Book Reviews - February 2008 - Volume 108 (2)

Understanding Mathematics and Science Matters

Editors: Thomas A. Romberg, Thomas P. Carpenter, Fae Dremock
Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 10 Industrial Avenue, Mahwah, New Jersey 07430
2005; 352 pages, Hardback $95.95, Paperback $34.50

Reviewer: Juliana Utley
Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK 74078

Understanding Mathematics and Science Matters offers the reader a variety of research that provides evidence of how students learn mathematics and/or science with understanding. The authors indicate that the purpose of this book is not only to report their findings and conclusions but to help the reader create an image of what mathematics and science classrooms could be like if they adhere to current standards-based reform and teaching for understanding.

This book is divided into four parts. Part I consists of one chapter that provides a theoretical framework on standards-based reform and what it means to teach for understanding for each of the other chapters. Learning with understanding is the focus of part II and consists of seven chapters that give the reader a glimpse into mathematics and science classrooms where the focus is student understanding. For example, the reader gets a sense of what modeling and argumentation looks like in both mathematics and science classrooms; how to algebrafy mathematics and develop algebraic reasoning; how students use modeling in science to collect, analyze, and make conjectures; and how to use computer tools to analyze statistical data. In part III, teaching with understanding, the focus moves to professional development and teacher change to meet the current reform efforts in mathematics and science education. The last section contains two chapters that focus on assessment practices and organizational support for change associated with standards-based reform.

Overall, the book addressed a variety of educational levels and subject areas. While there are books are on the market that discuss either mathematics or science education in terms of reform efforts, a strength of this book is how it addresses both mathematics and science as well as illustrates the similarities between reform efforts in both content areas.

Teacher educators could easily use this book as required reading to facilitate discussions about learning and teaching that centers on student sense-making. While this book could be used by either mathematics or science educators, it would be an excellent book to use in an integrated mathematics and science course. The editors suggest that “practitioners, policymakers, and the public can be helped to see the validity of the reform recommendations, understand recommended guidelines, and use these to transform the teaching and learning of mathematics and science in U.S. classrooms” (p. xi). Selections from this book would be great recommended reading for parents that are trying to understand changes that are happening in their child's mathematics and science classrooms.

The Discoveries: Great Breakthroughs in 20th Century Science

Author: Alan Lightman
Pantheon Books, New York
2005; 553 pages, Hardback $32.50

Reviewer: Robert J. Whitaker
Missouri State University, Springfield, MO 65897

You have been asked to select the 25 most important papers published in science during the 20th century. Which ones would you select? This was the task undertaken by the editor of this useful collection. The selections are arranged chronologically, and longer ones have been condensed. (A table at the end of the book indicates which ones.) These include eleven in physics (Planck's pioneering paper on the quantum is the first); nine in biology/medicine; one in chemistry (Pauling); and four in astronomy. The last selection is the 1972 paper by Jackson, Symons, and Berg on recombinant DNA. Many, but not all, of the authors received the Nobel Prize for their work.

The editor introduces each paper with an informative essay that illustrates its importance to its discipline at the time of its publication and its later influence. He provides a full bibliographic citation to the original publication data and includes some additional references on the subject or the author.

One unaccustomed to reading original papers in the journals may be surprised to find that many are readable and interesting. One can also see how the style of technical writing has changed over 75 years and how the style of each discipline has its own variations. Let us compare two brief examples. Einstein's 1905 paper introducing his theory of special relativity begins: “It is known that Maxwell's electrodynamics-as usually understood at the present time-when applied to moving bodies, leads to asymmetries which do not appear to be inherent in the phenomena.” Compare this to the (apparent) understatement introduction by Watson and Crick in their short 1953 letter to Nature announcing the structure of DNA: “We wish to suggest a structure for the salt of deoxyribose nucleic acid (D.N.A.). This structure has novel features which are of considerable biological interest.” Does the reader not want to see where the authors are going with this?

Several papers report theoretical explanations of phenomena; the majority report the results of experimental studies with explanations of data. Perhaps most important for the reader is the guidance authors take in guiding the reader through their report and the arguments each marshals to bring it to a meaningful conclusion. One will observe the interaction of theory and experiment as employed by the different disciplines. While the original thoughts of the researcher may be challenging or demanding for the reader, they provide a contrast to the predigested conclusions of the subject that may be found in most textbooks. Individually and collectively these papers guide the reader to a tentative answer to the question: “What is science?”

Thus, the reader will encounter pioneering papers on the theory of the atom (Rutherford; Bohr; von Laue; Heisenberg; Pauling). Is the atom a subject for physics or for chemistry? There are papers on the biochemistry of living organisms (Bayliss and Starling on hormones; Fleming on penicillin; Krebs and Johnson on metabolism; McClintock on moveable genes; etc.). Is biochemistry biology or chemistry? And there are papers on the size of the universe and the “big bang” (Leavitt; Hubble; Penzias and Wilson; Dicke, et al.). Is all science “experimental?” These are suggestive of what one will find in this varied collection. In the end the reader will have gained a perspective on the growth of these sciences during the last century.

Other collections of reprints of original papers exist, but they usually include only one discipline or subject area. This collection includes representation from several (although geology is missing). While one might quibble about a favorite paper being missing, this remains a valuable resource for both teachers and their students. It should be included in all school libraries and in the libraries of all science teachers.