Introduction for Week 3

Welcome to Week 3 of the course!

This week we will focus on other Asian mathematics teaching methods. As mentioned in the previous step, there are other Asian countries that do well in international comparisons.

There is debate about why this is, and several reasons haven been proposed. As well as the strong structures in place for continuing professional development, there is also something special in the way mathematics is taught.

In Week 3, we focus on two particularly effective principles: Two Basics and Variation theory.

• Two Basics comes from mainland China, and emphasises the importance of knowledge and skills, and how they are closely linked with conceptual understanding.

• Variation theory states that through the use of variation in sequences of tasks, both procedural fluency and conceptual understanding can be reinforced.

We will take a look at each of these two principles during Week 3.