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Full-Text Articles in Education

Mathematical Habits Of Mind, Kien H. Lim, Annie Selden Sep 2009

Mathematical Habits Of Mind, Kien H. Lim, Annie Selden

Kien H Lim

The idea of “mathematical habits of mind” has been introduced to emphasize the need to help students think about mathematics “the way mathematicians do.” There seems to be considerable interest among mathematics educators and mathematicians in helping students develop mathematical habits of mind. The objectives of this working group are: (a) to discuss various views and aspects of mathematical habits of mind, (b) to explore avenues for research, (c) to encourage research collaborations, and (d) to interest doctoral students in this topic. To facilitate the discussion during the working group meetings, we provide an overview of mathematical habits of mind, …


Assessing Problem-Solving Dispositions: Likelihood-To-Act Survey, Kien Lim, Osvaldo Morera, Mourat Tchoshanov Aug 2009

Assessing Problem-Solving Dispositions: Likelihood-To-Act Survey, Kien Lim, Osvaldo Morera, Mourat Tchoshanov

Kien H Lim

This paper reports an ongoing study that is aimed at developing an instrument for measuring two particular problem-solving dispositions: (a) impulsive disposition refers to students’ proclivity to spontaneously proceed with an action that comes to mind, and (b) analytic disposition refers to the tendency to analyze the problem situation. The instrument is under development and consists of likelihood-to-act items in which participants indicate on a scale of 1 to 5 how likely they are to take a particular action in a given situation. The instrument was administered to 318 college students, mainly pre-service teachers. Statistical analysis indicates that likelihood-to-act items …


Provoking Intellectual Need Aug 2009

Provoking Intellectual Need

Kien H Lim

According to Harel's Necessity Principle (1998) “students are most likely to learn when they see a need for what we intend to teach them, where by need is meant intellectual need, not social or economic need” (p. 501). Intellectual need for a particular mathematical concept is an internal drive experienced by a learner to solve a problem. In this paper, I discuss how tasks can be designed to provoke the intellectual need for two mathematical ideas, prime factorization and lowest common multiple.