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NATIONAL SCIENCE WEEK: Promoting clearer thinking in maths, science

August 17, 2005

Karoline.thumb.JPGTwo New England schools will be pioneers in the introduction of new visual techniques to help teachers and students think more systematically about science and mathematics.

Teachers from the schools will work with researchers from The University of New England on the government-funded project.

The coordinator of the project, Associate Professor Karoline Afamasaga-Fuata’i from UNE’s School of Education, said the techniques were designed to enable students to communicate (or “tell the story of”) the sequence of steps involved in solving a mathematical problem or doing a science experiment, and their knowledge of the theories guiding the solution or experiment.

Dr Afamasaga-Fuata’i (pictured here) is an international authority on the techniques, known as “concept mapping” and “vee diagrams”. She will be collaborating on the project with Professor John Pegg, the Director of the National Centre of Science, ICT and Mathematics Education for Rural and Regional Australia, based at UNE. The schools participating in the project are New England Girls’ School (NEGS) and Minimbah Primary School. Dr Greg McPhan from NEGS, who has extensive experience with concept mapping in science, is assisting Dr Afamasaga-Fuata’i.

Dr Afamasaga-Fuata’i explained that the techniques required the diagrammatic representation of theoretical principles underlying a procedure or experiment (using a concept map), or underlying the application of theory in context (using a vee diagram), in a way that exposed any gaps or inconsistencies in students’ understanding.

“Instead of just asking students to solve a mathematical problem,” she said, “by using concept maps we can ask them to describe their procedure and to justify why they’re solving it in that particular way. They’re externalising their conceptual understanding of procedures in a way that can be evaluated. When the network of interconnections is actually drawn on a concept map, it’s there for you to see. Vee diagrams, too, provide instant information that is useful for teachers, particularly about the integration of theory and application. Completed vee diagrams highlight gaps in a student’s knowledge that can then be rectified.”

She said that a hierarchical concept map was also a useful tool for teachers in planning the structure of a lesson or series of lessons.

The researchers will be conducting an initial two-day workshop with six teachers from NEGS (coordinated by Dr McPhan) and three from Minimbah (coordinated by Mrs Di Roberts) in Term 4 this year. The researchers will begin visiting the schools in March next year (after a further series of meetings with the teachers, and after the teachers have started working with students). In Term 3 next year a one-day conference will allow teachers throughout the region to participate in discussions and workshops and to see the best work to have come out of the two schools.

The one-year project is receiving Federal Government funding of about $48,000.

Dr Afamasaga-Fuata’i, who comes from Samoa and studied for seven years in the United States, has done pioneering work on these techniques in both countries. She is one of very few people in the world who have explored their potential for mathematics in particular. (Many more people have done similar work in science.)


Media contact: Associate Professor Karoline Afamasaga-Fuata'i, School of Education, UNE (02) 6773 3327 or Jim Scanlan, Public Relations, UNE (02) 6773 3049.

Posted by Jim Scanlan at August 17, 2005 02:45 PM