prezzi and choose fullscreen)

Marang Symposium Feedback

2009-10-12T04:13:00.000-07:00

I attended the Marang symposium at Wits last Friday which considered ways in which we can judge last years examinations by taking a closer look at the papers and assessment structure. The talks centred around the questions:

* What do different ways of classifying questions reveal about the relationship between the intended and examined curriculum?

* What does this reveal about the relationship between the policy documents and practice?

* What role can taxonomies play in analyzing the standard of the examinations, the spread of mathematical and science activities and what do they reveal about nature of the examinations and the conceptualization of the subjects?

Prof Hamsa Venkat kicked off by discussing a critique of the Mathematical Literacy assessment taxonomy. Lynn Bowie looked at it from a mathematics point of view and also examined different taxonomies. Arnout (always entertaining) then did a summary and his take on the issues and perspectives by providing a critique, not only on the two papers, but also on assessment practices regarding maths and maths literacy in general. You can (must) listen to the actual podcasts of the sessions, by clicking On each podcast:

Find more music like this on Maths Literacy Teacher's Network

Hamsa's presentation (View while listening to her podcast):
Critiquing the Mathematical Literacy assessment taxonomy

Lynn's presentation: (View while listening to her podcast):
Cognitive levels and types of mathematical activities

Our photo album:

Find more photos like this on Maths Literacy Teacher's Network

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-10-10T17:36:00.001-07:00

One on one maths help for pupils
We won't be able to afford such foa scheme here on South Africa. But it would be great. I can only dream....
tags: Articles, Education, mathematics
Free Online MIT Course Materials for High School (AP Calculus )
We have selected relevant material from MIT's introductory courses to support students as they study and educators as they teach the AP® Calculus curriculum.
tags: calculus, opencourseware, mathematics
How can maths help us in our daily lives?
How can maths help us in our daily lives? In this exhibit, you'll look at the language of numbers through common situations, such as playing games or cooking. Put your decision-making skills to the test by deciding whether buying or leasing a new car is right for you, and predict how much money you can save for your retirement by using an interest calculator.
tags: mathematics, ml, Mathsliteracy
Living Maths 2009 naths olympiad
The 2009 Naths olympiad for grades R-9 is taking place in October. FOr a free CD see the website
tags: mathematics, olympiads
Science Books Online
Science Books Online lists free science e-books, textbooks, lecture notes, monographs, and other science related documents.
tags: science, mathematics, education, ebooks

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-10-03T17:37:00.001-07:00

National Library of Virtual Manipulatives: Mathematics
tags: mathematics, iwb, school2.0
The Intergeo Project
The main objective of the Intergeo Project is to make digital content for mathematics teaching in Europe more accessible, usable and exploitable.

Intergeo will...

* offer content in a searchable and metadata-tagged portal.
* enable users to use their software of choice by specifying a common file format based on open standards.
* test available material in the classroom. All stakeholders, software teams, resource authors, teachers and learners will be involved, in order to promote quality enhancement cycles.
tags: iwb, mathematics, interactive, school2.0
Linear Programming Example
tags: mathematics, linearprogramming
National Library of Virtual Manipulatives
tags: manipulatives, education, geometry, mathematics, interactive, iwb
Juggling, maths and a beautiful mind
A look at juggling from a mathematical point of view
tags: mathematics, juggling, maths

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-09-26T17:36:00.001-07:00

How To Run a 3D Maths Test in Google Sketchup
A great lesson with video on how to get your learners to use Google sketcup to measure stuff.
tags: mathematics, google, sketchup, lessonplans, LO4, shapeandspace, perimeters

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-09-19T17:39:00.001-07:00

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Africme 3 2010 Conference

2009-09-09T06:42:00.000-07:00

The UN through the Education for All (EFA) Framework aims at the elimination of illiteracy in the whole world. EFA focuses on education from kindergarten to high school and ensures that issues of equity and equality in education are addressed at local level. We acknowledge that mathematics is part of EFA framework and in line with ICMI’s aim of promoting international cooperation in mathematics, this congress will provide a forum for mathematics educators, teachers, students, mathematicians, researchers, and policy makers in the African continent and beyond to discuss issues and exchange ideas relating to mathematics education and EFA goals.

The theme of this conference “Mathematics as a Leading edge in the Education for All (EfA) Framework” continues the debate initiated in the second and third congresses. For instance, AFRICME 1 which was held at the University of Witwatersrand, South Africa, provided an opportunity for participants to debate issues pertaining to “Mathematics Teaching and Teacher Education in the Changing Times”. Discussions in the forum were on emerging trends or patterns in teacher education and mathematics teaching and, in particular addressed inevitable changes resulting from the emergence of technology and research on indigenous knowledge systems.

The second congress, AFICME 2, which was held at Catholic University of Eastern Africa, Kenya, focused on “Embracing Innovative responses to Challenges in Mathematics Instruction” which gave participants an opportunity to debate on a myriad of challenges such as shortage of resources, HIV/AIDS, and political unrest, that are hurdles to mathematical instruction in the continent of Africa. ACFRICME 3, therefore, is a continuation of this series of debates on what role the subject mathematics, despite these constraints, can play in the governments’ endeavor to provide quality, meaningful, and useful education to all.

PURPOSES OF THE ICMI THIRD AFRICA REGIONAL CONGRESS
The objectives of the third Africa Regional Congress of ICMI are:

To provide an opportunity for reflection on AFRICME 1 and AFRICME 2
To promote and encourage the exchange of ideas on how mathematics education can contribute to the achievement of EFA goals in the region and beyond.
Encourage collaborative and/or comparative research in mathematics education at all levels and disseminating the results for policy consumption
To encourage the development of mathematics instructional practices which are relevant to the EFA context
To provide a forum for mathematics educators, mathematicians, policy markers, students and teachers to collaborate and discuss the current developments in mathematics education useful for EFA Framework

CONGRESS THEME
Mathematics Education as a leading Edge in the Education for All (EFA) Framework
CONGRESS SUBTHEMES
Papers in the following areas are invited:

Teacher preparation and development
Gender, HIV/AIDS and other equity issues
Instructional, assessment and evaluation issues
Applications of mathematics to real life situations
Integration of ICT in promoting quality mathematics instruction for all
Mathematics education as a critical element in life-long learning or continuous education

WHO SHOULD PARTICIPATE IN AFRICME 3
The congress invites mathematicians, mathematics educators, teacher educators, teachers, students, curriculum developers, school inspectors, policy makers, researchers, and anybody interested or involved in the teaching and learning of mathematics and EFA framework

Weekly maths bookmarks (weekly)

2009-09-05T17:35:00.001-07:00

Maths instructional videos (apaprently 1800 of them)
tags: tutorials, mathematics, algebra, geometry, precalculus
Online resources for algebra: tutorials, lessons, calculators, games, word problems, books
Online resources for algebra: tutorials, lessons, calculators, games, word problems, books
tags: mathematics, algebra
Placing numbers on a number line: great interactive
tags: mathematics, numbers
EXPLORING WHAT IT MEANS TO 'DO' MATHEMATICS
This unit gives a historical background to mathematics education in South Africa, to outcomes-based education and to the national curriculum statement for mathematics. The traditional approach to teaching mathematics is then contrasted with an approach to teaching mathematics that focuses on 'doing' mathematics, and mathematics as a science of pattern and order, in which learners actively explore mathematical ideas in a conducive classroom environment.
tags: mathematics, pd, ACE, obe
ACE Maths Project (OER Africa)
The aim of SAIDE ACEMaths project was to pilot a collaborative process for the selection, adaptation and use of OER materials for teacher education programmes in South Africa.

Over a period of two years we adapted, piloted and revised a set of materials on the teaching and learning of maths for teacher education. These are now available for downloading FOR FREE in two formats - for printing (PDF), and for adaptation (Word). See the ACEMaths Module to have a look.
tags: mathematics, ACE, school2.0
Math Central is really a great resource
Math Central is an Internet service for mathematics students and teachers. It is available in English, French, and Spanish.

The site includes:

* Resource Room: teaching resources and glossaries
* Quandaries and Queries: ask a question or search and browse answers
* Mathematics with a Human Face: biographies and career information
* Teachers' Bulletin Board: conferences, organizations, newsletters and periodicals
* Outreach Activities: Canadian educational outreach opportunities
* Math Beyond School: articles addressing "where will I ever use this?"
* Problem of the Month: see a new problem in September
tags: mathematics, lessonplans, education, maths
MATH GALLERY of photos
Calling all photographers: We’re looking for math-related images for our “Found Math” feature.
tags: mathematics, photos

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

An Assessment Bank of questions tool

2009-08-28T03:31:00.000-07:00

I attended a workshop by the Shuttleworth foundation last weekend where they introduced us to their new baby the Siyavula project where you can download (and create) free (as in gratis) high quality textbooks that are created under the creative commons license for your class. They already have maths and science textbooks available (they are busy loading lots of other subjects accross all grades- so let the other teachers know) but unfortunately no maths lit material yet. They are currently doing workshops around the country to introduce teachers to the Connextions platform from where they are running the project. The idea is that you can use "subject- lenses" or you can compile your own lens of material and lessons. You then have a choice to print the "textbook", store it electronically etc. To contribute to this open source collaborative project you can create a document in their connextions platform and add to the lenses. It even has a maths editor in place. At the moment I find the document creation tool quite difficult (it uses XML), but I am nagging them to provide us with an easy wysiwig tool to create our resources.

But.......if I look at how the teachers are using our maths literacy community (www.mathsliteracy.co.za) it seems to me that most of the interest is in downloading/getting tests and exams to use for setting/creating test and exams for our learners. I have therefore asked Mark Horner (the project manager) to create an assessment bank tool for us/the platform. This will in essence mean that we upload (original) questions according to Grade + LO+AS+assessment level+context+language and it will then make it possible to pick (tick) questions, click on a button and it will create the test/exam/assessment tool for us, after which we can edit it to custom suit our needs and print it out as a personalised test/exam on the fly. How does that sound??? Cool hey???!!!

This will require for them to motivate the building of such an assessment bank tool which will require funding. They are not going to do it if local teachers will not contribute (original- creative commons) questions to populate the assessment bank. So this is where I require your buy-in. An assessment bank tool would be an amazing help to us all, but it is not going to work if we do not have commitment from teachers to actively participate in providing questions. They have made it quite clear that we have to motivate the time, money and effort that will have to go into developing a tool like that for us to use freely.

So what do you think - should we pursue this? Will you be able to contribute if they create the tool for us? They have the programmers and will be able to let it happen provided that we will support it.

To talk about this I am scheduling an online session/meeting in my virtual classroom (promise nothing scary) so that we can discuss the feasibility and what we will need them to do for us (what elements should it have to work for us).... How does next Thursday evening at 6h30 pm sound? It will be an ONLINE meeting and you will just have to click on a link to join in (all you have to do to participate is to type with 1/more fingers and if you have a microphone and/or earphones, you will be able to hear/talk as well). I will post detailed instructions to guide you into my "virtual" classroom. (http://www.wiziq.com/tutorsession/detail.aspx?id=C767ABCF66CC4882B4...)

So please let me know if you will be joining our online meeting or if you have any ideas on the assessment bank idea by click on the comment link below.

Yet another maths blog

2009-08-28T03:10:00.000-07:00

Here I am creating yet another blog space. I already facilitate a similar blog space (http://mathsliteracy.wordpress.com) which has the exclusive goal of doing advocacy for mathematical literacy (ML) as a subject. As we have this constant battle between mathematics and ML as subject choices, I have decided to split and create a dumping space for my mathematics learning journey, a place where I can keep track of my mathematics resources, discussions and bookmarks.

So if you are looking for mathematics resources from around the web, this is where I will be posting them!