Mathematics Teaching 217 - Mar 2010
Mathematics Teaching is the journal of the Association of Teachers of Mathematics. It is a professional journal sent to all members of the Association. It is not a refereed journal. Submissions are reviewed by the editorial team. Many articles have additional information or associated files placed on the journal website. To make your views known go to the ATM forum add your views, ideas and comments.
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MT217 Contents
Editorial - Margaret Jones
These cover all phases and interests, and together focus on the role of the teacher in the classroom to provide not only stimulating and interesting activities, but also attempt to engage the learner in the mathematics rather than the task.
Directed numbers - Emma Armstrong
it quickly became apparent that students, as old as year eleven, were having trouble with addition and subtraction involving negative numbers.
Functional mathematics - Derek Ball
Derek Ball shares part of an article from The Guardian and asks some questions.
RISP - Parabolic clues - Jonny Griffiths
It is not possible for all four clues to be true together...why not?
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How to anamorph - John Sharp
I believe in teaching mathematics through art: it gives ownership to learners. By this I mean they are creating their own work and they have to be able to express themselves and produce their own result.
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Fibonominoes - Paul Stephenson
Paul Stephenson drew attention to an NRICH environment in which you can manipulate polyominoes based on Fibonacci numbers. Here is an analysis of the pieces themselves.
Simulating gravity - Savos Pipinos
Savos Pipinos works with students to simulate gravity by employing Euclidean Geometry in the classroom.
Geometer's Sketchpad files to accompany this article
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Rachel measures - Helen Williams
Rachel is certain they need to be strapped in for their trip into space, and, to this end, wraps a long length of wool around herself and her chair. She notices Connie isn't strapped in and speaks to me.
Otherwise engaged - Jenni Ingram and Robert Ward-Penny
Pupils' engagement with tasks can often be mistaken for an engagement with mathematics.
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Puzzle page - Richard Goodman
2 more than the square root of 1 less than 5 across.
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Straight line graphs - Tom Krueger
During the lesson I probably accused my class of not thinking hard enough when inside me I knew that it was me who had failed to do exactly that - think.
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Conjecture Rolle's Theorem - Bill Brakes and Bob Burn
Rolle's Theorem takes its name from Michel Rolle who in 1691 was able to show that between two adjacent roots of a polynomial, there was a maximum or minimum of that polynomial.
Preparing for Rolle's Theorem prompt sheet
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Not for teaching - Derek Ball
AQA say their GCSE "will allow learners to develop and refine their problem solving strategies and build the confidence and skills required to tackle unfamiliar challenges".
An engaging learning environment - Tom Krueger
The display work doesn't stop in a classroom of course but continues throughout the maths department for very much the same reasons - we want 'Regulars' and 'Visitors' to get inspired by the Mathematics around them.
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An ocean of possibilities - Doug Williams
Between us we have taught millions of young people. A few have dived in and kept swimming, some have lingered on the shore playing in pools, but most have dipped their toes in and run like heck in the other direction never to return.
Download the 'Working Mathematically' prompt sheet
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ATM website news - Marten Gallagher
It is my view, as the web editor, that the website needs to reflect the instincts, habits and technologies that are increasingly used by the current generation of younger teachers for whom social networking is not a mystery.
Visualising again - Hasan Unal
The inclusion of mathematics problems that will lead to multiple thinking modes (algebraic, geometric, etc) also allows teachers to accommodate different learning styles.
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A simple construction of the golden ratio - Seyfullah Hizarci, Suheyla Elmas and S¸Ukru Ilgun
a construction for the golden ratio, using the area bisector of an isosceles trapezium.
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RISP - Parabolic solution - Jonny Griffiths
A risp activity is synoptic, building and strengthening links between the different parts of a student's existing understanding, and can helpfully reveal areas of your students' mental socks where there are holes to be darned.
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Numberwords - Ji Un Lee
Work with familiar and unfamiliar foreign number words plays an important role in her emerging algebraic knowledge.
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The pathway to abstraction - A. Cihan Konyalioglu
The pathway from triple cycle of arithmetic start, algebraic process and geometric sense to abstraction in the teaching of mathematics in the secondary school.
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Vectors and the pantograph - Benjamin Baumslag
Many students enjoy making a working model of a pantograph and then using elementary vector algebra to show why it works.
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Thinking about 'rich' tasks - Lorna Box and Anne Watson
During her PGCE course Lorna decided to use a Bowland maths resource to stimulate some lessons and ran up against some puzzling problems and questions, so she emailed her tutor.
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Provocation 8 - Two old men
Without staff with the ability to think and plan creatively we can forget creativity in the classroom. Do you remember that previous governments believed they could train teaching staff to engender creativity?
News from ATM - Jean Carnell
The recent changes in the curriculum, giving a renewed emphasis on using enrichment and enhancement tasks, and including more problem solving, fit with the guiding principles of ATM so we look forward to considering all your ideas for new publishing.
