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Helping Aboriginal Students to Understand Mathematics and Science Concepts

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 July 2015

R.M. Hastie  and
D.F. Treagust
R.M. Hastie
Affiliation:
Goldfields Regional Education Office, Kalgoorlie, W.A. 6430
D.F. Treagust
Affiliation:
Science and Mathematics Education Centre, Western Australian Inst. of Technology, Bentley, WA, 6102
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Extract

Teachers of Aboriginal children in Australia often have the problem of adapting or modifying curriculum materials which have been developed to meet the needs of the average white Australian/European child. For science and mathematics teachers especially, we believe that appropriate adaptation is essential to ensure that Aboriginal children are better able to comprehend the concepts involved. Many of these concepts at the primary school level involve some aspect of conserving quantities. For example, take a simple experiment where a child is asked to find out whether or not aluminium foil sinks in water. Its flotation, of course, is dependent on shape. The child may roll the aluminium foil into a ball, or flatten it out, and place it in the water. What happens can be observed and discussed and reported. But what if the child thinks this aluminium foil has some unexplainable properties? Maybe it not only changes shape but also its weight! Certainly, on the surface this may appear to be a typical case of nonconservation of weight, but perhaps this is a direct consequence of working with unusual materials and is not a true indicator of mental development!

Type
Research Article
Information
The Australian Journal of Indigenous Education , Volume 13 , Issue 4 , September 1985 , pp. 8 - 15
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1985

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