Science and Mathematics Education Commons^™

Nebraska Earth Systems Education Network – Fall 2007

Nebraska Earth Systems Education Network

Content:

Master’s Online Course to Improve Teachers Science Knowledge by Lindsey Mohlman

Teacher Spotlight: Susan Frack by Susan Frack & Lindsey Mohlman

Nebraska View: A Resource for K-16 Educators by Milda Vaitkus

Mueller Planetarium Goes “Fulldome” by Jack Dunn

ANDRILL Antarctic Geological Drilling by Frank Rack

Toyota USA Foundation Grant to UNL will Promote K-12 Science Education by UNL Office of Communications

Promoting Mathematical Communication And Community Via Blackboard, Kris H. Green, Erica L. Johnson

Mathematical and Computing Sciences Faculty/Staff Publications

Major changes in mathematics pedagogy include writing as pedagogy and the role of community in learning. The classroom community is naturally extended by the use of online discussion boards. In this paper several models for student use of online discussion boards that have been successfully used to promote mathematical discourse are presented. Structured and unstructured examples that are easily adaptable and transportable to a variety of mathematics classroom settings are offered. These assignments facilitate student engagement and interaction outside of the classroom. Assessment, utility, and transferability are offered. Although the authors use the discussion boards provided by Blackboard, this particular …

Models Of Interdisciplinary Research And Service Learning At Hope College, Aaron A. Best, Matthew Dejongh, Amanda J. Barton, Jeff R. Brown, Christopher C. Barney

Publications

"Children love to explore the world around them. In doing so they are not aware of disciplinary boundaries or even of disciplines. They move freely from watching ants (biology) to building structures (engineering) to counting rocks (mathematics and geology) to seeing what things dissolve in water (chemistry). Only as they go to school do they learn that humans divide up the way we learn about the universe and start to think within disciplinary boundaries. In doing so, those children, who are now us, lose the ability to think broadly and use the insights of various ways of thinking to solve …

Breaking The Math Barrier, Bilqees Patel

Institute for Educational Development, Karachi

No abstract provided.

Ists E-Newsletter, September 15, 2007, Iowa Academy Of Science

ISTS Newsletter

In this issue:

--Message from the ISTS Chair, Traci Maxted

--Message from the Fall Conference Chair, Gale Vermeulen

--Message from the Vice Chair, Morgan Masters

--Attend the Fall Conference

--Announcements, Opportunities, News

--Your ISTS Leadership Team

Making Use Of Bilingual Interview Data: Some Experiences From The Field, Nelofer Halai

Institute for Educational Development, Karachi

This paper describes the challenges faced, and rules devised, while dealing with bilingual interview data as part of a life history study of a female science teacher’s conceptions of the nature of science while teaching in a school in Karachi. The interview data generated was both in Urdu and English, which underwent a number of processes (transcription, translation, and transliteration) to evolve into “interim texts,” to finally become a part of the data analysis process. I have called these translated materials “transmuted texts,” as they reflect the original, but have been recreated. This paper is significant because as globalization connects …

Education In The Environment: A Strategy For Continued Interagency Outdoor Programming: Quarterly Progress Report, Period Ending August 31, 2007, Environmental Education Strategy For Nevada

Reports (PLI Education)

During the past three months, the focus of the university’s efforts has included the following highlights:

• Three projects have been identified to meet SNAP strategic messaging needs: an anti-litter exhibit; a volunteer restoration program with educational components; and activity stations to tell the story of Lee Meadows restoration efforts.
• Interpretive planning is underway for Mountain’s Edge Explorer’s Interpretive Trail.
• A Hispanic survey and monitoring program has been identified.
• A six-week Spanish class tailored to meet the communication needs of environmental educators and interpreters will be offered beginning September 20.
• Forever Earth was scheduled for 11 days and benefited 297 individuals. …

The Council On Undergraduate Research As A Resource For Mathematicians, Thomas Q. Sibley

Mathematics Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

A New Framework For Grading, Kris H. Green, W. Allen Emerson

Mathematical and Computing Sciences Faculty/Staff Publications

Grading is one of the least liked, least understood and least considered aspects of teaching. After years of work, we have developed a grading system that is quite different from traditional and reformed approaches to grading and which meaningfully incorporates and integrates the collection of evidence, the evaluation of evidence, and the reporting of judgments about that evidence. This system satisfies the requirements of good grading system and answers many of the problems faced by more traditional methods by substantially changing the way in which grade information is aggregated, resulting in a final course grade that aligns qualitative evaluation with …

A Rotating Panel Survey To Assess Quality Of Hunter College Education, Jennifer Sousa Brennan, William (Bill) H. Williams

Publications and Research

A rotating sample design is proposed to most accurately measure the perceived quality of a Hunter College education. A representative sample of Hunter College students will belong to one of six rotating panels. Students will be contacted during four rotation periods and report their assessment of the two most recent months. It is advantageous to use a rotating panel design as opposed to a fixed panel design in order to guard against the negative effects of a deteriorating response rate. Stratified sampling will help to ensure representation across major departments and academic year of study. Methods for sampling procedures, stratification, …

An Investigation Of Successful And Unsuccessful Students’ Problem Solving In Stoichiometry, Ozcan Gulacar

Dissertations

In this study, I investigated how successful and unsuccessful students solve stoichiometry problems. I focus on three research questions: (1) To what extent do the difficulties in solving stoichiometry problems stem from poor understanding of pieces (domain-specific knowledge) versus students' inability to link those pieces together (conceptual knowledge)? (2) What are the differences between successful and unsuccessful students in knowledge, ability, and practice? (3) Is there a connection between students' (a) cognitive development levels, (b) formal (proportional) reasoning abilities, (c) working memory capacities, (d) conceptual understanding of particle nature of matter, (e) understanding of the mole concept, and their problem-solving …

Discovering The Derivative Can Be "Invigorating:" Mark's Journey To Understanding Instantaneous Velocity, Charity Ann Gardner Hyer

Theses and Dissertations

This is a case study using qualitative methods to analyze how a first semester calculus student named Mark makes sense of the derivative and the role of the classroom practice in his understanding. Mark is a bright yet fairly average student who successfully makes sense of the derivative and retains his knowledge and understanding. The study takes place within a collaborative, student-centered, task-based classroom where the students are given opportunity to explore mathematical ideas such as rate of change and accumulation. Mark's sense making of the derivative is analyzed in light of his use of physics, Mark as a visual …

Probing For Reasons: Presentations, Questions, Phases, Kellyn Nicole Farlow

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis reports on a research study based on data from experimental teaching. Students were invited, through real-world problem tasks that raised central conceptual issues, to invent major ideas of calculus. This research focuses on work and thinking of the students, as they sought to build key ideas, representations and compelling lines of reasoning. This focus on the students' and their agency as learners has brought about a new development of the psychological and logical perspectives, as well as, highlighted students' choices in academic and social roles. Such choices facilitated continued learning among these students.

The Main Challenges That A Teacher-In-Transition Faces When Teaching A High School Geometry Class, Greg Brough Henry

Theses and Dissertations

During a semester-long action research study, the author attempted to implement a standards-based approach to teaching mathematics in a high school geometry class. Having previously taught according to a more traditional manner, there were many challenges involved as he made this transition. Some of the challenges were related to Geometry and others were related to the standards-based approach in general. The main challenges that the author encountered are identified and discussed. A plan of action for possible solutions to these challenges is then described.

Applying Toulmin's Argumentation Framework To Explanations In A Reform Oriented Mathematics Class, Jennifer Alder Brinkerhoff

Theses and Dissertations

This study looks at conceptual explanations given in a reform-oriented mathematics class for preservice secondary mathematics teachers and extends Toulmin's argumentation framework to account for some of the complexities of the explanations given by these students. This study explains the complexities that arose in applying Toulmin's framework to explanations and extends the framework by accounting for the features of conceptual explanations. The complexities of these explanations are that they are made up of multiple arguments that build on each other to reach a final conclusion and that they are also dependant upon the social aspects of the class in which …

Recycle Please: Teach Your School To Recycle, To Care, And To Help Solve The Climate Crisis, Ted Wells

Graduate Student Independent Studies

This Independent Study offers one developmentally-appropriate way in which the elementary school teacher can help alleviate the current global warming crisis by leading students to organize a school-wide recycling program carried out in the spirit of service learning. The reader will learn that this recycling work is two-pronged: the physical labor of recycling and the educational outreach to the school community through marketing, using posters, assemblies, videos, and more. A philosophy of education underlying this work is described in detail, as is the journey of the author in discovering this pedagogy that includes tapping into a personal environmental activism for …

The Importance Of Vocabulary Instruction In Everyday Mathematics, Chad Larson

Action Research Projects

In this action research study of my 6th grade math students I try to answer the question of how mathematical vocabulary plays an integral role in the understanding and learning of middle level mathematics. It is my belief that mathematics is a language, and to be fluent in that language one must be able to use and understand vocabulary. With the use of vocabulary quizzes and mathematically-centered vocabulary activities, student scores and understanding of math concepts can be increased. I discovered that many of the students had never been exposed to consistent mathematical terminology in their elementary education, which led …

A Monte Carlo Simulation Of The Birthday Problem, Stacey Aldag

Department of Mathematics: Master of Arts in Teaching, Exam Expository Papers

Question, how many people would you need in a group in order for there to be a 50-50 chance that at least two people will share a birthday? Answer, 23 people. But how can this be? There are 365 days in a year and half of that would be 182, so why wouldn’t you need at least 182 people to have a 50-50 chance? Strangely enough the answer to this question is only 23 people are necessary to have a 50% chance at least two people in the group will share a birthday. This situation, where the answer is counter …

Calculators In The Classroom: Help Or Hindrance?, Christina L. Sheets

Action Research Projects

In a world where technology is ever present and ever changing, is too much technology at too young of an age detrimental to a child’s educational success? The purpose of this paper is to share the results of a four-month study that focused on the use of calculators in grade eight. This study was conducted in an eighth grade class, in a small kindergarten through twelfth grade school. This paper will share the findings of a study of a classroom in which calculator use was limited and mental computation was emphasized. The main focus of this study was whether or …

Connections Between Communication And Math Abilities, Rachelle Mayo

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Master of Arts in Teaching, Summative Projects

In this action research study of my Class I School’s 5th and 8th grade mathematics, I investigated students’ connections between communication of math skills and their math abilities. I discovered that students can increase their math abilities with the opportunities to discuss their thinking as well as evaluate thinking and strategies of other students. Electronic communication can be a valuable source for students to communicate further to other students.

Evaluating Polynomials, Thomas J. Harrington

Department of Mathematics: Master of Arts in Teaching, Exam Expository Papers

Computers use algorithms to evaluate polynomials. This paper will study the efficiency of various algorithms for evaluating polynomials. We do this by counting the number of basic operations needed; since multiplication takes much more time to perform on a computer, we will count only multiplications. This paper addresses the following: a) How many multiplications does it take to evaluate the one-variable polynomial, Σ= + + + + = n i i i n n a a x a x a x a x 0 2 0 1 2 ... when the operations are performed as indicated? (Remember that powers are …

How To Graphically Interpret The Complex Roots Of A Quadratic Equation, Carmen Melliger

Department of Mathematics: Master of Arts in Teaching, Exam Expository Papers

As a secondary math teacher I have taught my students to find the roots of a quadratic equation in several ways. One of these ways is to graphically look at the quadratic and see were it crosses the x-axis. For example, the equation of y = x2 – x – 2, as shown in Figure 1, has roots at x = -1 and x = 2. These are the two places in which the sketched graph crosses the x-axis.

Master Of Arts In Teaching (Mat), Josh Severin

Department of Mathematics: Master of Arts in Teaching, Exam Expository Papers

The number zero is a very powerful tool in mathematics that has many different applications and rules. An interesting fact about the number zero is that according to our calendar (the Gregorian calendar), there is no “year zero” in our history. There is also no “zeroth” century as time is recorded from centuries B.C. to the 1st century A.D. However, certain calendars do have a year zero. In the astronomical year numbering system year zero is defined as year 1 BC. Buddhist and Hindu lunar calendars also have a year zero. In this paper I am going to discuss many …

Hyperbolic Geometry, Christina L. Sheets

Department of Mathematics: Master of Arts in Teaching, Exam Expository Papers

In general, when one refers to geometry, he or she is referring to Euclidean geometry. Euclidean geometry is the geometry with which most people are familiar. It is the geometry taught in elementary and secondary school. Euclidean geometry can be attributed to the Greek mathematician Euclid of Alexandria. His work entitled The Elements was the first to systematically discuss geometry. Since approximately 600 B.C., mathematicians have used logical reasoning to deduce mathematical ideas, and Euclid was no exception. In his book, he started by assuming a small set of axioms and definitions, and was able to prove many other theorems. …

Pythagorean Triples, Diane Swartzlander

Department of Mathematics: Master of Arts in Teaching, Exam Expository Papers

Who was Pythagoras after which the Pythagorean Theorem is named? Pythagoras was born between 580-572 BC and died between 500-490 BC. Pythagoras and his students believed that everything was related to mathematics and that numbers were the ultimate reality. Very little is known about Pythagoras because none of his writings have survived. Many of his accomplishments may actually have been the work of his colleagues and students. Pythagoras established a secret cult called the Pythagoreans. His cult was open to both females and males and they lived a structured life consisting of religious teaching, common meals, exercise, reading and philosophical …

Perimeter And Area Of Inscribed And Circumscribed Polygons, Lindsey Thompson

Department of Mathematics: Master of Arts in Teaching, Exam Expository Papers

This paper looks at comparing the perimeter and area of inscribed and circumscribed regular polygons. All constructions will be made with circles of radius equal to 1 unit. To begin this exploration, I created a circle with a radius of 1(for my purposes I used 1 inch as my unit of measure). I chose my first construction to contain the most basic regular polygon, an equilateral triangle. A regular polygon implies that all sides of the figure are equal and all interior angles of the figure are congruent. My first construction shows an equilateral triangle inscribed in a circle (see …

The Volume Of A Platonic Solid, Cindy Steinkruger

Department of Mathematics: Master of Arts in Teaching, Exam Expository Papers

A regular tetrahedron and a regular octahedron are two of the five known Platonic Solids. These five “special” polyhedra look the same from any vertex, their faces are made of the same regular shape, and every edge is identical. The earliest known description of them as a group is found in Plato’s Timaeus, thus the name Platonic Solids. Plato theorized the classical elements were constructed from the regular solids. The tetrahedron was considered representative of fire, the hexahedron or cube represented earth, the octahedron stood for gas or air, the dodecahedron represented vacuum or ether (which is made up of …

Using Cooperative Learning To Promote A Problem-Solving Classroom, Amy Nebesniak

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Master of Arts in Teaching, Summative Projects

In this action research study of my eighth grade mathematics classroom, I investigate the benefits of cooperative learning, the support structures needed to promote a cooperative learning environment, and students’ ability to transfer the cooperative learning skills into less structured problem solving situations. The data analysis reveals that cooperative learning increases students’ confidence level as well as their involvement in the learning process. In order to create successful teams, students require my providing support structures and modifying the support for each group of students. Finally, students are able to more effectively apply their cooperative skills in concrete situations as compared …

A Study Of The Role Of Mnemonics In Learning Mathematics, Kathy Delashmutt

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Master of Arts in Teaching, Summative Projects

In this action research study of my fifth grade mathematics teaching, I investigated student engagement levels in the classroom, with a specific interest in the importance and effectiveness of mnemonics in learning mathematics for all learners. I defined mnemonic instruction as a strategy that provides a visual or verbal prompt for students who may have difficulty retaining information. It is a memory enhancing instructional strategy that involved teaching students to link new information that is taught to information they already know. I investigated mnemonics effectiveness in my classroom by using two student interviews, a teacher survey, two student surveys and …

Increasing Conceptual Learning Through Student Participation, Janet Timoney

Action Research Projects

In this action research study of my 9th grade Algebra I classroom, I investigated the idea of presenting problems at the beginning of class. Data was collected to determine if presenting problems at the beginning of class would have an effect on students’ conceptual learning, verbal communication and confidence. It was also my intention that this project would have a positive impact on my students both academically and mentally with increasing their confidence with mathematical problems. I discovered that presenting problems at the beginning of class did impact my students’ overall abilities and achievement. It seemed to improve their volunteerism …