• Communications of Mathematical Education
• /
• v.30 no.2
• /
• pp.121-138
• /
• 2016

Most of elementary and secondary school mathematical terms in Korean are Sino-Korean words. We check Chinese characters relating to such Sino-Korean words by using Chinese dictionaries, and critically judge how much we can understand Sino-Korean words by Chinese characters. Through this search, we classify Sino-Korean words into three categories; words which can be understood by Chinese characters, words which can not be understood by Chinese characters, words which are misunderstood by Chinese characters.

• Journal of Elementary Mathematics Education in Korea
• /
• v.15 no.3
• /
• pp.599-617
• /
• 2011

This study is aimed at finding some drawbacks of current elementary mathematics textbooks and to give suggestions for ongoing new textbooks according to 2009 revised curriculums, by comparing and analyzing Korean textbooks and chinese textbooks of People's Education Press. The areas are confined to number concepts, addition and subtraction for comparative analyzing. The results are followings: Korea textbooks have more verbal expressions, designated instructive activities for students to do, similar algorithm applied for enlarging mathematical concepts, bigger number concepts and number usage of operations, and monotonous number sense activities. Therefore Korean textbooks, compared to China's, is more weaker in areas such as encouraging student's interest, in challenging mathematics, and in forming fundamental mathematical concept.

• Research in Mathematical Education
• /
• v.10 no.3 s.27
• /
• pp.205-213
• /
• 2006

In this research, we interviewed primary school teachers and students with hypothetical situations questions and got a comprehensive picture of the status quo of what is happening in the new mathematics classrooms of Mainland China, that is, teachers' conceptions of mathematics and their teaching approaches influence the students' conceptions of mathematics to a large extent. For the teacher who emphasizes the precision and rigidity of mathematics, her students focus on the superficial characteristics of mathematics. On the contrary, for the teacher who believes that mathematics is an open process, related to real life and rich in content, her students are more interested in mathematics and have more diverse conceptions.

• Research in Mathematical Education
• /
• v.14 no.4
• /
• pp.361-380
• /
• 2010

Some 400 Secondary One (i.e. seventh-grade) students from 10 schools were provided with non-routine mathematical problems in their normal mathematics classes as exercises for one academic year. Their attitudes toward mathematics, their conceptions of mathematics and their problem-solving performance were measured both in the beginning and at the end of the year. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that the introduction of an appropriate dose of non-routine problems would generate some effects on the students' conceptions of mathematics. A medium dose of non-routine problems (as reported by the teachers) would result in a change of the students' conception of mathematics to perceiving mathematics as less of "a subject of calculables." On the other hand, a high dose would lead students to perceive mathematics as more useful and more as a discipline involving thinking. However, with a low dose of non-routine problems, students found mathematics more "friendly" (free from fear). It is therefore proposed that the use of non-routine mathematical problems to an appropriate extent can induce changes in students' "lived space" of mathematics learning and broaden their conceptions of mathematics and mathematics learning.

• Research in Mathematical Education
• /
• v.11 no.1
• /
• pp.33-51
• /
• 2007

The present study explores mathematics teachers' understanding of division by zero and their approaches to explaining the impossibility of division by zero. This study analyzes Chinese and Korean middle school mathematics teachers' responses to the teaching task of explaining the impossibility of dividing 7 by zero, and examples of teachers' reasoned explanations for their answers are presented. The findings from this study suggest that most Korean teachers offer multiple types of mathematical explanations for justifying the impossibility of division by zero, while Chinese teachers' explanations were more uniform and based less on mathematical ideas than those of their Korean counterparts. Another finding from this study is that teachers' particular conceptions of zero were strongly associated with their justifications for the impossibility of division by zero, and the influence of the teachers' conceptions of zero was revealed as a barrier in composing a well-reasoned explanation for the impossibility of division by zero. One of the practical implications of this study is those teachers' basic attitudes toward always attempting to give explanations for mathematical facts or mathematical concepts do not seem to be derived solely from their sufficient knowledge of the facts or concepts of mathematics.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
• /
• v.24 no.2
• /
• pp.1-15
• /
• 2011

Approximation is a very useful approach in mathematics research. It was the same in traditional Chinese and Chosun mathematics. This study derived five characteristics from approximation approaches which were found in Chinese and Chosun mathematical books: improvement of approximate values, common and inevitable use of approximate values, recognition of approximate values and their reasons, comparison of their exactness, application of approximate principles. Through these characteristics, we can infer what Chinese and Chosun mathematicians recognized approximate values and how they manipulated them. They took approximate approaches by necessity or for the sake of convenience in mathematical study and its applications. Also, they tried to improve the degree of exactness of approximate values and use the inverse calculations to check them.

• Research in Mathematical Education
• /
• v.6 no.2
• /
• pp.107-116
• /
• 2002

Geometry is one of the important parts of Chinese school mathematics. There is a large difference in teaching and contents (standards, curriculum) between the US and China. Many mathematics educators in both countries are trying to reform the instruction of geometry and have made some progress. Close attention has been given to the Principles and Standards for School Mathematics (NCTM 2000), in which we have found many good ideas. In this paper, we introduce new developments of school geometry in China and have made some comparisons between the US and China. The new technology is becoming popular step by step in Chinese high schools. We believe we should learn from each other and exchange the ideas. In doing this mathematics teaching will be improved.

• Education of Primary School Mathematics
• /
• v.18 no.1
• /
• pp.1-16
• /
• 2015

This study is a comparative study on the Korean and Chinese elementary school mathematics curriculum. Korea and China have announced a new mathematics curriculum in 2011, and have recently carried out in the whole school year. Korea and China are the countries to manage the national curriculum. The comparison with China is significant because of the similarity of our tradition and culture. In addition, the influence of Chinese education has been increasing gradually. Thus, the curriculum comparison between China and Korea has a significant value. Through this study, I extract the significant implications of mathematics education in Korea. This study can be summarized as the following. First, I have analyzed the elementary mathematics curriculum document systems in Korea and China. Second, I compared the goals of mathematics education in Korea and China. Third, this study compared the content areas and learning in elementary school mathematics curriculum in Korea and China. Fourth, I have analyzed the teaching and learning methods and the assessment of Korea and China. Finally, we compared and analyzed the proposed points for action set out in elementary school mathematics curriculum courses in Korea and China. The results of this study are expected to provide significant implications for the new curriculum document structure and mathematical contents of Korea.

• Journal of Educational Research in Mathematics
• /
• v.27 no.3
• /
• pp.451-467
• /
• 2017

This study examined how the distributive principles(DP) works in our elementary school textbooks and work books to figure out the implications for developing the elementary mathematics curriculum and textbooks. For this purpose, Chinese and Japanese elementary textbooks were reviewed and five criteria for the analysis of Korean textbooks and workbooks were prepared by the review. The analysis showed that Korean textbooks and work books are inefficient to handle DP in many ways. Based on these findings, this study suggested that the DP should be codified into the curriculum and explicitly dealt with in elementary math textbooks.

• Research in Mathematical Education
• /
• v.3 no.2
• /
• pp.69-88
• /
• 1999

The Hong Kong mathematics curriculum has launched its reform in recent years. It was the first time that a holistic review of syllabi from Primary 1 through Secondary 7 was made. The curriculum development agency also decided to base the reform on sound pedagogical foundations. That was assisted with academic research where the views of various stakeholders were investigated in detail. Surveys were conducted with students, parents, teachers, employers, university professors, and curriculum designers and they give a full picture of mathematics teaching and learning in Hong Kong. The rich data collected should shed light on the development of mathematics curriculum in other regions with similar socio-cultural and educational settings.