Modern geometry teaching in schools in Japan was modeled on the pedagogies of western countries. However, the core ideas of these pedagogies were often radically changed in the process of adaptation, resulting in teaching differing fundamentally from the original models. This paper discusses the radical changes the pedagogy of a German mathematics…

"Saxon Math" focuses on fundamental mathematics skills, targeting children from kindergarten through grade 12. This report focuses on middle school math, defined as grades 6 through 9. The 6th grade curriculum covers simplifying expressions containing parentheses, graphing functions, and understanding ratios and proportions. The 7th…

Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) "Special Education at a Glance," which includes a copy of the "Guide to Planning and Assessing School-Based Special Education Programs," provides in a single document, information about the special education population at each Montgomery County (Maryland public school, including…

This booklet is intended to help students do their best on the ACT. It summarizes general test-taking strategies, describes the content of each test, provides specific tips for each, and lets students know what they can expect on test day. Included in this booklet are complete practice tests--"retired" ACT questions that were administered to…

Beyond Crossroads is a call to action. Within this call, AMATYC has updated its 1995 Crossroads standards, developed a new set of guiding principles, and created a blueprint for implementing these revised principles and standards. The principles guiding Beyond Crossroads are a significant overhaul of their predecessors and are bold statements that…

Cubic symmetry is used to build the other four Platonic solids and some formalism from classical geometry is introduced. Initially, the approach is via geometric construction, e.g., the "golden ratio" is necessary to construct an icosahedron with pentagonal faces. Then conventional elementary vector algebra is used to extract quantitative…

The research question addressed by this study is whether or not students made effective use of dynamic geometry software to explore the validity of a geometrical statement. Particular attention was paid to the use of definitions and the types of justifications students employed. Interviews conducted with six secondary mathematics preservice…

Readers will find several papers that address high-level issues in the use of technology in education, for example architecture and design frameworks for building online education materials or tools. Several other chapters report novel approaches to intelligent tutors or adaptive systems in educational settings. A number of chapters consider many…

Presents 5 activities for the K-1, 2-3, 4-5, 6-8 grade levels and for in the home in which students explore the concept of triangle through cooperative open-ended investigations. Provides related reproducible worksheets. (MDH)

These excerpts from the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) Standards support the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) Resource Kit by offering some context for discussing the teaching of algebra and geometry seen in the videotapes that are also part of the kit. The Standards describe the mathematics content…

The main focus of the study was to describe how students of various ages established the truth of their ideas in school geometry. Thirty-two students in grades 2, 5, 7, and in a high school geometry class were interviewed. Formal proof was used in less than 1% of the student arguments. Second and 5th graders were most likely to convince themselves…

This document lists mathematics objectives for Boston high school students. All objectives are presented in two columns. The left-hand column states each objective in general terms and gives an idea of its scope. The right-hand column gives a specific example of what students should be able to do when the objective is achieved. Objectives are…

Using license plates to generate random number pairs, students can calculate an approximate value for pi. The author views this approach as easier to understand than Buffon's needle. (SD)

An activity involving comparison of boxes constructed is described. (SD)

Describes a theory concerning the formation of soap films which enables this technique to be applied to problems requiring the minimization of the surface area between fixed boundaries. (Author/CP)