The study documents the extent to which high school teachers reflect on their need to revise and extend their mathematical and practicing knowledge. In this context, teachers worked on a set of tasks as a part of an inquiring community that promoted the use of different computational tools in problem solving approaches. Results indicated that the…

Using data from the 2005 National Assessment of Educational Progress, students' use of calculators in the learning of high school mathematics was profiled based on their family background, curriculum background, and advanced mathematics coursework. A statistical method new to educational research--classification and regression trees--was applied…

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to examine the modeling of technology by mathematics professors in two universities in teaching required courses for secondary level pre-service mathematics teachers. Six professors participated in this case study. Their responses were documented in pre- and post-interviews and data were gathered from…

This study compared the effects of microcomputer-based statistical software and hand-held calculators on the statistics achievement of university males and females. The subjects, 73 graduate students enrolled in univariate statistics classes at a public comprehensive university, were randomly assigned to groups that used either microcomputer-based…

The mathematics for finding and plotting the locations of stars and constellations are available in many books on astronomy, but the steps involve mystifying and fragmented equations, calculations, and terminology. This paper will introduce an entirely new unified and cohesive technique that is easy to understand by mathematicians, and simple…

In this article, the authors discuss the importance of unexpected graphs as a vehicle for encouraging critical classroom dialogue. By examining such graphs more critically, teachers and their students can reexamine beliefs about the authority of technology in their classrooms. (Contains 15 figures.)

Calculus at the secondary school level has traditionally represented the peak of school mathematics in Australia, and has been available only to the most capable students. Until recently, many calculus curricula have focused on developing standard techniques, such as those concerned with differentiation and integration, with an emphasis on…

This research examines how e-assessment and e-resources were used to assess and support the mathematics of Technology and Design students undertaking a B.Ed. (post-primary) teacher education course. The students participated in two similar tests in order to ascertain if their mathematical difficulties were in the underlying concepts of the…

This study demonstrates that a popular graphing calculator among students, TI-83 Plus, has a powerful function to draw the NPV profile and find the accurate multiple IRRs for a project with non-conventional cash flows. However, finance textbooks or related supplementary materials do not provide students instructions for this part. The detailed…

The solutions of the discrete logistic growth model based on a difference equation and the continuous logistic growth model based on a differential equation are compared and contrasted. The investigation is conducted using a dynamic interactive spreadsheet. (Contains 5 figures.)

MATLAB is a powerful package for numerical computation. MATLAB contains a rich pool of mathematical functions and provides flexible plotting functions for illustrating mathematical solutions. The course of calculus-based business mathematics consists of two major topics: 1) derivative and its applications in business; and 2) integration and its…

Governments and other stakeholders have become increasingly interested in assessing the skills of their adult populations in order to monitor how well prepared they are to meet the challenges of the new information world. The current paper provides an overview of the conceptual framework for the assessment of numeracy developed for the OECD's…

In order to estimate the likely effects on item difficulty when a calculator becomes available on the quantitative section of the Graduate Record Examinations® (GRE®-Q), 168 items (in six 28-item forms) were administered either with or without access to an on-screen four-function calculator. The forms were administered as a special research…

Covers a project conducted by the Freudenthal Institute in which observation of student behavior supported the premise that the graphics calculator can stimulate the use of realistic contexts, the exploratory approach to mathematics, a more integrated view of mathematics, and more flexible behavior in problem solving. (AIM)

In this article, we explore the game based on the following problem from the 1st Mathematical Olympiad of Central America and the Caribbean, held in Costa Rica in 1999: Player A turns on the calculator, presses a digit key and then presses the + key. A second later, player B presses a digit key in the same row or column of the last digit key…