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Minutes of November 25, 2000 Meeting - with thanks to Shirley Dalrymple
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Minutes: Field's Mathematics Education Forum
Nov 25, 2000
Present: Rina Cohen, Lynda Colgan, Stewart Craven, Shirley Dalrymple, Lynda Graham, Enid Haley, Peter Harrison, John Kezys, Bill Langford, Miroslav Lovric, Eric Muller (Chair), Eugene Silaev, Chris Suutamm, Peter Taylor, Cheryl Turner, Walter Whitely, Diane Wymer

Regrets: Bradd Hart, Gary Flewelling, Geoffrey Roulet

1. Welcome

2. Minutes of October 14, 2000 meeting, accepted

3. Task Force Reports:
Report 1: Teacher Shortage- Eric Muller

Report 2: Secondary-Tertiary Transition Committee- Stewart Craven (See Appendix - attached)
a) Current state of affairs: Many Universities and Colleges have already decided on their admission requirements 2003-2004. It would be useful to have demonstration sessions for tertiary representatives around how technology fits into the new curriculum
b) Double Cohort: Need to draw up a list of issues that tertiary institutions should be concerned about.
c) Assigned tasks: Hans Bastel- the requirements of apprenticeship programs; Judy Crompton-report on new curriculum and relationship to old; Stewart Craven- prepare documents to compare content old-new; Ed Barbeau- investigate attitude of social science and business faculties regarding new curriculum; Stewart Craven and Ed Barbeau- double cohort issues

Eric will send information that will provide support and information to guidance departments regarding University and College requirements that are now fixed for many universities generally but there is time for adjustments.

Report3: Grade 12U Data Management Course Shirley Dalrymple
-committee members are currently working on a number of tasks: Eric Muller and Sandy Dilena- criteria for the culminating project; Tom Sutton- Exploring "Fathom" as a tool/resource for the course; Sunita Kosta- find an actual Stats Canada problem and develop the model used to answer the question(s); Shirley Dalrymple- explore some simulations that could be used in the course using a TI83
Discussion:
-want to build support for the MOE to license "Fathom" - it was suggested that we begin lobbying OCEPAC but interest in the province needs to be demonstrated; should try to get licenses in Faculties of Education
-support for teachers needed around real conclusions that connect to real world issues is critical to social sciences, need to get help from colleges and universities
-inservice is vital for quality control
-it was suggested that a meeting with the all publishers be set up later in January or early in February
-contact OTF Curriculum forum and apply for one or two 3 day institutes this summer aimed at consultants and heads of departments looking ahead for a draft or sense of this course

4. Keeping informed- Reports from Associations, Societies and Groups: OCMA - John Kerscys
The Ontario Colleges Mathematics Association will be holding its 21st Annual Conference at Georgian College Kempenfelt Conference Centre, Barrie Ontario on May 30 to June 1, 2001. All mathematics educators are invited to attend. The conference web page is
http://www.mohawk.on.ca/dept/math/OCMA/conf01.html (brochure was provided) The AMATYC American Mathematical Association Of Two-Year Colleges will be holding its 27thAnnual Conference on November 15 to 18, 2001. The OCMA is a sponsor of this event and it should attract 1500 mathematics educators to
Toronto. For information contact http:www.amatyc.org/
OAME- Shirley Dalrymple
-lots of information on the OAME web site including: elementary corner, grade 9 charts matching the expectations and the course profiles to all the textbooks with grade 10 to follow, grade 11/12 information is also available as well as the CARE package (Information from the OTF summer institutes on grades 9 and 10)
OMCA - update on the Waterloo math contests- a letter from Ron Scions indicated that the Descartes contest will not be used for admission for the next two years
-exemplars projects 1-8- OMCA has some strong concerns (the ministry training included only 3 of 50 math persons and there were some serious flaws )and (grade 9 the student tasks were good, the student work was good, but the rubrics were bad and the assignment of levels was bad)
Unfortunately the MOE is resistant to slow down training or to move off the tracks.
-annual OMCA working group is occurring in Burlington in January, the issue under discussion will be the Ontario Curriculum Slippage

5. Suggestions for entries on mathematics education pages of the Field's Institute Website
-task forces should have a spot
-links to OAME et al will happen
-send any ideas or information to Bradd Hart and/or Eric Muller

6. Professional Development Workshops for Teachers;
-College of Teachers is not likely to recognize certificates of participation in workshops, right now they are looking at accreditation courses and Masters courses. These courses can be offered by a number of groups so quality control may be an issue.

-Vision: There is a need for the teacher to be scholar. The Glenn Report and Studies around the world are seeing the need for strong math and science education of our young people.
-Where does Field's fit in? Do we offer AQ courses? Do we set criteria and provide "Seal of Approval?" Do we invite AQ proposal to apply for accreditation for additional qualifications courses- to assist with quality control and maintaining integrity of mathematics?
- through the College coordinators we will conduct a survey to get information regarding the existing AQ courses to see what we might recommend.
-this item will be on the agenda at the next Forum meeting
-inservice: ongoing workshops and institutes could be developed by Field's in conjunction with OAME

7. On line math courses: Stewart Craven
-issue under discussion at TDSB: every single student will graduate with 1 on-line credit course, they have a partnership with Alberta to develop 2 online math courses. ILC (Independent Learning Centre) is developing an online grade 9 applied math course
-Stewart has been involved with writing a course for ILC. His concerns are: they need to be attached to a teacher, students must have access to the tools of math, they must include assessment that is rich and provide opportunities to build models, the standards must be the same for both the on line course and the equivalent classroom course.

issues:
-quality comparable to classroom
-implication for teachers
- we could hold a symposium around this topic to discuss concerns around these issues. We need to have some researchers and other individuals in who have had real experience with online courses. For example the University of Brock didn't feel confident doing online courses but we need to discuss both sides of the issues around on line math courses. This item was tabled until the next meeting.

Next meeting January 20, or 27, 2001. Confirmation to follow.

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Eric Muller, Professor of Mathematics and Education
Chair, Department of Mathematics
Director, Concurrent BSc/BEd Program
Brock University
St Catharines, ON phone:- 905 688 5550 ext. 3297
L2S 3A1 fax:- 905 682 9020
email:- emuller@spartan.ac.brocku.ca
url:- http://www.brocku.ca/mathematics/people/muller/