Science Educators Also Under Fire By Traditionalist Math Warriors #3

Some blog followers be interested in a recent post “Science Educators Also Under Fire By Traditionalist Math Warriors #3” [Hake (2012)]. The abstract reads:

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ABSTRACT: Stacy Brown (2012) of the Research in Undergraduate Mathematics Education (RUME) list wrote at http://bit.ly/V55OTz (paraphrasing):

"Mathematics educators such as Jo Boaler (2012) http://bit.ly/R6XsuP are not the only academics who have had the misfortune of encountering attacks from Wayne Bishop. Science educators who worked with Cal Tech’s Precollege Science Initiative (CAPSI) project http://bit.ly/T9qRsv have been subjected to treatment from Bishop who called on federal funding agencies to audit several of their science projects in California in the hopes that the grant’s funds would be revoked.”

Further evidence that Traditionalist Math Warriors (TMW’s) such as Bishop, Hansen, and “Haim” are virulently opposed to ALL attempts (not just those in math education) to depart from “direct instruction”. . . . [in the sense used by the “Mathematically Correct Science Corner” http://bit.ly/bfzdZS: “drill and practice,” “non-hands-on,” “teach ’em the facts”; and “non-discovery-learning,” where “discovery learning” means setting students adrift either in aimless play or ostensibly to discover on their own, say, Archimedes’ principle or Newton’s Second Law - see Hake (2008b) at http://bit.ly/bHTebD]. . . . can be had by visiting the OPEN! archives http://bit.ly/eOTrs1 of Math-Teach, a den of TMW's. See, for example, the posts of:
(a) Bishop: click on “att1.html” near the top of the page at http://bit.ly/RBMyPZ and http://bit.ly/XoaQxx;
(b)"Haim" at http://bit.ly/RBDpHa, http://bit.ly/RTNfBB, and http://bit.ly/QmM5gb; and
(c) Hansen at http://bit.ly/S1Rcpn and http://bit.ly/U4LDJx.

Hansen's response at http://bit.ly/XkAtiO to my post “Re: Casualty of the Math Wars” at http://bit.ly/R1q22j is typical of the pathologic excess of TMW rhetoric. Hansen wrote: “I am quite content to keep [education researchers] in check by pointing out their lack of honesty and method. These poor bastards are pandering to social elements, not mathematics. . . . . Zealots full of ideology, devoid of fact or logic.. . . . Hakes and Boalers are part of the weather, albeit, the bad part. . . . . These poor bastards have been struggling for 40 years and they will struggle for another 40 years. I suspect that eventually they will move on to something other than mathematics, cause it really isn’t working out for them here. But I don’t suspect they will change their ways.”
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To access the complete 19 kB post please click on http://bit.ly/QuqXqo.

Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University
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REFERENCES [URL shortened by http://bit.ly/ and accessed on 18 Oct 2012.]

Hake, R.R. 2012. “Science Educators Also Under Fire By Traditionalist Math Warriorsn #3,” online on the OPEN! AERA-L archives at http://bit.ly/QuqXqo. Post of 18 Oct 2012 07:47:21-0700 to AERA-L and Net-Gold. The abstract and link to the complete post are being transmitted to several discussion lists.