Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Science and Mathematics Education Commons™
Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 4 of 4
Full-Text Articles in Science and Mathematics Education
Incorporating Quantitative Reasoning In Common Core Courses: Mathematics For The Ghost Map, John R. Jungck
Incorporating Quantitative Reasoning In Common Core Courses: Mathematics For The Ghost Map, John R. Jungck
Numeracy
How can mathematics be integrated into multi-section interdisciplinary courses to enhance thematic understandings and shared common readings? As an example, four forms of quantitative reasoning are used to understand and critique one such common reading: Steven Berlin Johnson’s "The Ghost Map: The Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic - and How it Changed Science, Cities and the Modern World" (Riverhead Books, 2006). Geometry, statistics, modeling, and networks are featured in this essay as the means of depicting, understanding, elaborating, and critiquing the public health issues raised in Johnson’s book. Specific pedagogical examples and resources are included to illustrate applications and …
Calculus, Biology And Medicine: A Case Study In Quantitative Literacy For Science Students, Kim Rheinlander, Dorothy Wallace
Calculus, Biology And Medicine: A Case Study In Quantitative Literacy For Science Students, Kim Rheinlander, Dorothy Wallace
Numeracy
This paper describes a course designed to enhance the numeracy of biology and pre-medical students. The course introduces students with the background of one semester of calculus to systems of nonlinear ordinary differential equations as they appear in the mathematical biology literature. Evaluation of the course showed increased enjoyment and confidence in doing mathematics, and an increased appreciation of the utility of mathematics to science. Students who complete this course are better able to read the research literature in mathematical biology and carry out research problems of their own.
Quantitative Literacy On The Web Of Science, 2 – Mining The Health Numeracy Literature For Assessment Items, H L. Vacher, Todd Chavez
Quantitative Literacy On The Web Of Science, 2 – Mining The Health Numeracy Literature For Assessment Items, H L. Vacher, Todd Chavez
Numeracy
A topic search of the Web of Science (WoS) database using the term “numeracy” produced a bibliography of 293 articles, reviews and editorial commentaries (Oct 2008). The citation graph of the bibliography clearly identifies five benchmark papers (1995-2001), four of which developed numeracy assessment instruments. Starting with the 80 papers that cite these benchmarks, we identified a set of 25 papers (1995-2008) in which the medical research community reports the development and/or application of health-numeracy assessments. In all we found 10 assessment instruments from which we have compiled a total of 48 assessment items. There are both general and context-specific …
False Positives And Referral Bias: Content For A Quantitative Literacy Course, Stuart Boersma, Teri Willard
False Positives And Referral Bias: Content For A Quantitative Literacy Course, Stuart Boersma, Teri Willard
Numeracy
An extended study of accuracy in medical screening is presented as a useful application to increase students’ quantitative reasoning skills. Two detailed examples are presented. The first explores the frequency of obtaining false positive results from a medical screening tool while the second examines the issue of referral bias and its effect on the apparent sensitivity and specificity of the screening tool. Results from student assessments indicate that the activity increases one’s ability to define terms such as “false positive” and “false negative” and increases one’s ability to read and compute with information obtained from a two-way table. Teacher assessment …