The Eighth International Literacy & Education Research Network Conference on

SPETSES, GREECE
4-8 July 2001

Abstract:

Mathematics has always been considered an extremely important school subject in Hong Kong. Its importance has been perpetuated by two main lines of thought upheld by many teachers, students and parents. On the one hand, it is considered to be important for the development of logical and rational thinking in children's mind. On the other hand, students' good performance in school mathematics would certainly benefit their future educational and career development. This paper argues that these two lines of thoughts have also caused the devastating instrumental rationality in mathematics education in Hong Kong. In order to introduce a humanistic view on the importance of mathematics education to a group of secondary mathematics teachers, Egan's (1997) sophisticated framework about the development of educated mind and different kinds of understanding has been adopted. With reference to his framework, mathematics is considered to be an indispensable tool for the growth of philosophical understanding. This paper then gives a detailed illustration of how the difficult idea of philosophical understanding has been introduced to these teachers. Story-telling approach has been adopted. The long story starts from 200BC, when Eratosthenes measured the diameter of the earth and ends at 1618, when the German astronomer Johannes Kepler announced his third law of planetary motion. In order to make this Western story more interesting and relevant to these Hong Kong teachers, Matteo Ricci's arrival in 1582 in Macau and his Chinese translation work on Treatise on the Celestial Bodies, Work on Trigonometry and Treatise on Geometry, and Elements of Geometry of Euclid have also been introduced. Moreover, the use of multimedia materials has been found to be a very useful strategy.

Bionote

Tang Kwok-chun is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Education Studies, Hong Kong Baptist University. He was born in Macau and moved to Hong Kong at the age of eight. He was a secondary mathematics teacher in Hong Kong from 1983 to 1993. His Ph.D. study focuses on the stability and change of secondary school mathematics knowledge in Macau. His research interests include curriculum stability and change, sociology of knowledge, and mathematics teaching and learning.

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Presentation Type
30 min. Paper

Presentation Equipment and Other Requests
Data Projector

Speaking Date/Time Restrictions

Country
Hong Kong