“All knowledge about reality begins with experience and terminates in it."

                                                                                          Albert Einstein (1)

"A symbol which is induced from without, which has not been led up to in preliminary activities, is, as we say, a bare or mere symbol; it is dead and barren."

                                                                                          John Dewey (2)

“Learning is the process whereby knowledge is created through the transformation of experience. Knowledge results from the combination of grasping experience and transforming it."

                                                                                          David Kolb (3)

If we are to breathe life into these “dead and barren” symbols and make mathematics accessible to the widest possible constituency, we must restore experience to its proper place in the process of creating and validating mathematical knowledge, and we must incorporate our children’s powers of construction in this process. In other words, we must provide the conditions that will allow our children to create knowledge through the transformation of experience.

The materials on this web-site were designed, with these principles in mind, for my seventh and eighth grade students. Those who are interested are welcome to download and use them as they see fit. While these problem sets constitute the curriculum for my students at Inly School, those who use a standard textbook will find that these materials will supplement and enrich a more traditional curriculum.

(1)        On the Method of Theoretical Physics. 1933. Oxford University Press.

Page 8.

(2)        The School and Society & The Child and The Curriculum. 1990. The University of Chicago Press. Page 202.

(3)        Experiential Learning. 1984. Prentice-Hall, Inc. Page 41.