Mathematics Elsewhere: An Exploration of Ideas Across Cultures by
Mathematics Elsewhere is a fascinating and important contribution to a global view of mathematics. Presenting mathematical ideas of peoples from a variety of small-scale and traditional cultures, it humanizes our view of mathematics and expands our conception of what is mathematical.
Formulations: Architecture, Mathematics and Culture by
An investigation of mathematics as it was drawn, encoded, imagined, and interpreted by architects on the eve of digitization in the mid-twentieth century. In Formulations, Andrew Witt examines the visual, methodological, and cultural intersections between architecture and mathematics. The linkages Witt explores involve not the mystic transcendence of numbers invoked throughout architectural history, but rather architecture's encounters with a range of calculational systems--techniques that architects inventively retooled for design.
Rough Draft Math by
Many students, especially as they get older, only share their thinking in math class when they're sure they have the right answer. This means that some students hardly talk at all. Yet, talking and writing about in-process and unfinished ideas are vital to learning mathematics. How can we meet this challenge? Amanda (Mandy) Jansen and her collaborating teachers have developed a breakthrough approach: expand the idea of 'rough drafts' to the mathematics classroom. In Rough Draft Math, Mandy shares the power of infusing math class with the spirit of revision so that students feel comfortable thinking aloud as they talk to learn through problem-solving rather than talking only to perform right answers. In the process, a class of students becomes a community of mathematical thinkers, and teachers gain access into their students' ideas and understandings. Inside you'll find the following: an exploration of what the idea of revision could mean for math teaching and learning classroom vignettes to see rough draft math in action specific teaching techniques to encourage and practice rough draft thinking voices of teachers and students in rough draft classrooms Mandy's reflections about her own teaching as a work in progress In Rough Draft Math, Mandy shows how to create a classroom culture in which your students will feel more comfortable expressing their partial understandings and in-process thinking, and then continually revising that thinking as they build deep, conceptual understanding of mathematics.
Mathematical Imagining by
"Imagine a plastic cup lying on the floor. Give the cup a nudge so that it begins to roll. What does the path it takes look like?" So begins the journey that Christof Weber takes you on in Mathematical Imagining. Along the way, he makes the case that the ability to imagine, manipulate, and explain mathematical images and situations is fundamental to all mathematics and particularly important to higher level study. Most importantly, drawing on years of experiments in his own classroom, Weber shows that mathematical imagining is a skill that can be taught efficiently and effectively. Mathematical Imagining describes an original routine that gives students space and time to imagine a mathematical situation and then revise, discuss, and act upon the mental images they create. You can use this creative routine to glimpse into your students' thinking and discover teaching opportunities, while empowering them to create their own mathematics. Inside you'll find the following: an introduction to the routine including the rationale behind it, facilitation guidance, and classroom examples modifications to implement the routine in your classroom, even with varying time constraints 37 exercises broken into four categories: constructions, problem-solving, reasoning, and paradoxes discussions of the mathematics involved in each exercise, including possible follow-up questions instructions on how to create your own exercises beyond the book This one-of-a-kind resource is for secondary teachers looking to inspire student creativity and curiosity, deepen their own subject matter knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge, and invite all students to access the power of their own mathematical imaginations.
Critical Mathematics Education by
Mathematics is traditionally seen as the most neutral of disciplines, the furthest removed from the arguments and controversy of politics and social life. However, critical mathematics challenges these assumptions and actively attacks the idea that mathematics is pure, objective, and value neutral. It argues that history, society, and politics have shaped mathematics-not only through its applications and uses but also through molding its concepts, methods, and even mathematical truth and proof, the very means of establishing truth. Critical mathematics education also attacks the neutrality of the teaching and learning of mathematics, showing how these are value laden activities indissolubly linked to social and political life. Instead, it argues that the values of openness, dialogicality, criticality towards received opinion, empowerment of the learner, and social/political engagement and citizenship are necessary dimensions of the teaching and learning of mathematics, if it is to contribute towards democracy and social justice.
Learning Mathematics Successfully : Raising Self-efficacy in Students, Teachers and Parents by
This book is an important resource for pre-service and in-service teachers, as well as families in applying the theory of self-efficacy to support learners in becoming confident and assured in their ability to understand and apply mathematical principles and procedures. Coupled with classroom ready mathematics instructional strategies, the book provides readers with the background, tools and strategies needed to carry content success and confidence forward to remain persistent in solving all future mathematical problems
Infinite Powers by
Infinite Powers recounts how calculus tantalized and thrilled its inventors, starting with its first glimmers in ancient Greece and bringing us right up to the discovery of gravitational waves (a phenomenon predicted by calculus). Strogatz reveals how this form of math rose to the challenges of each age: how to determine the area of a circle with only sand and a stick; how to explain why Mars goes "backwards" sometimes; how to make electricity with magnets; how to ensure your rocket doesn't miss the moon; how to turn the tide in the fight against AIDS. As Strogatz proves, calculus is truly the language of the universe. By unveiling the principles of that language, Infinite Powers makes us marvel at the world anew.
Are Numbers Real? by
In Are Numbers Real?, Brian Clegg explores the way that math has become more and more detached from reality, and yet despite this is driving the development of modern physics.
How to Bake Pi by
What is math? How exactly does it work? And what do three siblings trying to share a cake have to do with it? In How to Bake Pi, math professor Eugenia Cheng provides an accessible introduction to the logic and beauty of mathematics, powered, unexpectedly, by insights from the kitchen.