Recent Perspectives of Research in Mathematics Education : "Culture" and "Ecology"

Abstract

The aim of this article is to examine two perspectives of the recent research in mathematics education; they would respectively be expressed in two key-words: "culture" and "ecology". The former perspective may be referred to the recognition that mathematics and its education, as a domain of human cultures, have charactors good or bad which are common to all other cultures. The latter ecological perspective would be extended to the argument that even mathematics education should be treated as a complex organic system in its research. These perspectives come from the reflection that in hitherto ways of mathematics teaching, mathematics is apt to be regarded as the absolute entities and its education often falls into the mechanical training. However, in the recent mathematics eduction, especially in elementary schools, the classroom of mathematics comes to proceed in the process of negotiation among pupils being guided by teachers. The auther would like to confirm the legitimity of this way of mathematics education. It would be also suggested why it is desirable to make pupils acquire the knowledge as a whole without making it in pieces and craming.