November 4, 2025 • 29 mins
Most people quietly believe they’re “not a math person,” yet they plan trips, compare prices, rearrange furniture, and decode ads with sharp logic every week. We pull that thread with Dr. Laura Tuohilampi from The University of New South Wales to ask why everyday confidence evaporates at the classroom door—and how to stitch it back together.
We talk about the moments that shape a learner’s identity, from being punished for answering “too fast” to absorbing the myth that perfection equals understanding. Laura makes a compelling case that the bottleneck isn’t just content knowledge; it’s the teacher’s relationship with math. When educators feel safe to be curious, make mistakes, and co-discover strategies, students mirror that mindset. We explore simple, powerful practices that ground procedures in meaning: have kids build rectangles with 20 blocks and watch area and multiplication emerge; use estimation and multiple methods as first-class tools; value reasoning as much as answers.
The conversation widens to what math should do for humans now. If calculators and AI handle routine computation, we should center data literacy, algorithmic thinking, uncertainty, and ethics. That means reading statistics in political messaging, spotting selective graphs, and understanding how models can encode bias. We also dive into coding and computational thinking not as a separate silo, but as part of a broader mathematical lens on systems, patterns, and decisions.
AI shows up as a partner, not a proxy. Laura’s team designs tools that help teachers reflect on trade-offs, avoid bias, and choose strategies with clearer foresight. For students, we introduce vertical contextualization—asking AI to imagine where a skill will matter decades from now—so practice has real purpose. The result is a practical roadmap to turn anxiety into agency and make math feel like what it truly is: a way to understand and shape the world.
If this resonates, follow the show, share it with a colleague who teaches maths, and leave a review telling us where you use maths most in your week.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Chris Colley (00:14):
All right, people.
Welcome back to another episodeof Shift ED Podcast.
Well, you will not believewhere I'm going to uh right now,
or bringing you guys with me.
Uh, we are actually headed touh down under, or we're headed
over to Australia.
Um, I have the wonderfulDr Laura Tuohilampi.
(00:34):
Um and Laura's coming in.
Um, she works at the Universityof uh New South Wales, uh a
book writer, a researcher, anintellect, a mathematician.
Um and I found Laura onLinkedIn and I reached out, she
gracefully um accepted myinvitation to come here because
I do think math is in need ofsome conversation and in need of
(00:59):
some exposure.
Um and you know, typically Ithink, oh, I'm gonna, you know,
I have to find some old whiteguy that that can tell us about
math.
And not at all.
And I would to my amazement andmy pleasure, um, I've been
doing a big deep dive intoLaura's work and we've got
something special for you today.
So, Laura, thank you so, somuch for for hopping on here in
(01:22):
your early morning and myevening uh to share some of your
thoughts on uh the teaching ofmath to our kids or our
students.
Thank you so much.
Oh, it's a real pleasure.
Now, Laura, I just want tostart off this.
You say maths with plural,right?
We always see here in Canadait's math teaching, you know,
(01:44):
math class, etc.
Where does the S come from?
I mean, I I I hope I'm notsounding too ignorant, but what
what what's the origin of whywould there be an S at the end?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (01:57):
Oh, I love that question.
Uh I come originally fromFinland and I was ignorant as
well.
I first moved to Australia andI was using math actually, as I
was, you know, more exposed tothat version.
And then I actually got oneteacher correcting me and
telling that in Australia we usemaths, and it's like an
(02:17):
American version to not use theS in you know at the end of it.
So that's the um that's theexplanation.
Chris Colley (02:25):
There we go.
Very great.
Um and I guess my firstquestion is, and I kind of want
to dive back into your time asas a youngster yourself.
What were your what were thosemoments in your early education
where math was, and I and I'veread that you were always very
into math and it was somethingthat you you were you were
(02:47):
attracted to and you were goodat.
What were some of those earlymoments where you realized math
was going to be a path thatperhaps I could take as as a
career or leading me into thefuture?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (03:00):
Oh, that's a very good question because
there were definitely multiplemoments like that.
The first one maybe being whenI was on the uh second grade and
I was able to see the answer tothis complicated, you know,
mathematical question.
But the teacher wasn't happyfor me to know the answer
because he had she had like aspecific teaching strategy in
(03:22):
mind, and there was a little bitof like a yeah um
misunderstanding, I guess,because I was so keen to show
that I actually know the answer,but she wanted us to go slowly.
And while I understand thatapproach, it made me think about
like all those you knowdifferent approaches dictating
mathematics, and um I was alsopunished for telling the answer
(03:45):
too soon.
So I yeah, I ended up standingin front of a class for 40
minutes as an eight years oldyou know girl.
So it I had 40 minutes to thinkabout, you know, uh pedagogical
strategies and mathematics.
I was always always very intoscience and mathematics.
I read, you know, uh scientificbooks and quantum mechanics and
(04:09):
you know things like that atthe very early age.
But at the same time, I wasn'tlike I did get like A's, but I
get like A minus, not like anyou know, a full A.
So I always thought that maybeI should be like a genius to do
mathematics.
Like maybe I can't actuallymake this in my career because I
don't do like I always make alittle you know error or mistake
(04:30):
or something.
And that's another, you know,uh like an important thing that
made me better understand thatwe really need more versatile
role models and more maybe likeyou know, comprehensive approach
to mathematics, becauseoftentimes when you actually
learn deeply and you're veryinto you know something, you do
(04:52):
make mistakes.
That's how you learn.
And sometimes if you just kindof like get everything from the
onset, you you don't developthis, you know, um competence of
you know overcoming challengesand you know all kinds of
things.
So um yeah.
Chris Colley (05:08):
Um totally I I love you saying that too,
because it seems like math,there's a right and there's a
wrong, right?
Like get it, you get your A, oryou fail and you get your F.
What is, if you could explainit to us, at the root of
teaching math to kids.
Now, I understand that numeracyis important um as a skill, as
(05:32):
a competency to have.
But math always seems to bethis overarching subject in
elementary school as much as inhigh school, that it's the
subject, you know, it's like theimportant subject.
Um, and it, you know, theteachers that tend to teach it
seem to, you know, be a littlebit more focused on the content
and like um not really wantingto explore competency-based or
(05:56):
skill development.
It's like, no, the stuff, thestuff.
Can you unpack that a bit forus, Laura?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (06:03):
Yeah, I find it a very short-sighted
strategy because um uh, well,first of all, we do have this
normalization of you know,students becoming anxious about
mathematics, you know, optingout for mathematics, even
hating, you know, mathematics,or simply being ignorant, like I
just simply don't want toengage with mathematics longer.
(06:24):
And we spend, I'd say in allcountries, we spend more than
1,000 hours, you know, lessons,uh, comprehensive you know,
years only, like from one to uh,I'd say net nine years.
So it's a lot of you know,working hours for students and
teachers, teachers' salaries,you know, textbooks, all those
things, and with the outcomes ofyou know, just passing some
(06:46):
exams and then leavingmathematics for forever.
At the same time, I'd say allpeople around the world use
mathematics all the time.
And now I'm not just talkingabout you know numbers or you
know you know number strategiesor you know, calculation
strategies or something likethat, but things like logical
reasoning, what can be you knowum interpreted from this data,
(07:09):
like how am I being impacted byadvertisements, political
messaging, those kinds ofthings.
And and even things like youknow, geometrical, um, uh like
spatial thinking, such as likehow am I decorating my house,
like what am I, you know, howI'm gonna, my removal, how am I
able to get my couch out of theuh uh the door, and those kinds
(07:31):
of things.
And like when I observe people,I see them using mathematics in
this broad sense all the time,and yet feeling horrible about
their actual mathematics, likenumerosity skills.
And and um interestingly, Ijust collected data of uh
students um asking whether theyfeel themselves as a maths
(07:54):
person or not, and every singleone of them said no, like I'm
not a math person, who wouldever be, you know, call
themselves a math person.
And and we did go through someyou know situations where they
used mathematics likebrilliantly, like you
sophisticated, you know,approaches, strategies, um,
logical thinking, reasoning, andso on.
(08:16):
And they all said that theyfeel very confident and
competent in those situations,and they call them like my
world, my maths world.
And in that the world Iactually like when I'm you know
planning my travels, or maybeI'm like doing my workout, you
know, planning or designing, oryou know, any any kind of like
you know, real life in amathematics usage, and feeling
(08:38):
like, of course, like I do, likeof course I can trust my
mathematics skills, like I'mgreat.
But then like we went back touh kind of like the memories of
you know learning those skillsin the maths class and thinking
about like kind of doing it in amore mathematical or official
or such way, and likeimmediately the uh confidence
crashes, and it's like, but inthat situation, I wouldn't feel
(09:02):
confident, I wouldn't feelconfident.
So there's this weird mismatch,and yeah, that comes from just
like you know, focusing on likecan you do this one whatever
pass closed, you know, questionperfectly, and not just you
know, thinking that in real lifewhen we do things, we actually
can like almost do them.
(09:23):
We we're not doing thingsperfectly all the time.
We use estimation, we we kindof like account for you know,
there's be there's gonna be alittle range of error and we
understand how to you know dealwith that.
And yeah, I think that'slargely missing in maths
classrooms.
Chris Colley (09:38):
And yeah, and I I from what I've seen too, and
I've been in education my wholelife, as as you have.
I mean, we see that kids inelementary school, so our our
our younger learners going intohigh school already convinced
they're horrible at math, right?
Yeah, and I will say that I seemore on of girls feeling that
(09:58):
too.
Like, I just no, no, I don't domath, don't do it, can't do it.
And right away they have thisfixed mindset that no good, no
good at it.
How do you start to unravelthat?
Because what I've seen also isthat in elementary schools, we
often don't have math experts,right?
And they're kind of likefiguring it out themselves as
(10:18):
they're going through, which isno, which is fine, but that
they're gonna make errors andthere's gonna be mistakes made,
and it might not be the most umconfident teacher teaching math
because they just don't feelthey have that so it we kind of
start planting the seed earlierso that when they hit high
school, when there's high-stakestests and graduations and all
(10:41):
of that coming, they've alreadymade their minds up.
What can we do to unravel orprevent or minimize that impact
on our kids as they're growingthrough formalized education in
elementary school?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (10:57):
Thanks for this question.
It's a global issue and we faceit everywhere.
And the usual solution to thishas typically been you know,
let's either bring math expertsto you know primary um stages,
or let's just you know, upskillyou know, primary teachers'
mathematical skills.
But I'm actually gonna disagreewith that.
(11:20):
While you know, you know,knowledge of mathematics is
always important and likethere's no nothing wrong with
it, obviously, like increasingteachers' mathematical
confidences, but like there'sanother reason that is more, you
know, or you know, issue orproblem that is more pending,
which is those teachers'relationship with mathematics.
Like you said, like many of theteachers struggle themselves.
(11:43):
They might have had you knowdifficult negative experiences,
they struggle with theirconfidence.
So it's less about like youknow, a teacher not really not
being able to know what afaction means.
That's not the issue.
It's more about like, what if Imake a mistake?
What if I don't understand youknow deeply in all these things?
So once you have thatconfidence of, you know, but we
(12:06):
can always explore thingstogether, like like this is my
understanding.
Let's, you know, you know, kindof discuss these ideas and make
new discoveries together andhaving that confidence.
But once you feel like I'm nota math person, I don't actually
know how these rules work.
It's very difficult.
And that's why we do, it'sactually something I've been
(12:27):
working on a lot uh in my ownwork and also in UNISW, uh, that
we do have for our teacherstudents courses where we don't
start with teaching strategiesor you know, increasing
competences, but you know, kindof like what is your perception
of mathematics and identifying,like said earlier, like
mathematics that you use in youreveryday life, like the maths
(12:49):
that you already do, and feelconfident with.
And then you can bring thoseexperiences to the maths, you
know, class and make it morelike just a normal thing to do,
something that we just do, like,and then maybe add a little
more accuracy and a little moreof those like mathematical, you
know, rules and and you know,principles on top of what we
(13:11):
already do and feel just youknow normal and confident about
it.
Chris Colley (13:15):
I love that.
I love that.
And what about our youngestlearners, Laura?
Like, when do you startbringing in concepts or you
know, counting or numbers?
And like I work a lot inpreschool kindergarten areas,
and it's always like when is ituh when is it time to bring
(13:37):
those ideas or play around withthose concepts?
Is it is there is there um youknow any research or information
that sh tells us along thechild's development when talking
about math can come into play?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (13:54):
Yeah, I there's definitely lots of
studies showing exactly like howto sequence things and like
what building blocks must be youknow established before you go
any further, or you know, whenyou uh and especially when you
utilize things like cognitiveload theory, like you you you
shouldn't put like too manythings uh into the situation at
(14:15):
once, but that also again kindof like addresses these more
kind of like accurate, like howto make things you know
perfectly, how to understand therules and principles perfectly.
So I would say this is moreabout that would be more about
procedural knowledge, but at thesame time, like when you let's
(14:38):
say let's let's say let's talkabout multiplication, for
instance, and how that um canlike manifests when we work on
areas.
So we we essentially know thatthere might be you know five
rows of you know four pebbles,say, or something like that.
So so we can kind of like youknow bring this multiplication
(14:58):
into when we start you knowunderstanding what area means,
and obviously you need tounderstand what multiplication
means before that, and youprobably need to know what four
times five is in its situation,but at the same time, you can
like work with two-year-old kidswith Lego blocks, for instance,
and just give them like 20 Legoblocks, and like how can you,
(15:21):
you know, or say, you know,three years old or four years
old, maybe not two years old,but um, like can you build you
know rectangles out of these,you know, 20 blocks?
And like how would they looklike?
Like, are they all like do youare using the same amount, but
you know, number of blocks foreach of these rectangles?
Maybe one is you know buildingtwo times 10 and another one is
building uh four times five andso on.
(15:42):
So kind of like it in in thatway, we can kind of like bring
those ideas constantly into youknow explorations and
investigations.
And then like when the timecomes, we can then introduce
like the actual formula for youknow calculating area, and and
(16:03):
then we need the multiplicationskills, but we can still kind of
like instill that foundationfrom from very early on.
Chris Colley (16:11):
Yeah, well, I love that.
And I love what you're sayingtoo, that teachers just have to
um you don't have to be anexpert.
You can explore, you can becurious and show curiosity to
your students, and in turn theymight start reflecting those
kinds of um, you know, uh skillsas well of curiosity and oh
(16:31):
mistakes are fine, and we'll tryagain and uh let's problem
solve this and figure it out.
And I like that that that canbe an approach rather than you
know focusing on too much on thetext and on the on the workbook
and like not understanding it,but just having to go through
the routine, which kind of killsthat uh idea that math is
(16:52):
everywhere, um which you hadmentioned before.
And when you um created likeyou have two um well, I saw that
uh math for humans, the onethat you have on Australia
website.
Um it's such a great resource.
What what do you hope that thatinformation can help teachers
(17:13):
with?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (17:15):
Oh yeah, so the whole thing like ideology
behind math for humans and likeyou know, establishing such a
conduct concept.
Um and I do want to mentionthat the page is a little bit
out of the day, so I'm gonnawork on that very soon.
But there are some resourcesthere, and I do uh post uh, you
(17:38):
know, blocks well, posts andstuff there.
But the whole idea is to, asyou said in the introduction,
introduction, that uh, you know,the whole mathematics education
needs an overhole.
Like we need to really likethink about like how is
mathematics education going toserve humankind in the future.
(17:58):
So not just uh not just kind oflike how do we keep doing, how
do we keep like educating, youknow, new cohorts with these
mathematical competences thatcan nowadays be done with AI.
It doesn't mean that wewouldn't need to, you know, have
people understanding thoseprinciples, but we do have like
a very different, you know,world, and it's only gonna
(18:21):
change even more.
So like um like the whole ideaof reimagining what mathematics
could look like and what aresome skills that people really
do need.
For instance, like I saidearlier, better understanding
how algorithms work oradvertisement work or political
messaging works and how data canbe used correctly, but
(18:46):
deliberately, you know, choosingyou know certain numbers or
certain trends, or you know, notlying uh directly, but just you
know, kind of like giving somelittle messages.
So all those things areextremely important to you know
have you know critical citizensthat can also be confident in
(19:07):
and in their skills andunderstanding what is going on
and not be kind of like uh likevictims or whatever like other
people say and just like notreally understanding how things
actually work and you know, soand I think mathematics
education, if anything, is theplace to develop those skills.
(19:28):
Like, how do you how do wethink?
How do we share information?
Like, how do we understand youknow these kind of like
numerical databased messages?
So, yeah, so through math forhumans, I I'm kind of like free
from what is in the syllabustoday and what is in the
textbook, you know, for the nextlesson.
(19:49):
And like, really, like what arewe doing like in in you know 30
years or like 300 years?
So, yeah, that that's the idea.
Chris Colley (19:57):
We're not doing the same thing as we're doing
now.
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (20:00):
Yeah, yeah.
Chris Colley (20:01):
That we're we're and I love what you said that
we're selling it better.
Like, I think our messaging isjust not so good.
Um, and it's very constricted,you know, like it it's it seems
like there's one way, and if youdon't do it that way, it's the
wrong way.
Um do you ever have you everheard of computational thinking?
Um, the the idea from uhSeymour Papert out of MIT, where
(20:26):
there are four main you know,pattern recognition, uh
decomposition, abstraction, andalgorithms, right?
It was it had to do aroundcoding.
But I guess my question is isthe idea of coding can can that
be integrated into math?
Possibly?
I mean, can can math and codingcoexist as one instead of it
(20:51):
just being math?
But there I mean, because onceyou open the doors to coding,
there's so much more that youcould do.
There's so many more, you know,robots and microcontrollers and
whatever that you can actuallyplay with.
Um where do you sit on on thatidea that instead of like
formulaic that we're looking atmore of the bigger view of
(21:15):
things?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (21:16):
Yes, I'd say there's uh as soon as we can
get rid of some ideas that evenus educators cannot justify for
students, because there arecertain mathematical concepts
that like like students mightyou know question like why do
why are we learning this?
And nobody can answer thatquestion.
So as soon as we you knowreduce the kind of emphasis of
(21:40):
those ideas that we really don'tsee much relevance longer,
there is you know room for allkinds of new ideas,
computational thinking being oneof them, and like the whole
again, like the whole idea ofhow is this kind of like
techno-based universe workingaround us at the moment.
So I think it's extremelyimportant to bring that.
I don't think we need a newsubject, I think we just need to
(22:04):
like broaden the idea of whatmathematics you know inhales,
what can be like you knowexamined under its scope.
Um but then this just you knowkind of like uh makes me think
of something else that I justnoticed when I was doing that
data collection of you knowstudents mad worlds where they
(22:25):
you know felt confident and soon.
Because one thing is to utilizemathematics for um, you know,
in situations where we wherethings actually work pretty
neatly.
So we know that if I you knowprogram something or you know
ask you know an algorithm to doyou know a certain thing, they
(22:45):
will actually do it.
So there is like you know, thiscausational, you know, if I do
this, then this happens.
Uh maybe there's a little bitof uncertainty or no likelihoods
involved, uh, or you know, if Iuse this data, I get these you
know implications or conclusionsand so on.
So kind of like this the wholekind of you know accuracy of
mathematics.
(23:05):
But those students actuallyquite a lot of them brought up
the um concern of howmathematics uh you know
historically has been used toalso justify biases and like
injustice and you knowinequalities when we are you
know just selecting or can likemaybe putting too much emphasis
(23:28):
on numbers or patterns or trendsand not seeing that you know
things can always be contextualor individual and you know that
kind of like human aspect.
So, you know, kind of a long,long answer to your question.
I think there's definitely aneed to include you know things
like computational thinking inyou know under the uh you know
the official math syllabus, butalso I think we need even more.
(23:53):
Like what is the kind of likethe little less mathematical
human side of you know, againlike encountering and dealing
with you know situations thatstill are based on data and
information?
Chris Colley (24:08):
Yeah, excellent.
And I guess my last question,too, just because it's such a
hot topic, um, and we alluded toit artificial intelligence
before.
I mean, it seems like it'staking the world by storm, and
education's kind of like, whoa.
Like um where do you see yourwork evolving with artificial
(24:29):
intelligence down the road?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (24:32):
Oh, yeah, so I think this is my personal
opinion.
Like obviously we can use andwe can utilize, and I think
we're already doing it quite,you know, uh quite a lot uh to
kind of equipping AI to keepoff.
So it can be a good, you know,just you know, informants, we
can, you know, program AI toteach, you know, kids,
(24:54):
mathematics, whatever, like youknow, skills and competences.
Uh but I think it's maybe evenmore effective if you use AI to
uh increase our confidence andagency.
So having it more as a like asupport partner that we're
working together with.
(25:14):
And uh we currently just uhdeveloping a project where we're
examining just that, like howcan we um make AI respond to
teachers' needs better in a waythat the teacher informs like
what are some of my issues, whatare some of my goals, and at
(25:35):
the same time, because AI canalso like um uh like strengthen
or confirm certain like biasesthat the teacher might have.
So they might think that youknow a certain strategy is great
without noticing that it mightbe you know uh not good for
certain demographics or you knowcertain you know group of
(25:55):
students or something.
So there's this risk of AI justcan like you know increasing
those biases.
So in this project, we'reexamining how can we how can AI
be programmed so that it canbetter show for any teacher that
goes to you know asking youknow help or support, like if
you do this, this will be youknow some likely coin uh what is
(26:19):
it, like uh um results.
And if you do that instead, sothis is something that you might
you know expect.
So then that gives you know theteacher the um uh the
opportunity to make moreinformed decisions and not just
kind of like you know, can yougive me something and the LEI is
doing the work?
Chris Colley (26:38):
Right, right.
It it demands critical thinkingof the user, it's not just yes,
yes, give me a lesson on mathon fractions, like it's not
they've got to think about it.
Why?
What's your intent?
What competency you're lookingto develop, etc.
I love that.
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (26:52):
I love that.
Chris Colley (26:52):
Yeah, I think that that might be also kind of an
avenue um for educators to kindof actually start to explore
more.
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (26:59):
Um yeah, and and and it would kind of
like the similar situation umlike like uh resembling example
would be when uh in anotherproject, we helping students use
AI in an almost similar way.
Uh that's what we call verticalcontextualization.
So instead of just you knowhaving students to work on their
(27:22):
typical tasks, uh not asking AIto help them or teach them, but
asking to envision contextswhere you know certain skills
are used.
And the word verticalcontextualization comes from,
you know, let's envision thefuture and ask AI to you know
tell us why where we might beusing these skills in the
(27:44):
future.
An example being I was workingwith year five students and they
had decimal multiplication ormultiplying decimal numbers, and
they couldn't really say likewhat where would we ever use
this and using verticalcontextualization, which is like
asking AI, how about 30 yearsfrom now?
Do you think that human humansare still using you know
multiplying decimal numbers?
(28:05):
And AI can quite nicely givesome context.
So maybe you know in thissituation or that situation, and
the students then choose like,oh, I'm gonna have a smart home
and I'm gonna, you know, need toadjust my you know temperature
or something like that.
They are actually have decimalnumbers and I need to you know
use modification.
So kind of like helping usingAI to uh broaden our imagination
(28:29):
and like helping us to makethose connections rather than
just simply like can it hit methis?
Chris Colley (28:34):
Right.
I love that.
Well, Laura, this has been I'mjust popping now with ideas and
thoughts.
Um I really thank you for fortaking some time um and sharing
your ideas.
And I'm glad that we'reexposing math a little bit more.
It's a it's a it's a valuedsubject that needs attention,
(28:55):
um, but maybe some little tweaksalong the way to make it more
relevant for kids so that theycan see that math is important.
Um, and they use it every day.
I loved how you describe thosekinds of scenarios.
I I I wish you all the best.
Check out Laura's website.
Um, I'll put the information inthe descriptor.
And also check out her book,Seriously Fun Maths.
(29:16):
Definitely gonna dive into thatone, Laura.
Um, I wish you all the best inyour day.
Um, thanks so much again.
And uh I hope one day we can uhpick this conversation up.
I feel we could talk foranother half an hour.
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (29:29):
That will be lovely.
Chris Colley (29:31):
Thanks so much, Laura.
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (29:32):
Thank you, Chris.
All right, people.
Welcome back to another episodeof Shift ED Podcast.
Well, you will not believewhere I'm going to uh right now,
or bringing you guys with me.
Uh, we are actually headed touh down under, or we're headed
over to Australia.
Um, I have the wonderfulDr Laura Tuohilampi.
(00:34):
Um and Laura's coming in.
Um, she works at the Universityof uh New South Wales, uh a
book writer, a researcher, anintellect, a mathematician.
Um and I found Laura onLinkedIn and I reached out, she
gracefully um accepted myinvitation to come here because
I do think math is in need ofsome conversation and in need of
(00:59):
some exposure.
Um and you know, typically Ithink, oh, I'm gonna, you know,
I have to find some old whiteguy that that can tell us about
math.
And not at all.
And I would to my amazement andmy pleasure, um, I've been
doing a big deep dive intoLaura's work and we've got
something special for you today.
So, Laura, thank you so, somuch for for hopping on here in
(01:22):
your early morning and myevening uh to share some of your
thoughts on uh the teaching ofmath to our kids or our
students.
Thank you so much.
Oh, it's a real pleasure.
Now, Laura, I just want tostart off this.
You say maths with plural,right?
We always see here in Canadait's math teaching, you know,
(01:44):
math class, etc.
Where does the S come from?
I mean, I I I hope I'm notsounding too ignorant, but what
what what's the origin of whywould there be an S at the end?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (01:57):
Oh, I love that question.
Uh I come originally fromFinland and I was ignorant as
well.
I first moved to Australia andI was using math actually, as I
was, you know, more exposed tothat version.
And then I actually got oneteacher correcting me and
telling that in Australia we usemaths, and it's like an
(02:17):
American version to not use theS in you know at the end of it.
So that's the um that's theexplanation.
Chris Colley (02:25):
There we go.
Very great.
Um and I guess my firstquestion is, and I kind of want
to dive back into your time asas a youngster yourself.
What were your what were thosemoments in your early education
where math was, and I and I'veread that you were always very
into math and it was somethingthat you you were you were
(02:47):
attracted to and you were goodat.
What were some of those earlymoments where you realized math
was going to be a path thatperhaps I could take as as a
career or leading me into thefuture?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (03:00):
Oh, that's a very good question because
there were definitely multiplemoments like that.
The first one maybe being whenI was on the uh second grade and
I was able to see the answer tothis complicated, you know,
mathematical question.
But the teacher wasn't happyfor me to know the answer
because he had she had like aspecific teaching strategy in
(03:22):
mind, and there was a little bitof like a yeah um
misunderstanding, I guess,because I was so keen to show
that I actually know the answer,but she wanted us to go slowly.
And while I understand thatapproach, it made me think about
like all those you knowdifferent approaches dictating
mathematics, and um I was alsopunished for telling the answer
(03:45):
too soon.
So I yeah, I ended up standingin front of a class for 40
minutes as an eight years oldyou know girl.
So it I had 40 minutes to thinkabout, you know, uh pedagogical
strategies and mathematics.
I was always always very intoscience and mathematics.
I read, you know, uh scientificbooks and quantum mechanics and
(04:09):
you know things like that atthe very early age.
But at the same time, I wasn'tlike I did get like A's, but I
get like A minus, not like anyou know, a full A.
So I always thought that maybeI should be like a genius to do
mathematics.
Like maybe I can't actuallymake this in my career because I
don't do like I always make alittle you know error or mistake
(04:30):
or something.
And that's another, you know,uh like an important thing that
made me better understand thatwe really need more versatile
role models and more maybe likeyou know, comprehensive approach
to mathematics, becauseoftentimes when you actually
learn deeply and you're veryinto you know something, you do
(04:52):
make mistakes.
That's how you learn.
And sometimes if you just kindof like get everything from the
onset, you you don't developthis, you know, um competence of
you know overcoming challengesand you know all kinds of
things.
So um yeah.
Chris Colley (05:08):
Um totally I I love you saying that too,
because it seems like math,there's a right and there's a
wrong, right?
Like get it, you get your A, oryou fail and you get your F.
What is, if you could explainit to us, at the root of
teaching math to kids.
Now, I understand that numeracyis important um as a skill, as
(05:32):
a competency to have.
But math always seems to bethis overarching subject in
elementary school as much as inhigh school, that it's the
subject, you know, it's like theimportant subject.
Um, and it, you know, theteachers that tend to teach it
seem to, you know, be a littlebit more focused on the content
and like um not really wantingto explore competency-based or
(05:56):
skill development.
It's like, no, the stuff, thestuff.
Can you unpack that a bit forus, Laura?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (06:03):
Yeah, I find it a very short-sighted
strategy because um uh, well,first of all, we do have this
normalization of you know,students becoming anxious about
mathematics, you know, optingout for mathematics, even
hating, you know, mathematics,or simply being ignorant, like I
just simply don't want toengage with mathematics longer.
(06:24):
And we spend, I'd say in allcountries, we spend more than
1,000 hours, you know, lessons,uh, comprehensive you know,
years only, like from one to uh,I'd say net nine years.
So it's a lot of you know,working hours for students and
teachers, teachers' salaries,you know, textbooks, all those
things, and with the outcomes ofyou know, just passing some
(06:46):
exams and then leavingmathematics for forever.
At the same time, I'd say allpeople around the world use
mathematics all the time.
And now I'm not just talkingabout you know numbers or you
know you know number strategiesor you know, calculation
strategies or something likethat, but things like logical
reasoning, what can be you knowum interpreted from this data,
(07:09):
like how am I being impacted byadvertisements, political
messaging, those kinds ofthings.
And and even things like youknow, geometrical, um, uh like
spatial thinking, such as likehow am I decorating my house,
like what am I, you know, howI'm gonna, my removal, how am I
able to get my couch out of theuh uh the door, and those kinds
(07:31):
of things.
And like when I observe people,I see them using mathematics in
this broad sense all the time,and yet feeling horrible about
their actual mathematics, likenumerosity skills.
And and um interestingly, Ijust collected data of uh
students um asking whether theyfeel themselves as a maths
(07:54):
person or not, and every singleone of them said no, like I'm
not a math person, who wouldever be, you know, call
themselves a math person.
And and we did go through someyou know situations where they
used mathematics likebrilliantly, like you
sophisticated, you know,approaches, strategies, um,
logical thinking, reasoning, andso on.
(08:16):
And they all said that theyfeel very confident and
competent in those situations,and they call them like my
world, my maths world.
And in that the world Iactually like when I'm you know
planning my travels, or maybeI'm like doing my workout, you
know, planning or designing, oryou know, any any kind of like
you know, real life in amathematics usage, and feeling
(08:38):
like, of course, like I do, likeof course I can trust my
mathematics skills, like I'mgreat.
But then like we went back touh kind of like the memories of
you know learning those skillsin the maths class and thinking
about like kind of doing it in amore mathematical or official
or such way, and likeimmediately the uh confidence
crashes, and it's like, but inthat situation, I wouldn't feel
(09:02):
confident, I wouldn't feelconfident.
So there's this weird mismatch,and yeah, that comes from just
like you know, focusing on likecan you do this one whatever
pass closed, you know, questionperfectly, and not just you
know, thinking that in real lifewhen we do things, we actually
can like almost do them.
(09:23):
We we're not doing thingsperfectly all the time.
We use estimation, we we kindof like account for you know,
there's be there's gonna be alittle range of error and we
understand how to you know dealwith that.
And yeah, I think that'slargely missing in maths
classrooms.
Chris Colley (09:38):
And yeah, and I I from what I've seen too, and
I've been in education my wholelife, as as you have.
I mean, we see that kids inelementary school, so our our
our younger learners going intohigh school already convinced
they're horrible at math, right?
Yeah, and I will say that I seemore on of girls feeling that
(09:58):
too.
Like, I just no, no, I don't domath, don't do it, can't do it.
And right away they have thisfixed mindset that no good, no
good at it.
How do you start to unravelthat?
Because what I've seen also isthat in elementary schools, we
often don't have math experts,right?
And they're kind of likefiguring it out themselves as
(10:18):
they're going through, which isno, which is fine, but that
they're gonna make errors andthere's gonna be mistakes made,
and it might not be the most umconfident teacher teaching math
because they just don't feelthey have that so it we kind of
start planting the seed earlierso that when they hit high
school, when there's high-stakestests and graduations and all
(10:41):
of that coming, they've alreadymade their minds up.
What can we do to unravel orprevent or minimize that impact
on our kids as they're growingthrough formalized education in
elementary school?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (10:57):
Thanks for this question.
It's a global issue and we faceit everywhere.
And the usual solution to thishas typically been you know,
let's either bring math expertsto you know primary um stages,
or let's just you know, upskillyou know, primary teachers'
mathematical skills.
But I'm actually gonna disagreewith that.
(11:20):
While you know, you know,knowledge of mathematics is
always important and likethere's no nothing wrong with
it, obviously, like increasingteachers' mathematical
confidences, but like there'sanother reason that is more, you
know, or you know, issue orproblem that is more pending,
which is those teachers'relationship with mathematics.
Like you said, like many of theteachers struggle themselves.
(11:43):
They might have had you knowdifficult negative experiences,
they struggle with theirconfidence.
So it's less about like youknow, a teacher not really not
being able to know what afaction means.
That's not the issue.
It's more about like, what if Imake a mistake?
What if I don't understand youknow deeply in all these things?
So once you have thatconfidence of, you know, but we
(12:06):
can always explore thingstogether, like like this is my
understanding.
Let's, you know, you know, kindof discuss these ideas and make
new discoveries together andhaving that confidence.
But once you feel like I'm nota math person, I don't actually
know how these rules work.
It's very difficult.
And that's why we do, it'sactually something I've been
(12:27):
working on a lot uh in my ownwork and also in UNISW, uh, that
we do have for our teacherstudents courses where we don't
start with teaching strategiesor you know, increasing
competences, but you know, kindof like what is your perception
of mathematics and identifying,like said earlier, like
mathematics that you use in youreveryday life, like the maths
(12:49):
that you already do, and feelconfident with.
And then you can bring thoseexperiences to the maths, you
know, class and make it morelike just a normal thing to do,
something that we just do, like,and then maybe add a little
more accuracy and a little moreof those like mathematical, you
know, rules and and you know,principles on top of what we
(13:11):
already do and feel just youknow normal and confident about
it.
Chris Colley (13:15):
I love that.
I love that.
And what about our youngestlearners, Laura?
Like, when do you startbringing in concepts or you
know, counting or numbers?
And like I work a lot inpreschool kindergarten areas,
and it's always like when is ituh when is it time to bring
(13:37):
those ideas or play around withthose concepts?
Is it is there is there um youknow any research or information
that sh tells us along thechild's development when talking
about math can come into play?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (13:54):
Yeah, I there's definitely lots of
studies showing exactly like howto sequence things and like
what building blocks must be youknow established before you go
any further, or you know, whenyou uh and especially when you
utilize things like cognitiveload theory, like you you you
shouldn't put like too manythings uh into the situation at
(14:15):
once, but that also again kindof like addresses these more
kind of like accurate, like howto make things you know
perfectly, how to understand therules and principles perfectly.
So I would say this is moreabout that would be more about
procedural knowledge, but at thesame time, like when you let's
(14:38):
say let's let's say let's talkabout multiplication, for
instance, and how that um canlike manifests when we work on
areas.
So we we essentially know thatthere might be you know five
rows of you know four pebbles,say, or something like that.
So so we can kind of like youknow bring this multiplication
(14:58):
into when we start you knowunderstanding what area means,
and obviously you need tounderstand what multiplication
means before that, and youprobably need to know what four
times five is in its situation,but at the same time, you can
like work with two-year-old kidswith Lego blocks, for instance,
and just give them like 20 Legoblocks, and like how can you,
(15:21):
you know, or say, you know,three years old or four years
old, maybe not two years old,but um, like can you build you
know rectangles out of these,you know, 20 blocks?
And like how would they looklike?
Like, are they all like do youare using the same amount, but
you know, number of blocks foreach of these rectangles?
Maybe one is you know buildingtwo times 10 and another one is
building uh four times five andso on.
(15:42):
So kind of like it in in thatway, we can kind of like bring
those ideas constantly into youknow explorations and
investigations.
And then like when the timecomes, we can then introduce
like the actual formula for youknow calculating area, and and
(16:03):
then we need the multiplicationskills, but we can still kind of
like instill that foundationfrom from very early on.
Chris Colley (16:11):
Yeah, well, I love that.
And I love what you're sayingtoo, that teachers just have to
um you don't have to be anexpert.
You can explore, you can becurious and show curiosity to
your students, and in turn theymight start reflecting those
kinds of um, you know, uh skillsas well of curiosity and oh
(16:31):
mistakes are fine, and we'll tryagain and uh let's problem
solve this and figure it out.
And I like that that that canbe an approach rather than you
know focusing on too much on thetext and on the on the workbook
and like not understanding it,but just having to go through
the routine, which kind of killsthat uh idea that math is
(16:52):
everywhere, um which you hadmentioned before.
And when you um created likeyou have two um well, I saw that
uh math for humans, the onethat you have on Australia
website.
Um it's such a great resource.
What what do you hope that thatinformation can help teachers
(17:13):
with?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (17:15):
Oh yeah, so the whole thing like ideology
behind math for humans and likeyou know, establishing such a
conduct concept.
Um and I do want to mentionthat the page is a little bit
out of the day, so I'm gonnawork on that very soon.
But there are some resourcesthere, and I do uh post uh, you
(17:38):
know, blocks well, posts andstuff there.
But the whole idea is to, asyou said in the introduction,
introduction, that uh, you know,the whole mathematics education
needs an overhole.
Like we need to really likethink about like how is
mathematics education going toserve humankind in the future.
(17:58):
So not just uh not just kind oflike how do we keep doing, how
do we keep like educating, youknow, new cohorts with these
mathematical competences thatcan nowadays be done with AI.
It doesn't mean that wewouldn't need to, you know, have
people understanding thoseprinciples, but we do have like
a very different, you know,world, and it's only gonna
(18:21):
change even more.
So like um like the whole ideaof reimagining what mathematics
could look like and what aresome skills that people really
do need.
For instance, like I saidearlier, better understanding
how algorithms work oradvertisement work or political
messaging works and how data canbe used correctly, but
(18:46):
deliberately, you know, choosingyou know certain numbers or
certain trends, or you know, notlying uh directly, but just you
know, kind of like giving somelittle messages.
So all those things areextremely important to you know
have you know critical citizensthat can also be confident in
(19:07):
and in their skills andunderstanding what is going on
and not be kind of like uh likevictims or whatever like other
people say and just like notreally understanding how things
actually work and you know, soand I think mathematics
education, if anything, is theplace to develop those skills.
(19:28):
Like, how do you how do wethink?
How do we share information?
Like, how do we understand youknow these kind of like
numerical databased messages?
So, yeah, so through math forhumans, I I'm kind of like free
from what is in the syllabustoday and what is in the
textbook, you know, for the nextlesson.
(19:49):
And like, really, like what arewe doing like in in you know 30
years or like 300 years?
So, yeah, that that's the idea.
Chris Colley (19:57):
We're not doing the same thing as we're doing
now.
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (20:00):
Yeah, yeah.
Chris Colley (20:01):
That we're we're and I love what you said that
we're selling it better.
Like, I think our messaging isjust not so good.
Um, and it's very constricted,you know, like it it's it seems
like there's one way, and if youdon't do it that way, it's the
wrong way.
Um do you ever have you everheard of computational thinking?
Um, the the idea from uhSeymour Papert out of MIT, where
(20:26):
there are four main you know,pattern recognition, uh
decomposition, abstraction, andalgorithms, right?
It was it had to do aroundcoding.
But I guess my question is isthe idea of coding can can that
be integrated into math?
Possibly?
I mean, can can math and codingcoexist as one instead of it
(20:51):
just being math?
But there I mean, because onceyou open the doors to coding,
there's so much more that youcould do.
There's so many more, you know,robots and microcontrollers and
whatever that you can actuallyplay with.
Um where do you sit on on thatidea that instead of like
formulaic that we're looking atmore of the bigger view of
(21:15):
things?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (21:16):
Yes, I'd say there's uh as soon as we can
get rid of some ideas that evenus educators cannot justify for
students, because there arecertain mathematical concepts
that like like students mightyou know question like why do
why are we learning this?
And nobody can answer thatquestion.
So as soon as we you knowreduce the kind of emphasis of
(21:40):
those ideas that we really don'tsee much relevance longer,
there is you know room for allkinds of new ideas,
computational thinking being oneof them, and like the whole
again, like the whole idea ofhow is this kind of like
techno-based universe workingaround us at the moment.
So I think it's extremelyimportant to bring that.
I don't think we need a newsubject, I think we just need to
(22:04):
like broaden the idea of whatmathematics you know inhales,
what can be like you knowexamined under its scope.
Um but then this just you knowkind of like uh makes me think
of something else that I justnoticed when I was doing that
data collection of you knowstudents mad worlds where they
(22:25):
you know felt confident and soon.
Because one thing is to utilizemathematics for um, you know,
in situations where we wherethings actually work pretty
neatly.
So we know that if I you knowprogram something or you know
ask you know an algorithm to doyou know a certain thing, they
(22:45):
will actually do it.
So there is like you know, thiscausational, you know, if I do
this, then this happens.
Uh maybe there's a little bitof uncertainty or no likelihoods
involved, uh, or you know, if Iuse this data, I get these you
know implications or conclusionsand so on.
So kind of like this the wholekind of you know accuracy of
mathematics.
(23:05):
But those students actuallyquite a lot of them brought up
the um concern of howmathematics uh you know
historically has been used toalso justify biases and like
injustice and you knowinequalities when we are you
know just selecting or can likemaybe putting too much emphasis
(23:28):
on numbers or patterns or trendsand not seeing that you know
things can always be contextualor individual and you know that
kind of like human aspect.
So, you know, kind of a long,long answer to your question.
I think there's definitely aneed to include you know things
like computational thinking inyou know under the uh you know
the official math syllabus, butalso I think we need even more.
(23:53):
Like what is the kind of likethe little less mathematical
human side of you know, againlike encountering and dealing
with you know situations thatstill are based on data and
information?
Chris Colley (24:08):
Yeah, excellent.
And I guess my last question,too, just because it's such a
hot topic, um, and we alluded toit artificial intelligence
before.
I mean, it seems like it'staking the world by storm, and
education's kind of like, whoa.
Like um where do you see yourwork evolving with artificial
(24:29):
intelligence down the road?
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (24:32):
Oh, yeah, so I think this is my personal
opinion.
Like obviously we can use andwe can utilize, and I think
we're already doing it quite,you know, uh quite a lot uh to
kind of equipping AI to keepoff.
So it can be a good, you know,just you know, informants, we
can, you know, program AI toteach, you know, kids,
(24:54):
mathematics, whatever, like youknow, skills and competences.
Uh but I think it's maybe evenmore effective if you use AI to
uh increase our confidence andagency.
So having it more as a like asupport partner that we're
working together with.
(25:14):
And uh we currently just uhdeveloping a project where we're
examining just that, like howcan we um make AI respond to
teachers' needs better in a waythat the teacher informs like
what are some of my issues, whatare some of my goals, and at
(25:35):
the same time, because AI canalso like um uh like strengthen
or confirm certain like biasesthat the teacher might have.
So they might think that youknow a certain strategy is great
without noticing that it mightbe you know uh not good for
certain demographics or you knowcertain you know group of
(25:55):
students or something.
So there's this risk of AI justcan like you know increasing
those biases.
So in this project, we'reexamining how can we how can AI
be programmed so that it canbetter show for any teacher that
goes to you know asking youknow help or support, like if
you do this, this will be youknow some likely coin uh what is
(26:19):
it, like uh um results.
And if you do that instead, sothis is something that you might
you know expect.
So then that gives you know theteacher the um uh the
opportunity to make moreinformed decisions and not just
kind of like you know, can yougive me something and the LEI is
doing the work?
Chris Colley (26:38):
Right, right.
It it demands critical thinkingof the user, it's not just yes,
yes, give me a lesson on mathon fractions, like it's not
they've got to think about it.
Why?
What's your intent?
What competency you're lookingto develop, etc.
I love that.
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (26:52):
I love that.
Chris Colley (26:52):
Yeah, I think that that might be also kind of an
avenue um for educators to kindof actually start to explore
more.
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (26:59):
Um yeah, and and and it would kind of
like the similar situation umlike like uh resembling example
would be when uh in anotherproject, we helping students use
AI in an almost similar way.
Uh that's what we call verticalcontextualization.
So instead of just you knowhaving students to work on their
(27:22):
typical tasks, uh not asking AIto help them or teach them, but
asking to envision contextswhere you know certain skills
are used.
And the word verticalcontextualization comes from,
you know, let's envision thefuture and ask AI to you know
tell us why where we might beusing these skills in the
(27:44):
future.
An example being I was workingwith year five students and they
had decimal multiplication ormultiplying decimal numbers, and
they couldn't really say likewhat where would we ever use
this and using verticalcontextualization, which is like
asking AI, how about 30 yearsfrom now?
Do you think that human humansare still using you know
multiplying decimal numbers?
(28:05):
And AI can quite nicely givesome context.
So maybe you know in thissituation or that situation, and
the students then choose like,oh, I'm gonna have a smart home
and I'm gonna, you know, need toadjust my you know temperature
or something like that.
They are actually have decimalnumbers and I need to you know
use modification.
So kind of like helping usingAI to uh broaden our imagination
(28:29):
and like helping us to makethose connections rather than
just simply like can it hit methis?
Chris Colley (28:34):
Right.
I love that.
Well, Laura, this has been I'mjust popping now with ideas and
thoughts.
Um I really thank you for fortaking some time um and sharing
your ideas.
And I'm glad that we'reexposing math a little bit more.
It's a it's a it's a valuedsubject that needs attention,
(28:55):
um, but maybe some little tweaksalong the way to make it more
relevant for kids so that theycan see that math is important.
Um, and they use it every day.
I loved how you describe thosekinds of scenarios.
I I I wish you all the best.
Check out Laura's website.
Um, I'll put the information inthe descriptor.
And also check out her book,Seriously Fun Maths.
(29:16):
Definitely gonna dive into thatone, Laura.
Um, I wish you all the best inyour day.
Um, thanks so much again.
And uh I hope one day we can uhpick this conversation up.
I feel we could talk foranother half an hour.
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (29:29):
That will be lovely.
Chris Colley (29:31):
Thanks so much, Laura.
Dr Laura Tuohilampi (29:32):
Thank you, Chris.
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My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January of 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921. My Favorite Murder is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including historic true crime, comedic interviews and news, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com