Math is a universal subject and its rich history of discovery across the world is worth mentioning. Humans are critical thinkers and math arouses topics that explain how things are around us. Different discoveries around the world lead to new findings, and applying how the people in the past figured things out without the use of technology is astounding. They understand that the math mysteries are deep within nature. A certain concept is called differently throughout history. The credit should be given to anyone who independently came up with the idea. I like to not only call it Pascal’s triangle, but also the Staircase of Mount Meru or Yang Hui’s triangle. How the information came to be in our school books doesn’t come in a blink. It is through eons of discovery and trials, and it gives the evidence of the first forms of applications/usage.
Math is displayed as a learning subject that evolves throughout time. I see how math notations and instructional styles taught 300 years ago during Newton’s time are not the same as today. How students learn math around the world is also unique, so knowing the universal history of math allows a better context for the entirety of the subject’s exploration. It’s like many flowing streams branching out of a large basin. Why study and row in one stream when it's connected to all other streams? The deeper awareness of math in its intrinsic and extrinsic nature reminded me of the Philosophy of Mathematics course I earlier took. How to analyze math per se in its rigor and asking questions on the realistic or abstract meanings of mathematical concepts will allow students to think deeper and openly.
The article allowed me to better know the benefits of having a deeper mathematical foundation through learning its rich history of discoveries. I know I will mostly bring up a lot of topics done differently in grade school compared to university (eg. the notations, change of definitions), so it is fascinating to see why that is. Finding and setting some time aside to implement some history in the classroom initially seems complicated, but bringing forth some historical problems which lead to what is being studied gives a background context for why certain topics are being studied in the classrooms.
Hi Michael, I enjoyed your weaving of multiple histories, philosophy of mathematics, and what could be called politics of mathematics curriculum. Your questions are thoughtful and I appreciated your highlighting of giving credit where credit is due. I wonder about how you might engage with these questions and issues with your future students. Are there particular issues or questions you would want to integrate into a math activity or lesson?
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