In my opinion, the secondary math curriculum already contains too much. My pre-reading ideas is not to add more to the curriculum, including math history, but instead to remove or restructure the existing curriculum. Adding math history could take up time that can be better spent on allowing for teachers to teach basic, fundamental concepts at a more deep rooted level so that students can gain a relational understanding of mathematics. An issue that stands out for me is the topic of math history as well. In my opinion, you have to be interested in a subject to want to learn about its history. Students already dislike going into their math classes – to pile on top of that history that seems unrelatable would be too much for the teacher. I think there are better ways to induce curiosity and creativity in the math classroom.
There were a couple of points in the reading that stuck out to me. The notion that mathematics is presented in a polished, organized structure when it was never found like that. This is something I agree with, and never thought about before. Teaching kids how mathematicians of the past came to discover a basic concept we teach today could be a means of inspiring a more exploratory method to approach math with. Although the author presented an entire section on how to integrate math history in the classroom I think he may have added to an already existing issue of an overburdened curriculum. In one of the examples, he used a project (that was described as taking one to two semesters) that was done by graduate level students in University. The issue with this as a supporting point is that students at the graduate level still pursuing mathematics are an anomaly – their interest in math far exceeds that of most students. His other examples as well, including worksheets and readings only add to the curriculum.
I don’t think I read this article at a good time. My bias lies too heavily against it. Although I do agree that the exploratory nature of studying the history of mathematics and mathematicians can inspire a different form of learning, I don’t believe it can be applied at a public school level. There were two things in the article that I thought were good ideas – a whole course dedicated to the history of mathematics and the notion of experiential mathematical activities. I think the latter would also have to be presented to students wanting to pursue further mathematics as well. I think teaching the history of mathematics to students already interested in math is a great way to induce further curiosity and learning but with the current curriculum and varying levels of understanding amongst secondary students, I believe more resources need to be put into how we teach math.
Thank you for your honest and thoughtful reflection, Sahl! Your comment that “you have to be interested in a subject to want to learn about its history” is interesting; I wonder if, in some cases, introducing history could engage students who don’t usually engage in math but like the humanities. The lack of time is certainly a legitimate concern; however, incorporating a bit of history into math lessons doesn’t have to take up a lot of time. Here is an example of a short TED video I used a lesson hook in Math 8 when introducing the Pythagorean Theorem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YompsDlEdtc
ReplyDeletePerhaps this course could provide some resources in how history can be incorporated in high school math classrooms. And it’s totally okay if you are more passionate about other ways of inducing curiosity and creativity in your math classroom!