RISK at IOE | The TURS Project

London Mathematics Education Research Seminar Series (LMERSS) 

5:00 - 6:30pm,  Wednesday, 12 January, 2011, at King's College London

Constructing a principled approach to the teaching of risk in mathematics and science 

Dave Pratt, Ralph Levinson and Phillip Kent, Institute of Education, University of London 

[Download the presentation: TURS-seminar-for-LMERSS-2011-01-12.pdf]

Even though talk about risk pervades our daily domestic and working lives, the essential nature of risk is still a matter of debate. Yet, risk is now an element of both the science and mathematics national curricula, a reflection of its perceived significance for society. Psychological research is attempting to understand how people make judgements of risk but, as educationalists, we might wish to intervene in how our students are sensitive to risk-based decision-making. We know that risk is a difficult topic and that the detailed questions about what and how to teach it remain largely unanswered. We report on a research project (funded by the Wellcome Trust) that has been investigating how mathematics and science teachers make sense of risk, how the concept figures in their teaching, and what new possibilities exist for teaching where a cross-curricular and technology-enhanced approach is taken. We will illustrate a decision-making scenario, which explores the different dimensions of risk and points towards some guiding principles for how we might intervene in the learning process.