The Best of Our Knowledge
(2008-05-05)
Listen Now:
ALBANY, NY
(WAMC) -
NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION SERIES
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THE SOUNDS OF PROGRESS: THE CHANGING ROLE
OF GIRLS AND WOMEN IN SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING
THE ROLE OF GENDER IN LANGUAGE USED BY CHILDREN AND PARENTS WORKING ON MATHEMATICAL TASKS
It's a challenge for parents and teachers to help students develop positive
self-beliefs in math at an early age. But it's important children gain that confidence while they are young, so they can become successful in math throughout their lives.
Research has found gender-based differences in how parents perceive
their children's abilities in mathematics. For example, In 2002 one such
study found that parents of 7-year old boys rated their children's competence higher than did parents of 7-year old girls. Other research from 1998
revealed that even when girls received better grades than boys in math,
parents of daughters reported that they believe their daughters had lower
math ability than did parents of sons. Another study one year earlier,
found that children's competence beliefs are shaped by their parent's expectations more than by grades given by teachers. Parent's beliefs
not only impact children's self-efficacy, but also the experience they
provide for their children.
Mathematics researchers at the Curriculum Development & Research
Group at the University of Hawaii, have extended that research by
recruiting 100 child-parent teams called dyads to participate in their study.
These teams perform tasks that encourage high levels of interaction
between parent and child. And then researchers analyze videotapes for
evidence of gender-related differences on how children and parents
interact when working on: spatial tasks in geometry...patterning tasks
in algebra...and tasks related to numbers and operations.
Thus far, the inquiry is uncovering results that could inform the mathematics community and hopefully will contribute to finding ways to increase the representation of women in mathematics, engineering, computer technology,
and the physical sciences. The Hawaii research team continues to transcribe
and code its video recordings. They expect to analyze the data throughout
the remainder of this year, before publishing final results in peer reviewed journals.. But here now for the very first time are some early findings.
Kayla Rosenfeld reports. (15:17)
* The preceding material is supported by the National Science Foundation
under Grant HRD 0631603. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or
recommendations expressed in this story, are those of th authors, and
do not necessarily reflect those of the National Science Foundation.
* Featured in the above story are:
Co-Lead Researchers, Dr. Judith Olson and Dr. Milfried Olson, University
of Hawaii's Curriculum Research and Development Group, Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii; Claire Okazaki, Research Team; Alice Taum, Lab School's Program
and Evaluation Section; Parent-Child Dyad Teams: She-Von Buan & Deborah Buan; Thiara Brunner & I Made Brunner
* Program Directors and Listeners please note. If you would like to hear
this story again, and other similar stories in this series, visit our website
at www.womeninscience.org. The click on The Sounds of Progress button.
MATHEMATICS ADVISORY PANEL -
Because we're focusing on math in this show, we wanted to briefly
mention a report just issued by a National Mathematics Advisory Panel,
Chaired by Dr. Larry Faulkner. We'll have more about this and hear from
Dr. Faulkner in a future TBOOK. But we asked Education Secretary,
Margaret Spellings, what she hopes will happen now that the study is
complete? If you would like to read the Math Panel's full report, it's online
at www.ed.gov.
Dr. Karen Hitchcock reports. (2:00)
NEW STATION WELCOME -
We want to give a special welcome to another new station that's joined
The Best of Our Knowledge family. Hello goes out to KELA, 1470 AM in
Seattle-Tacoma, Washington. Enjoy the shows!
Dr. Karen Hitchcock. (:30)
© Copyright 2012, WAMC
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