THE CURVE
WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF THE PROJECT?
The project's vision is to contribute to more and more skilled professionals within the scientific and technological professions; mathematical competencies are the foundation for students' vocational and societal qualifications, and mathematics is an essential part of the basic courses in scientific and technological vocational education.
The purpose of this project is to further develop a community for mathematics teachers in technical vocational education. A mathematics teacher community to improve mathematics teaching towards more concrete, experimental and application-oriented content that can increase the depth of students' understanding of central mathematical concepts.
WHO IS BEHIND?
Funder: Novo Nordisk Foundation - https://novonordiskfonden.dk/da/
For enhanced quality and scalability, Bent Lindhardt, associate professor of mathematics at PA, and Martin Aggerbeck, founder of Idefu and external associate professor at Sustainable Design at Aalborg University, are attached as external consultants and will, as the schools' close partners, be key figures in the project.
Bent Lindhardt has many years of experience in developing mathematics education and is affiliated with the National Center for the Development of Mathematics Education as an expert. He will therefore act as an external consultant on the competence development process and the documentation and evaluation of the project's results.
Martin Aggerbeck has extensive experience in facilitating design processes, especially around science communication and creativity. He will act as an external consultant on the processes of specifying and designing a materialization of mathematics education.
To ensure coherence and common thread throughout the project, Bent and Martin will be part of the organization described below, and in practice they will work closely together on the development of the full project process.
The quality and progress of the project is ensured by establishing two organizational levels, each with its own area of responsibility.
The project must be managed overall by a steering committee, whose responsibility is to make overall decisions about the project's course, content and finances within the framework of the grant, with the overall objective as its goal.
Furthermore, the quality of the project is ensured by establishing a collaboration group consisting of the following, which must qualify the content and coherence of the project, including activities, results and evaluation, and ensure the common thread in the project.
WHICH COURSES ARE PARTICIPATING?
The project targets the following vocational training courses:
Automation and process
Electrician
Mason
Carpenter
HVAC energy
Data and communication
Graphic technician
Landscaper
Blacksmith
Web developer
THE PROJECT IN NUMBERS
Total project budget: DKK 4,918,340.
Project period: 2021 – spring 2024
WHAT ACTIVITIES ARE PART OF THE PROJECT?
The following sub-goals will contribute to the project's objectives:
1. Competence development of mathematics teachers with a focus on a concrete, experimental and application-oriented view of the subject, which can lead to better learning and content choices.
2. Development of dialogic, experimental teaching that increases students' level of understanding and their experience of mathematical competencies as useful in carrying out their chosen profession.
3. Establish and organize a concretization and materialization of mathematical themes aimed at specific professions, including the establishment of a physical mathematics laboratory that supports the above two sub-goals.
4. Documentation of the process and the effect in relation to students' learning with the possibility of scaling the project to other vocational schools.
WHAT ARE THE EXPECTED RESULTS OF THE PROJECT?
The chain of effects can be illustrated as follows:
The project concludes with knowledge sharing of the results and experiences achieved both to didactic development professionals and educational leaders, but also to mathematics teachers at other Danish vocational schools, right through to teaching practice.