Re: [MATHEDCC] [Fwd: Help]

Ddeliberto@AOL.COM
Sat, 3 Oct 1998 14:55:51 EDT

When I I was a student at Hofstra University, LI, NY, I worked with Dr. Jerome
Epstein from the computer science department on a project that might be of
interest to you. We were essentially gathering data regarding students
knowledge of mathematics for computer science and math majors at various
points in their four year sequence. A number of difficulties were found with
students math understanding and so a number of activities including
manipulatives were used so that students could "construct" their own knowledge
of mathematics. There was real data and the study was published but I am not
sure how widely the results were shared. In any event, I would suggest you
contact him for the actual data with respect to the college population. I had
piloted the instrument with adults who were taking night classes to improve
their mathematics skills and found it to be very useful.

One comment that I can make briefly is that the manipulatives were effective
once you were able to dispel the notion that this was babyish. I think that
issue is less of a concern now that more use of manipulatives is being done at
the high school level. I also taught high school math and my recollection was
that it was easier to get the adults to buy into manipulatives than the high
school population.

If I can be of any further assistance, please let me know.

Deanna
===================================================
Deanna M. De'Liberto, President/Director of Assessment
D Squared Assessments, Inc.
(Specialists in Test Development/Validation and Test Administration)
9 Bedle Road, Suite 250
Hazlet, NJ 07730-1209
Phone: (732) 888-9339
Email: Ddeliberto@aol.com
Web: http://www.quikpage.com/D/dsquared

Member of the Association of Test Publishers
===================================================

In a message dated 10/3/98 1:20:49 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
glickman@nevada.edu writes:

>
>
>
> --------------------
> Message-ID: <3615543A.25594BD4@nevada.edu>
> Date: Fri, 02 Oct 1998 15:31:22 -0700
> From: Cynthia Glickman <glickman@nevada.edu>
> X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.06 [en] (Win95; U)
> MIME-Version: 1.0
> To: mathedcc <mathedcc@archives.math.utk.edu>
> Subject: Help
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
> Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>
> OKAY, HELP!
>
> I have been searching far and wide for research regarding the use of
> manipulative materials at the college level. Does anyone know where I
> might find something on this topic. Or even better, research on a
> concept approach to college level mathematics. By research I mean an
> actual study that was conducted and hopefully published.
>
> Let me know anything you can come up with. I would greatly appreciate
> it.
>
> Thank you,
> Cynthia
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