This is a call for volunteers to take part in my tiny research project into how adults use and learn maths.

I've mentioned a couple of times that I'm doing a part-time BA Education course. G dragged me into this when I was made redundant as a way of getting back in touch with what is going on in adult and further education after being in a fairly specialised niche for more than 15 years.

It is interesting and enjoyable, but hard work!

Anyway, one of the modules is about numeracy, that is, how people use maths in their work and in their lives generally. We're now starting to work towards the assignment and for that I need a few victims volunteers to help me with my project.

What's involved?

Though most of the class will be doing face-to-face interviews, I plan to conduct my research via the Net. As all of you out there are happy communicating via LJ, email and chat/IM, I felt this would be the easiest way to manage the project, especially as it would allow me to perhaps use people from different countries, which might throw up some interesting differences. Or not, but that would be interesting too. ☺ ( More details here... )

How many people do I need?

I need 3 people, though if more of you would like to take part, I could probably cope with 5-6 max. All the interviews have to be transcribed and analysed and this is only a small assignment, not a major research project.

What level of maths are you looking for?

Not too high, please! If you use a lot of maths in your job (eg you're a computer programmer or engineer) and/or you have a maths degree, then sadly you are probably too good at maths for my purposes. I'm looking for people with a level of maths similar to myself (did A-level many years ago and now forgotten most of it) or lower. In fact people who lack confidence in maths and feel they really ought to know more would be ideal subjects. (See below re learning plan.)


What do I get out of this?

Firstly, a warm glow of satisfaction at helping me! ☺

Secondly, you will be helping, albeit in a small way, to improve maths teaching. My husband, G, is very interested in the teaching of maths. He has already given papers at international academic conferences on the subject and it will be the subject of his second PhD. Maths is often taught very badly -- as I'm sure some of you may be aware -- but without research into how people tackle maths problems and finding out exactly where they get stuck, it's impossible to devise better teaching strategies. The projects we BA Education students are doing are likely to feed into G's research.

Thirdly, as part of the assignment, I have to devise a learning plan for my subjects. So if you are interested in knowing how to improve your maths, then this could be helpful. On the other hand, that part is optional (for you, not me!). There is, of course, no obligation for you to learn any more maths unless you want to.

If you're interested in volunteering, please say so in a comment to this post.

Thank you.

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ETA: I do now have three volunteers, which is sufficient for my needs, but if you're interested in taking part, please feel free to add a comment. Depending on how time consuming the process ends up being, it may be possible to use more people. Also, G is interested in bilingual people because the PhD he's planning on doing next will be looking at whether being bilingual helps or hinders the acquisition of maths skill.

Tags: ba education, maths, maths project
Current Mood: busy

I have three deadlines looming next week. (Possibly 4 if you count the Research Methods assignment which I could take longer over, but which I want to get out of the way.) This might account for the rather stressful dream I had last night.

I therefore decided that I need to focus on at least a couple of things today and get them finished in order to take some pressure off.

First success this morning was finishing a poem for the A215 Creative Writing assignment. After being stuck for ages with 1.5 poems, I finally struggled the second one into submission. I now have the two poems^[*] required for the TMA03 (ie third assignment).

I still have to let the second poem (a sort of sonnet, ie it has the rhyme scheme, but the metre isn't strict) sit for a bit so I can see whether it needs a final tweak. I also need to write the Reflection, but the most difficult part is done!

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^[*] The assignment asked for 40 lines of poetry (plus or minus 10%) and I had toyed with the idea of doing another sestina, which proved successful when I did the introductory poetry writing course, but the opinion in the forums was that doing two poems enabled you to show off more poetic techniques than just one, so that's what I've opted for.

Tags: a215, ba education
Current Mood: accomplished

I have to give a seminar next Thursday as part of the assessment for the BA Education course. This is a new thing for me and I've been thrashing around trying to get something coherent out of the vague idea that I started with.

However, I now have the bulk of the briefing sheet done, most of a PowerPoint presentation and the seminar now has a shape. I knew from the beginning that it would be about lifelong learning, but of course that is a huge topic. Anyway, I've managed to prune away the distracting sidetracks and I now have what I hope will be a strong thread running through the talk and discussion.

Oh, and I'm sure you'll all be pleased to know that My Typing Round Cat skills have returned. ☺

You know, I hadn't realised how truly sedentary I had become until Aimee arrived. I now have to jump up from the computer every so often to let her into the kitchen or out of the kitchen or to persuade her to stop wowling in a forlorn manner at the bottom of the stairs and come and sit on my lap instead.

I'm sure it's much better for me.

Tags: aimee, ba education, cats
Current Mood: cheerful and productive