This study aims to provide useful resources for the revision of Korean National Curriculum, and the development and compilation of the textbooks in the future by deriving the implications through a comparative study on the use of calculators in elemen...
This study aims to provide useful resources for the revision of Korean National Curriculum, and the development and compilation of the textbooks in the future by deriving the implications through a comparative study on the use of calculators in elementary mathematics curriculum and textbooks of South Korea, the United States, Finland, and Singapore.
To this end, the following questions were set.
A. What are specified contents with respect to the use of calculators in elementary mathematics curriculum of South Korea, the US, Finland, and Singapore?
B. How can scenes of using calculators in elementary mathematics textbooks of South Korea, the US, Finland, and Singapore be characterized?
1) What are their characteristics by learning stages, mathematics content domains, and the types of using calculators?
2) What are the characteristics of the composition of activities?
In order to solve these problems, each country's elementary mathematics curriculum notified as a completed document as of May 2015, and textbooks for a grade or a semester with the scene of using calculators among those that have relatively high share and many scenes of using calculators in each country were analyzed. Thus, the following curricula and textbooks were selected: 2009 revised curriculum in Korea and the mathematics textbooks reflecting this; Common Core State Standards for Mathematics in the US (CCSSM), Mathematics Framework for California Public Schools in the state of California, Macmillan/McGraw-Hill Math (a textbook by the Macmillan/McGraw-Hill publishing company); National Core Curriculum for Basic Education in Finland, and Laskutaito, a textbook by WSOY Publishing Company (a Korean translated version by the Solbitgil Publishing Company); Mathematics Syllabus Primary in Singapore, and textbooks reflecting this by the Marshall Cavendish Education Publishing Company. The curriculum was analyzed on the basis of classification of characteristics into 'objective', 'content domains and standards', 'teaching and learning method', 'assessment', and characteristics distinguished from other countries. Also, textbooks were analyzed by classifying characteristics into learning stages, mathematics content domains, the types of using calculators, and characteristics of the activity composition. The analysis of textbooks by learning stages was performed on the basis of the number of pages containing the scenes of using calculators and its percentage, the analysis by mathematics content domains and the types of using calculators were on the basis of the number of the scenes of using calculators and its percentage. In addition, the analysis by characteristics of activity composition was based on distinctive aspects of each country.
The comparative analysis of the use of calculators in elementary mathematics curriculum and textbooks of South Korea, the US, Finland and Singapore lead to the following conclusions.
Five conclusions were derived with respect to the elementary mathematics curriculum in each country. First, there was difference in the category covering the use of calculators in each national curriculum document. Second, it was only Singapore among four countries that specified calculators in the 'objective' category. Third, all of South Korea, the US, Finland and Singapore presented the contents related to calculators in 'content domains and standards'. Fourth, South Korea presented the contents related to calculators in 'teaching and learning method' and 'assessment'. Fifth, the US and Singapore set the calculator-related category separately in the mathematics curriculum.
Next, five conclusions were derived with respect to the elementary mathematics textbooks in each country. First, there was difference in timing when the scene of using calculators shows up in textbooks of each country. Second, it was analyzed that the US and Singapore were more active in using calculators compared to South Korea and Finland. Third, all four countries used calculators in ‘number and calculation’ domain, but not in ‘geometry’ domain. Fourth, each country had difference in the number and kinds of the types of using calculators in textbooks. Fifth, each country had very different characteristics of the activity composition using calculators.
Although previous studies related to calculators in the education of mathematics emphasized the use of calculators as an effective learning tool, those did not provide the comparative analysis of at what the level different countries deal with the use of calculators in the mathematics curriculum and textbooks. Thus, to complement the paucity of those studies, a comparative analysis on the use of calculators among countries was conducted in this study, which subsequently is expected to provide useful information in improving the curriculum and textbooks.
Keywords : Calculator, Curriculum, Scene of using calculators, Textbook
，韩语毕业论文，韩语论文 |
