Teachers move to bring maths on line

After researching and testing various IT products, the Irish Maths Teachers' Association (IMTA) is recommending a software pack based on interactive teaching to its members for use in the classroom. Maths teachers, who are due to start a course at education centres in the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs), are to learn how to use this pack, MathView, along with Geometer's Sketch-Pad and any spread package, such as Microsoft's Excel, which are also being recommended by the IMTA.

According to Seamus Knox, national co-ordinator of the ICT schools' integration project at the National Centre for Technology in Education (NCTE) for schools, MathView will form an essential part of this course.

The software pack claims to provide "a singularly unique environment in which to manipulate symbolic mathematics and explore ideas through exceptional graphing facilities." It is produced by the Canadian group, Waterloo Maple.

Maths teachers, who take part this winter in ICT courses on the use of MathView, will also learn about the educational benefits of linking into the Internet and using the web as an effective teaching resource, says John Marshall, publisher and marketing agent for MathView. The use of these as teaching resources are at embryonic stage, he says. Tim Brophy, acting deputy principal of the CBS Nenagh and author of an accompanying manual for MathView, has been using this programme for the past eight years. "It allows you to teach children on a computer screen," he says. "They will do things on the screen that you want them to do themselves. It has splendid graphics, which can be animated. It's particularly suitable for alegbra, co-ordinate geometry, calculus and vectors."

The IMTA, he explains, ran a course for trainers last August and these trainers, "are to go out two by two to convert the multitude, running courses in every county throughout the winter, starting in two weeks."

The teacher still has to teach, he says. "The teacher can design it and have complete control of it. Students can make any error and the programme will follow on logically from their command."

Originally, Brophy read about the package in a computer magazine. He bought it and brought it into the school and he's been hooked ever since, he says. It's hoped that a pilot project to assess the effectiveness of MathView in Irish schools will be set up by November. Given a successful outcome, the NCTE is expected to recommend MathView for use in all schools.