Republic of Mathematics blog

Archive for January 2010

Is commutativity of multiplication a natural concept?

Posted by: Gary Ernest Davis on: January 30, 2010

This post is a response to a tweet of Chiara Maieron, and a follow-up from Christopher Simpson. The original tweet was: “chiamai @republicofmath Heard kid who could multiply 4*9 but had troubles w 9*4 and wondered if commutativity concept is natural for math students ” My initial response was that it depends on the kid’s […]

How not to report Pearson's r: a cautionary tale in mathematical cognition

Posted by: Gary Ernest Davis on: January 27, 2010

Mark Ashcraft is a Professor of Psychology at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He specializes in mathematical cognition. In his own words, he: investigates issues in mathematical cognition, asking questions such as “What do people know about numbers, arithmetic, and math?” and “How do we learn math?” In 2007 Mark Ashcraft published a paper […]