MSU at ICME-15

Gail Burrill and Ishan Santra from the MSU Mathematics Education group will be traveling to Sydney, Australia in early July to present at ICME-15. 

The International Congress on Mathematical Education (ICME) is the largest international conference on mathematics education in the world. This event occurs every 4 years and is organized by the International Commission on Mathematical Instruction. ICME explores current global trends in mathematics education research and mathematics teaching practices at all levels. 

The 15th International Congress on Mathematical Education (ICME-15) will take place July 7-14, 2024 at the International Convention Centre in Sydney, Australia. The theme of ICME-15 is Come and be counted!  

Gail Burrill, math ed faculty member, commented, “I am bringing 20 mathematics educators, from K-12 teachers to mathematicians, from across the US to ICME 15 as part of the ICME 14 Travel Grant as we did not use all of the funds from that grant. They will form teams and bring back ideas and information to share with the US math ed community - not sure of the format yet, maybe virtual workshops during the academic year.” 

 She continued, “We are hoping they will be able to interact in a small workshop during ICME with mathematics educators from Australia - the program is PRIME but stands for Partnerships for Research and Innovations in Mathematics Education!” 

 Gail remarked, “I am doing two papers, one for the TSG on technology at the secondary level and the other on data science A framework for Storytelling, a paper I wrote with Anthony Dickson that presents a framework for writing stories from data based on the data from the stat and probability course I taught for the elementary/middle school preservice students. It is really a nice framework with good and not so good supporting illustrations.”

Here is the abstract for the data science A framework for Storytelling paper: 

ABSTRACT: A key skill for data scientists is the ability to answer questions and explain complex results to nontechnical stakeholders. Accordingly, descriptions of the data science process call for clear and concise communication, both written and visual, with respect to telling the story in the data. However, little attention has been given to developing the skills necessary for effectively using written communication in the storytelling. Just as students need to learn what is important in communicating with a visual display, they also need guidelines in learning to communicate using words and numbers. This paper addresses the question: what are characteristics of a good data story?  Based on a research project involving prospective elementary teachers, the result is a framework that identifies characteristics of written communication with both appropriate and inappropriate examples.   

On Monday, July 8, 14:00-15:30 (Australian Standard time), Gail will be presenting, with others on The role and the use of technology in the teaching and learning of mathematics at upper secondary and tertiary level. This is listed as TSG 3.8: Topic Study Group - Strand A C4.10. Specifically, Gail will be talking about Preparing Students for Tomorrow: The role of Technology. The abstract of this paper follows: 

 ABSTRACT: Technology today can retrieve, manage, and analyze vast amounts of data; create complex interactive visualizations; and manipulate mathematical symbols. This increasing power of technology presents the opportunity to focus on understanding and interpreting mathematical results rather than on the traditional content designed to develop procedures. Despite research that suggests technology can make a difference in mathematics teaching and learning, enabling students to build conceptual understanding and engaging them in problems of real interest, technology is too often limited in the classroom. This paper identifies four uses of interactive dynamic technology that can and should play a role in rethinking the mathematics and statistics curriculum at the secondary level. 

 Gail concluded, “Prior to ICME I am attending a roundtable on data science in Auckland, NZ where I am presenting the paper Integrating the Curriculum: Mathematics, Statistics, Statistical literacy, and Data Science.” The abstract appears below. 

 ABSTRACT: Many argue that all students should be prepared for a data driven world, implying statistical/data literacies should be part of their school experience. Across countries, the content in curricular documents at the secondary level related to these topics varies greatly from very little to some data analysis to simulation-based inference. In many countries, statistics is an elective course or added onto the mathematics curriculum. Thus, students not choosing those courses are not prepared to make sense of a world of data or statistical/data content is at the end of a mathematics course and often omitted. This paper argues for integrating mathematics and statistics through data and addresses two research questions: 1) to what extent and how are statistical ideas involving data envisioned and enacted in typical secondary school curricula across different countries and 2) in what ways can data-driven activities be integrated into the secondary school mathematics curriculum. 

 Ishan Santra, a doctoral student in PRIME, noted that the topic study group "TSG 5.5: Social and political dimensions of mathematics education" which accepted his paper for presentation has a time-table during which the papers will be presented by the authors in pre-designated small groups, as group discussions, and then the discussions will be brought to the whole TSG group meetings. These meetings will occur on Monday, 8 July, 2024 (1600 to 1730 hrs), Wednesday, 10 July 2024 (1130 to 1230 hrs), and Friday, 12 July 2024 (1630 to 1800 hrs). All times listed are Australian Standard time. 

The title of Ishan's accepted paper is Educational Assessments As Social-assessments. 

In his ICME-15 presentation, Ishan commented that he is planning to "launch a critical conversation with the existing research literature on the educational  assessment-models and their evolution, arguing that there exists a disciplinary (pertaining to the disciplines of psychology and education research) tendency of hoping against hope in finding an optimal model of assessment to measure learning and inform instruction effectively, all yet towards perpetual failures of the whole project in terms of finding an elixir of something optimal. In this small yet contrastive attempt by foregrounding two participants’ Disciplinary experiences of mathematics (in terms of assessments), Ishan calls for a re-conceptualization of educational (mathematics) assessments as social-assessments."

At ICME-15 there will also be an Early Career Researcher Program (ECRP), which expands upon the Early Career Researcher Day that was held during ICME-13 and ICME-14. Ishan will be participating in the ECRP, which includes a full-day workshop on the day prior to the opening of ICME-15, and other events specifically targeted towards the interests and needs of early career researchers. ECRP attendees will have opportunities to develop their research competencies in various fields, meet with international experts in the field, and establish new contacts to build their networks. 

 Best wishes to Gail and Ishan on their travels and presentations in The Land Down Under!