Mathematics learning and the imagination

What	Seminar
When	2007-11-22 from 16:30 to 18:00
Where	7500F EDB, Burnaby Campus
Contact Name	Teresa Martin
Contact Email	ierg-ed@sfu.ca
Contact Phone	778.782.4479
Add event to calendar	vCal iCal

last modified 2008-07-02 13:05

Setting the stage for this seminar, Susan Gerofsky and Pamela Hagen provide three quotations, the first of which is: "Besides language and music, mathematics is one of the primary manifestations of the free creative power of the human mind." --Hermann Weyl

About this Session:

"All mathematicians share a sense of amazement over the infinite depth and the mysterious beauty and usefulness of mathematics." -- Martin Gardner

Many people find it difficult to connect mathematics learning and teaching with imaginative education, since traditions of schooling in mathematics so often amount to nothing more than the rote learning and application of instrumental rules.

This seminar, led by two women who are passionate about mathematics and math learning, offers examples of other ways of engaging with mathematics learning through the imagination. They will present aspects of imaginative math education from their own research.

If prevailed upon, Susan will be happy to offer an instrumental break on pennywhistle or accordion at some point in the talk…!

"I never got a pass mark in math ... Just imagine -- mathematicians now use my prints to illustrate their books." -- M.C. Escher

About Pam and Susan:

Pamela Hagen’s work is concerned with listening to elementary students’ voices and responses to learning mathematics when imagination and ideas from IE are used to structure math education. She is also interested the ways that using IE affects the way that curriculum is presented and the resources a teacher decides to use. Pamela Hagen is a doctoral student in mathematics education and curriculum studies at UBC. She also teaches intermediate elementary grades in Coquitlam schools.

Susan Gerofsky is interested in using somatic cognitive tools as a way of understanding and supporting mathematics learning. She will report on her research project on “an archaeology of gesture in graphing”, which uses gesture to reveal cultural meanings unintentionally embedded in mathematical graphs. An unexpected spin-off of this project is the development of a concise diagnostic and remediation tool for students based on intellectual engagement through gesture and movement. Susan Gerofsky is an assistant professor in mathematics education and curriculum studies at UBC. Her work involves gesture, genre and performance, and uses linguistic, paralinguistic and arts-infused approaches to mathematics education.