Psychology 3443G-001
Development of the Mathematical Brain
If there is a discrepancy between the outline posted below and the outline posted on the OWL course website, the latter shall prevail.
1.0 CALENDAR DESCRIPTION
An examination of how children develop numerical abilities from infancy onwards, focusing on the roles of memory, spatial ability and language. The course will also examine well-publicized studies on the poor levels of performance in mathematics among North American students and compare this to student performance in other countries.Prerequisites: Psychology 2820E or both Psychology 2800E and 2810, and one of Psychology 2040A/B, 2220A/B, 2221A/B, 2410A/B, or Neuroscience 2000
3 lecture/seminar hours, 0.5 course
Unless you have either the requisites for this course or written special permission from your Dean to enroll in it, you may be removed from this course and it will be deleted from your record. This decision may not be appealed. You will receive no adjustment to your fees in the event that you are dropped from a course for failing to have the necessary prerequisites.
2.0 COURSE INFORMATION
Instructor: Daniel AnsariOffice and Phone Number: 325 East, Westminster Hall
Office Hours: Mondays 11.30am-1.30pm (or by appointment – please use e-mail to schedule)
Email: daniel.ansari@uwo.ca
Teaching Assistant: Anna Matejko
Office: 215 East, Westminster Hall
Office Hours: Fridays 9.00am-11.00am (or by appointment – please use e-mail to schedule)
Email: amatejko@uwo.ca
Time and Location of Classes: SSC-3024, Thursdays, 3.30-6.30pm
If you or someone you know is experiencing distress, there are several resources here at Western to assist you. Please visit: http://www.uwo.ca/uwocom/mentalhealth/ for more information on these resources and on mental health.
Please contact the course instructor if you require material in an alternate format or if you require any other arrangements to make this course more accessible to you. You may also wish to contact Services for Students with Disabilities (SSD) at 519-661-2111 ext 82147 for any specific question regarding an accommodation.
3.0 TEXTBOOK
The readings, with a few exceptions, will be recently published, peer-reviewed journal articles or book chapters. For this course to be productive, interesting, and successful it is imperative that you do all the readings. For your convenience I have posted the readings on the OWL website (https://owl.uwo.ca) for this course. If you have difficulties accessing the materials or if you find that materials are missing from the website, please contact the TA.4.0 COURSE OBJECTIVES
The first aim is to enable students to gain a detailed understanding of how children develop numerical abilities. The emphasis will be on the development of mathematical skills. We will review psychological, educational, evolutionary, and neuroscientific perspectives on number development. The course takes a journey from infant numerical abilities to children’s difficulties with fractions and cross-cultural differences in mathematical abilities. Against the background of research findings, we will be discussing the various developmental changes in children’s numerical understandings. The second aim is to encourage students to think about mathematical education and development from multiple perspectives and to see the relationships between education and basic research in this field. The final objective of the course is to develop reading, presentation, critical thinking, writing, and public communication skills.5.0 EVALUATION
Class attendance & participation: This course depends on your active participation in the class discussions. It is therefore crucial that you make every effort to attend every class and come prepared to participate. Often the instructor will ask for definitions of terms from a previous class and thereby conduct a mini-review of the preceding class at the beginning of each class. Your active participation is required for this part of each class.5- page paper: You are required to write a paper of no more than 5 pages (double spaced, excluding references). Longer papers will be penalized. During the second week the instructor will circulate a list of 5 possible essay topics/questions. You are required to pick one of these topics for your paper. In your paper you should not merely rely on the class readings, but go beyond them and do your own independent literature searches. The Midterm paper is due by 11pm via Owl on Monday, February, 22nd, 2015
Presentation: During the first week of term you are required to choose a class during which you will present the readings and extra materials relevant to your chosen week’s topic. The instructor will provide a list of topics/questions for each week for you to choose from. This will give you the opportunity to review a topic in substantial depth and go beyond the assigned readings. You will be required to give a 10-15 minute visual presentation. In your presentation you should state the major questions and problems addressed in the literature you have reviewed. You should review BOTH the literature assigned AND other relevant literature that you have found through independent literature searches.
Podcast: Your podcast should cover one of the topics/questions/issues covered in the course. You will be expected to show your ability to engage a broad audience and to incorporate media to enliven your piece, such as interviews, and sound effects (for podcasts). We will discuss the research, writing, and production processes in class and a detailed rubric will be provided which both the instructor and your fellow students will use to assess your project: this will give you a more detailed sense of what will make a strong submission
This assignment is broken down into several stages:
• A 2-page analysis of an existing podcast that focuses on research in Psychology and/or Cognitive Neuroscience. Describe the structure of the podcast and features that made it effective or ineffective. (Due via Owl by noon, Thursday January 28th)
• Your final project in draft form (written script) should be submitted for peer review by your classmates through the course website. (Due via Owl by noon, Thursday March 3rd).
• Peer review: review the scripts assigned to you. For each project, provide half a page of discussion of the content and structure (single spaced) and suggest 1 thing its creator could do to make it even stronger. (Due via Owl by noon, Thursday March 10th)
• Your final podcast plus the script (as a word document) needs to be submitted via the course website. Please include a separate document listing the sources you used. (Due via Owl by 11pm on Sunday, April 3rd).
Assignment summary
Class attendance and participation (5%)
5-page Paper (25%) Presentation (25%) Podcast analysis (5%)
Peer-review of podcast scripts (5%)
Final Podcast Project (35%)
Although the Psychology Department does not require instructors to adjust their course grades to conform to specific targets, the expectation is that course marks will be distributed around the following averages:
70% 1000-level and 2000-level courses
72% 2190-2990 level courses
75% 3000-level courses
80% 4000-level courses
The Psychology Department follows the University of Western Ontario grading guidelines, which are as follows (see http://www.uwo.ca/univsec/pdf/academic_policies/general/grades_undergrad.pdf ):
A+ 90-100 One could scarcely expect better from a student at this level
A 80-89 Superior work that is clearly above average
B 70-79 Good work, meeting all requirements, and eminently satisfactory
C 60-69 Competent work, meeting requirements
D 50-59 Fair work, minimally acceptable
F below 50 Fail
6.0 TEST AND EXAMINATION SCHEDULE
7.0 CLASS SCHEDULE
January 7th: Introduction to the Course: Review of Topics and Assignments
No readings assigned for this week
January 14th: Origins of number representation: evidence from infants & animals
(Cantlon, 2012)
(Libertus & Brannon, 2009)
January 21st: Children’s development of verbal number skills
(Sarnecka, Goldman & Slusser, 2015)
January 28th: Basic number processing and its role in higher-level math learning
(Feigenson, Libertus, & Halberda, 2013)
(De Smedt, Noël, Gilmore, & Ansari, 2013)
PODCAST ANALYSIS DUE TODAY BY NOON VIA OWL
February 4th: Mental Arithmetic & Fractions
(Siegler, 2000)
(Lortie-Forgues, Tian, & Siegler, 2015)
IN-CLASS DISCUSSION OF PODCAST EVALUATION TODAY
February 11th: Developmental Dyscalculia
(Fias, Menon, & Szucs, 2013)
(Price & Ansari, 2013)
February 18th: No Class – Reading Week
PAPER DUE MONDAY, FEBRUARY 22nd BY 11.00PM VIA OWL
February 25th: Mathematics Anxiety
(Maloney & Beilock, 2012)
(Maloney, Sattizahn, & Beilock, 2014)
March 3rd: The mathematical brain: adult studies
(Piazza & Eger, 2015)
(Holloway, Battista, Vogel, & Ansari, 2013)
PODCAST SCRIPTS FOR PEER-REVIEW DUE NOON TODAY VIA OWL
March 10th: The mathematical brain: developmental studies
(Menon, 2010)
(Ansari, 2008)
PEER-REVIEWS DUE NOON TODAY VIA OWL
March 17th: Gender Differences
(Hyde, 2013)
(Spelke, 2005)
March 24th: Cross-cultural studies and international comparison studies
(Rodic et al., 2015)
(Tang & Liu, 2009)
March 31st: Final Class: Course summary & Discussion
FINAL PODCAST PROJECT DUE BY 11PM SUNDAY APRIL 3rd
8.0 STATEMENT ON ACADEMIC OFFENCES
Students are responsible for understanding the nature and avoiding the occurrence of plagiarism and other scholastic offenses. Plagiarism and cheating are considered very serious offenses because they undermine the integrity of research and education. Actions constituting a scholastic offense are described at the following link: http://www.uwo.ca/univsec/pdf/academic_policies/appeals/scholastic_discipline_undergrad.pdf
As of Sept. 1, 2009, the Department of Psychology will take the following steps to detect scholastic offenses. All multiple-choice tests and exams will be checked for similarities in the pattern of responses using reliable software, and records will be made of student seating locations in all tests and exams. All written assignments will be submitted to TurnItIn, a service designed to detect and deter plagiarism by comparing written material to over 5 billion pages of content located on the Internet or in TurnItIn’s databases. All papers submitted for such checking will be included as source documents in the reference database for the purpose of detecting plagiarism of papers subsequently submitted to the system. Use of the service is subject to the licensing agreement, currently between Western and Turnitin.com http://www.turnitin.com
Possible penalties for a scholastic offense include failure of the assignment, failure of the course, suspension from the University, and expulsion from the University.
9.0 POLICY ON ACCOMMODATION FOR MEDICAL ILLNESS
The University of Western Ontario’s policy on Accommodation for Medical Illness can be found at:
http://www.westerncalendar.uwo.ca/2015/pg117.html
Students must see the Academic Counsellor and submit all required documentation in order to be approved for certain accommodation:
http://counselling.ssc.uwo.ca/procedures/medical_accommodation.html
10.0 OTHER INFORMATION
Office of the Registrar web site: http://registrar.uwo.ca
Student Development Services web site: http://www.sdc.uwo.ca
Please see the Psychology Undergraduate web site for information on the following:
http://psychology.uwo.ca/undergraduate/student_responsibilities/index.html
- Policy on Cheating and Academic Misconduct
- Procedures for Appealing Academic Evaluations
- Policy on Attendance
- Policy Regarding Makeup Exams and Extensions of Deadlines
- Policy for Assignments
- Short Absences
- Extended Absences
- Documentation
- Academic Concerns
- 2015 Calendar References
No electronic devices, including cell phones, will be allowed during exams.
REFERENCES FOR ASSIGNED READINGS
Ansari, D. (2008). Effects of development and enculturation on number representation in the brain. Nat Rev Neurosci, 9(4), 278–291. doi:nrn2334 [pii]10.1038/nrn2334
Cantlon, J. F. (2012). Math, monkeys, and the developing brain. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 109 Suppl , 10725–32. doi:10.1073/pnas.1201893109
De Smedt, B., Noël, M.-P., Gilmore, C., & Ansari, D. (2013). How do symbolic and non-symbolic numerical magnitude processing skills relate to individual differences in children’s mathematical skills? A review of evidence from brain and behavior. Trends in Neuroscience and Education, 2(2), 55–48. doi:10.1016/j.tine.2013.06.001
Feigenson, L., Libertus, M. E., & Halberda, J. (2013). Links Between the Intuitive Sense of Number and Formal Mathematics Ability. Child Development Perspectives, 7(2), 74–79. doi:10.1111/cdep.12019
Fias, W., Menon, V., & Szucs, D. (2013). Multiple components of developmental dyscalculia. Trends in Neuroscience and Education, 2(2), 43–47. Retrieved from http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211949313000203
Holloway, I. D., Battista, C., Vogel, S. E., & Ansari, D. (2013). Semantic and perceptual processing of number symbols: evidence from a cross-linguistic fMRI adaptation study. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 25, 388–400. doi:10.1162/jocn_a_00323
Hyde, J. S. (2013). Gender Similarities and Differences. Annual Review of Psychology. doi:10.1146/annurev-psych-010213-115057
Libertus, M. E., & Brannon, E. M. (2009). Behavioral and Neural Basis of Number Sense in Infancy. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 18(6), 346–351. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8721.2009.01665.x
Lortie-Forgues, H., Tian, J., & Siegler, R. S. (2015). Why is learning fraction and decimal arithmetic so difficult? Developmental Review, 38, 201–221. doi:10.1016/j.dr.2015.07.008
Maloney, E. A., & Beilock, S. L. (2012). Math anxiety: who has it, why it develops, and how to guard against it. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 16(8), 404–6. doi:10.1016/j.tics.2012.06.008
Maloney, E. A., Sattizahn, J. R., & Beilock, S. L. (2014). Anxiety and cognition. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews. Cognitive Science, 5(4), 403–11. doi:10.1002/wcs.1299
Menon, V. (2010). Developmental cognitive neuroscience of arithmetic: implications for learning and education. ZDM : The International Journal on Mathematics Education, 42(6), 515–525. doi:10.1007/s11858-010-0242-0
Piazza, M., & Eger, E. (2015). Neural foundations and functional specificity of number representations. Neuropsychologia. doi:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2015.09.025
Price, G., & Ansari, D. (2013). Dyscalculia: Characteristics, Causes, and Treatments. Numeracy, 6(1). doi:10.5038/1936-4660.6.1.2
Rodic, M., Zhou, X., Tikhomirova, T., Wei, W., Malykh, S., Ismatulina, V., … Kovas, Y. (2015). Cross-cultural investigation into cognitive underpinnings of individual differences in early arithmetic. Developmental Science, 18(1), 165–74. doi:10.1111/desc.12204
Sarnecka, Barbara W, Goldman, M.C, Slusser, E. B. (2015). How counting leads to children’s first representations of exact, large numbers. In A. Cohen Kadosh, R., Dowker (Ed.), Oxford Handbook of Numerical Cognition. Oxford Univ Press.
Siegler, R. S. (2000). The rebirth of children’s learning. Child Development, 71(1), 26–35. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10836555
Spelke, E. S. (2005). Sex differences in intrinsic aptitude for mathematics and science?: a critical review. The American Psychologist, 60(9), 950–8. doi:10.1037/0003-066X.60.9.950
Tang, Y.-Y., & Liu, Y. (2009). Numbers in the cultural brain. Progress in Brain Research, 178, 151–7. doi:10.1016/S0079-6123(09)17810-X
