Mathematics and Culture in Micronesia

• In Event: Roundtable Session 84
  In Roundtable Session: Moi: Indigenous Knowledges—Maths and Sciences

Abstract

Wheatley and Frieze’s book, Walking Out Walking On, provides the conceptual framework for an examination of Project MACIMISE, a National Science Foundation funded project that focuses on the languages and cultural practices of nine Pacific islands and the state of Hawai‘i. MACIMISE, pronounced as if spelled ‘maximize’, is a 5-year Project. There are twenty-two participants (who call themselves the Macimisers) in the Project. The Project’s task is the development of elementary school mathematics curriculum units sensitive to local mathematical thought and experience. The Project is analyzed in terms of the concepts (scaling across, start anywhere—follow it everywhere, intervention to friendship, the art of hosting and the use of circle) advanced by Wheatley and Frieze.

Author

• A.J. (Sandy) Dawson, University of Hawaii