The
Consultation
GIVE PEACE A VOICE
St George's House, Windsor
28th-29th January 2009
.
Links to zipped .pdf and word .doc copies of this text are at the bottom of the page.
Appendix A (last revised 7th December 2008)
Participants, or their representatives, room allocations, and visitors:
1. Dr.
Sheikha Bint Jabor Al-Thani, Vice President, Qatar University (AA AA);
2. Professor Dr E. Vásárhelyi, Eötvös
Lorand University, Hungary (AA);
3. Professor Nancy Nagel, Lewis and Clark College, USA (A);
4. Dr Ayman Bassil, Senior Research Analyst, Qatar Foundation
(A);
5. Dr. Bruno Behr, Director, Qatar Leadership Academy (A);
6. Dr. Mahmoud Boutefnouchet, Head, Department of Mathematics
and Physics, Qatar University (A);
7. Dr Chee Wen Chong, Head, Research Partnerships, Qatar
Foundation (A);
8. Emeritus Professor Dr Duane Davis, Mercer University,
USA (AA);
9. Emeritus Professor Dr Paul Ernest, Exeter University,
UK (A);
10. Professor Johan Galtung, Rector, Transcend Peace University (AA);
11. Professor Dr Humam Ghassib, Jordan University, for HRH Prince El
Hassan (A);
12. Mr Colin Hannaford, IDM, Oxford, UK (AA);
13. Dr. Gregory Hedger, Director, Qatar Academy (A);
14. Mr. Michael Hitchman, Head of Senior School, Qatar Academy (A);
15. Professor Dr Hani Khoury, Mercer University, USA (video presentation);
16. Herr Wolfgang Ringkowski, representing Dr Hartmut Köhler, Stuttgart
Landesinstitut für Schulentwicklung, Germany (A);
17. M. Didier Nordon, Bordeaux University, France (AA);
18. Dr Jerome Ravetz, James Martin Institute, Oxford University, UK
(A);
19. Professor Michael Savage, University of Leeds, UK (A);
20. Mr. Adel Al Sayed, Director of Evaluation Institute for the Supreme
Education Council (A);
21. Mr Roger Sutcliffe, founding President of SAPERE ( Society for the Advancement
of Philosophical Enquiry and Reflection in Education), UK (A);
22. Mr Stuart Tester, for TRH the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall
(A);
23. Mr and Mrs Jimmy Kilpatrick, Education News, USA (AA);
24. Ms Katalin Fried, assistant to Professor Vásárhelyi
(sharing, see above);
25. Mrs Jackie Fairchild, Assistant Head, Gosford School, Oxford, UK
(A).
NB
AA means a twin bed room; A is a single bed room.
Currently single rooms for participants 3, 4, 5, 6,7,12, 13, 14, 21
are assigned to Qatar) and there are no more spare rooms.
Visitors (confirmed):
1. H.E. Mr
Yigit Alpogan, Ambassador of the Republic of Turkey.
2. H.E. Ms. Borbála Czakó, Ambassador of the Republic of Hungary.
3. H.E. M. Maurice Gourdault-Montagne, Ambassador of the Republic of France
will be represented by Dr Serge Plattard, Conseiller pour la Science et
la Technologie.
4. H.E. Mrs Barbara Tuge-Erecinska. Ambassador of the Republic of Poland,
will be represented by Mr Emil Pietras, First Secretary (Science and Education).
5. H.E. Mr Georg Boomgaarden, Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany
will be represented by Mrs Margit Hosseini, Education Attachée.
6. Ms Julia Strong, Deputy-Director, National Literacy Trust, UK.
7. Ms Delia Stafford, President, Haberman Educational Foundation, USA.
Appendix B
A
unique opportunity to participate in a groundbreaking debate at Windsor
Castle, January 2009
on using mathematics education in schools to
GIVE
PEACE A VOICE
The
Socratic Methodology for teaching mathematics will be explained at a
conference in St George's House, Windsor Castle, England in January
2009. Since this historic setting offers very limited space, only selected
international representatives can be invited. They will be shown how
mathematics can be taught to form models of peaceful interaction and
positive cultural exchange.
No expensive training is required for this approach.
Although actually extremely simple, the Socratic Methodology offers
a fully developed approach to progressive mathematics education with
consistent empirical and moral aims. Qualitative and quantitative skills
are developed in the early years. Literacy and numeracy are later combined,
allowing pupils to learn an honest understanding of mathematics from
collective discussion of expert texts, rather than pretended understanding
of imperfectly given or received instruction.
This practice also makes easier the usually difficult
transition from primary to secondary education. The ultimate aim, openly
shared with pupils, is the attainment of their intellectual and moral
maturity, strengthening their preference for critical, constructive,
receptive discourse rather than anger and violence.
The philosophy of this approach has already resulted
in government-funded development in Germany. It is also being taught
in an important student teacher programme in the United States as the
basis of democratic citizenship education.
The
Consultation
St George's House, Windsor Castle, 28th-29th January 2009
Adopting the Socrates Method for teaching mathematics: encouraging
a culture of democratic behaviour to foster inter-cultural and inter-faith
understanding and tolerance
Day
1 (28th afternoon) Supported by the Qatar Foundation (Its Chair,
H.H. Sheikha Mozah, consort of the Emir of Qatar, is UNESCO Special
Envoy for Basic and Higher Education and winner of the 2007 Chatham
House prize). The Foundation will share in inviting international specialists
in education to this opening forum. HRH Prince Charles, The Prince of
Wales, will be represented, as will HRH Prince El Hassan of Jordan,
Chair of the Global Commons.
Conference.Day 2 (29th) Participants will learn about the development
of this new approach through the original two-year study directed in
Germany for the EU Education Commission; through university research
in Hungary; government sponsored development and the production of new
textbooks in Germany; and its application in student teacher courses
in the United States. Papers by participants will be distributed and
further global academic collaboration will be invited.
Appendix C
Printed Introduction
Distinguished Guests,
In
this short meeting, in this historic setting of St George's House, my
colleagues and I intend to explain how a very simple change in mathematics
education can achieve what mathematics education was originally supposed
to achieve: competence in critical, constructive, receptive discourse,
the basis of democratic citizenship and national unity.
We hope you will question everything we have to say.
We believe we can convince you that there exists today no better, simpler,
or more inexpensive solution for resolving civic, national - and even
international - discord.
We believe that in this short meeting we can begin to show how all the
cultures of the world are actually united, and how they can become more
aware of this essential fact.
*
In
1992 the American scientists Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan wrote a book
that they called 'Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors'.
On its first page they pointed out that by the early
1980s the United States and the Soviet Union - for such reasons, they
suggest, as 'deterrence, coercion, pride, and fear' - had together created
arsenals totalling at least 60,000 nuclear weapons.
Both countries and their proxies engaged simultaneously
in a furious propaganda war: praising their own people for representing
'humanity', whilst declaring that the people of the other nation represented
a danger to humankind.
The Sagans reckoned that the United States spent ten
trillion dollars assembling its own arsenal. Mathematics had been vital
in constructing them. The consequences of using them were also calculated
using mathematics.
As a young man I spent several intervals of my life
on the North German plain, waiting to defend democracy as part of the
'trip-wire' strategy: the planned 'success' of which would have left
all of Central Europe - at the very least - a radioactive desert for
hundreds, possibly thousands, of years. This made the prospect of war
so frightening that no major power dared begin it.
But today we have to reckon on the possibility that
some much more minor power would begin a nuclear war if only they were
able. One of the reasons for our being here is therefore to Give Peace
a Voice: to think of a way of showing the billions of young people in
the world whose lives wars would destroy how to resolve difficult problems
peacefully. All of this: without having trillions of dollars to spend.
Dr Sagan and his wife, like many others, seemed to
believe that a major obstacle to peace is the belief of many people
that God has a plan for them to follow. If only, they thought, such
people might be persuaded to abandon these beliefs, the light of pure
human intelligence, no longer confused and no longer distracted, would
show them the right path to take.
Well, maybe. But it may be remembered that pure human
intelligence created those 60,000 nuclear weapons - about 30,000 of
which, incidentally, still exist in the United States and the previous
Soviet Union, and other countries are eager to have or add to their
own.
The Chapel of St George, next to this house, is dedicated
to a soldier saint. The history of St George is actually rather obscure;
but the English, who rather like their heroes rather obscure, decided
that he was - and is - a fitting symbol of themselves. It was also dedicated
to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and to a much earlier English King Edward
- who is, incidentally, the patron saint of all kings: and difficult
marriages! It was Edward - this earlier Edward - who also built what
is now called Westminster Abbey.
The Chapel was built to the glory of God, the Virgin, saint of all mothers,
and to strengthen the loyalty of the English nobles - and people - to
their King.
So Christianity has more than just some resonance
here: it is the reason that this place exists at all. The ground around
us - within these walls of Windsor Castle - is arguably one of the most
important Christian centres in Europe. It was also, in effect, a military
headquarters. The soldiers you see on duty here are not here only for
show.
So how can we escape - in this place, above all -
from the shadows of centuries of vicious conflict between Christian
nations, between Christian and Muslim, between all the different factions
of the human race, which disgrace us all as the human race?
Two thousand three hundred and forty two years ago
- that is in three hundred and thirty three BC - we are told that Alexander
the Great of Macedonia was invited to attempt to untie the famous Gordian
Knot in a place called Telmissus, the ancient capital of Phrygia, now
in Central Turkey.
I am sure you all know the story. This was a Knot
so complex that no-one had ever been able to undo it. But it had been
prophesied that whoever would separate the two ends of the rope would
go on to conquer the world.
Alexander did not try to undo the Knot. He took his
sword and cut it in two.
The Oxford Dictionary has a nice way of explaining
the modern use of 'cutting a Gordian Knot'. It suggests that this means
solving impossible problems by 'eliminating the conditions which create
the problem.'
I enjoyed the Sagans' book. There is much to learn
in it. (i) But what if our pure intelligence has been attempting to
show us precisely how to 'eliminate the conditions which create our
problems' - for thousands of years?
What if we have still not recognised that path?
What if those who believe in God's inspiration of
humankind are not as naïve as the Sagans appeared to believe, and
as many others seem to believe today?
What if many are so fascinated by the complexity of what separates one
end of the rope from the other, that they do not see what joins them!
Mathematics joins all the cultures on earth.
To cut through our Gordian Knot, of conflicts and
divisions which now threaten the survival of us all, we need to explain
to those who have not yet noticed that mathematics has not become the
universal language of humankind because it is an easy language to learn.
It never was an easy language. It never will be. It is not composed
of obvious facts, as many like to think. It is composed almost entirely
of arguments. That one plus one equals two - for example - is not actually
a fact; it is first of all an argument, and quite a difficult argument
at that.
We do not need to confuse little children with these
details. They already know that mummy and daddy made three - at least:
not always two!
The far more important fact that needs to be known,
however - and I will state it in the words of Dr Hani Khoury's 2006
paper for the Qatar Foundation's Second Innovation in Education Symposium
- is: 'mathematics is a universal moral system.' (ii)
This is the crux, the heart, of the matter. Humankind
has always sought certainties. Far too often their certainties drive
people apart rather than unite them. Very often they also serve to release
man's inexhaustible capacity for cruelty and evil.
Today we know that the dream that mathematics might
be made a perfect system of certainty is impossible. There will always
be truths we cannot prove; inconsistencies we cannot resolve; (iii)
statements beyond the reach of theory. (iv)
But if we are aware that mathematics must remain an
incomplete and imperfect language, we have also become aware that its
creation has always been driven by an older, deeper, and actually far
stronger impulse than reason. This impulse suggests that, if the perception
of any one mind is adequately expressed, all other minds, in varying
degrees, should be capable of sharing its perception.
This is an astonishing idea. In principle - and morality,
after all, consists of principles - there are no exceptions. All our
understanding can be, will be, and must be, shared. This is the real
basis of humanity. In mathematics - in particular - all people are morally
equal.
This is the morality that our societies need to teach
young people: that in their mathematics lessons they can learn the skills
of critical, constructive, but - above all - receptive discourse, which
allow such individual perceptions to be shared.
We may have more hope for their future if this ability
is sufficiently well understood. Without it, their future, and ours,
is to be feared. Our world is about to teach us that we were given an
Eden, and we have desecrated it - and the world is now ready to take
its revenge.
We cannot stop this revenge. But we can provide our
children - and then, we may hope, they can provide their children -
with a better understanding of the only universal language that no one
can misunderstand or corrupt for very long.
Whatever may befall our civilisations, it is just
possible that with this knowledge of the real importance of mathematics
as a universal language and as a universal moral system - our survivors
may be able to build a civilisation that does not carry within itself
the seeds of its own destruction.
The Socratic Methodology is not a new idea. Its deliberate
introduction into school education is a new idea: but it is not a revolution.
All that we have discovered is that children learn best through discussion
and that they learn least well from instruction.
Through directed discussion, especially in mathematics
- which, it must always be remembered, actually began as forms of discussion
to encourage democratic debate - they can learn to listen to one another
more respectfully, to accept criticism and correction, even gratefully,
and to understand that learning is more useful for society as a whole
when it is a co-operative, and not a competitive, endeavour.
Whether we want to believe that this is because of
evolution, or whether it is because of God's inspiration, I am personally
sure: God will not mind.
Thank you! Please prepare your questions!
Colin
Hannaford, Oxford, UK;
Ed. Dr Duane Davis, Georgia, USA.
i.
Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors, 1992.
ii. http://iie.qf.org.qa/files/pdf/Hani%20Khoury.pdf
cf Hannaford, 1992.
iii. Gödel, 1931.
iv. Church, Turing , 1936.
Appendix D
St George's House, Windsor,
28th-29th January 2009
Proposed Programme
28th Jan
16h00 Registration and Tea
17h30 Welcome: Colin Hannaford: Reasons and Aims.
Dr Vásárhelyi: Pedagogical Research, Hungary.
Comments and questions noted.
19h00 Supper
20h45 Talk: Dr Davis.
29th Jan
09h00 Colin Hannaford: the EU Education Commission study, Stuttgart 1996-98
09h15 Dr Nordon: the French perspective
09h45 Dr Ravetz: Toxic maths.
10h15 Discussion: (Chaired by Dr Davis.)
10h45 Coffee
11h15 Dr Köhler: the German experience.
11h45 Dr Khoury (represented): the United States experience.
12h15 Discussion: Chaired by Dr Ernest.
12h45 Lunch
14h15 Global perspectives: Dr Galtung.
14h45 Discussion: Chaired by Dr Nordon.
15h15 The Way Forward: Qatar
15h45
Ends.
Appendix E
Biographical Summaries of Contributing Participants (on 3rd October 2008)
Professor
Dr. Éva Vásárhelyi:
I was born in the small village of Biharuga in Hungary
in 1951, and went first to my village school and then to Eötvös
József Gymnasium in Budapest. After achieving my diploma at Eötvös
Loránd University, I was appointed to teach mathematics in the
Gymnasium and the University. I have held simultaneous appointments
ever since, and at once became a member of the Institute of Mathematics
and later, in 1991, of the Mathematics Teaching and Education Centre
(integrated in the Institute of Mathematics). In 2008 I became the director
of this Centre.
I was one of the founders of the doctoral studies
of the didactics of mathematics in Hungary. Since 1991 I have been holding
scientific co-operations (research and lectures) with several other
European universities, especially with the University of Salzburg, in
which I also did teaching experiments in schools and at that University.
Throughout Eastern Europe there is concern for the
many multi-cultural minorities in schools. These children must be taught
to read, write and speak a national language, and to integrate socially.
Most important is to teach all the children independent competence in
learning.
We have found that this is best achieved through dialogues
(directed class discussions): the first activity with help of paper
and pencil models (enactive level); later on of pictures and films (iconic
level); and eventually of mathematic symbols (symbolic level). The quality
of discussion is found to improve successively of the difficulty of
the problems being discussed.
My colleagues and I engage in continuous interdisciplinary
research with the emphasis on competence in learning (Lernkompetenz).
I met Mr. Hannaford in 1999, and thereby learnt of
the 1996-98 study he had inspired for the European Union. I informed
him of my Department's research, and I was subsequently invited to participate
with him and Dr. Khoury in the Qatar Foundation's 2006 Symposium.
As the Director of Mathematics Teaching and Education
Centre, I am convinced that teaching mathematics through discussion
is essential in achieving competence in learning, in promoting social
responsibility, and in reducing potentials for violence everywhere.
I fully endorse the aims of this event.
Professor
Nancy Nagel, Lewis and Clark College, Oregon, USA.
My
background in mathematics is in teaching graduate level courses to future
and current teachers, primarily at the elementary school level. My work
has also focused on mathematics as problem solving (which, of course,
connects well with the theme of the conference). I am not a mathematician,
but a teacher educator who has taught courses in teaching elementary
school mathematics for over 10 years. I have had in all thirty years'
experience as a teacher educator, elementary school teacher, researcher,
and author. .My career has fostered scholarship in real-world problem-solving,
teacher education, the process of equitable and democratic education,
and mathematical education. Since arriving at Lewis & Clark in 1992,
I have coordinated an elementary cohort, coordinated the early childhood/elementary
program, served as chair of teacher education and as Associate Dean
of the Graduate School. I am in the process of writing a book on "integrating
curriculum through service-learning," which focuses on community
connections and "real" use of curriculum and learning. I am
editor of the journal 'Democracy and Education'.
Professor
Dr Humam Bishara Ghassib
Born in Amman, Jordan on 27 April 1948. Educated
at University of Manchester, UK, 1968-74: BSc Hons in Physics, 1971;
PhD, Theoretical Physics, 1974.
Deputy Secretary General (formerly, Director of Studies
& Programs), Arab Thought Forum, and Advisor to HRH Prince El Hassan
bin Talal, 1999 to date. Professor of Physics, University of Jordan,
1986 to date.
Fulbright Senior Research Fellow, Cornell University,
1983-84. Chairman, Department of Physics, University of Jordan, 1986-88.
Dean of Research, 1990-94. Associate, [Abdul Salam] International Centre
for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, 1977-90; Editor-in-Chief: The Cultural
Journal (Arabic), 1989-99; Dirasat (refereed research journal, Arabic
and English), 1990-94; Al Muntada (Journal of Arab Thought Forum, Arabic
and English editions), 1999 to date.
Awarded: Abdul Hameed Shoman Prize for Young Arab
Scientists in Fundamental Sciences, Amman, 1986. Al-Hussein Order of
Merit for Distinguished Contribution, Amman: 2nd order, 1998; 1st order,
2000.
Member, New York Academy of Sciences, 1981; Jordan
Academy of Arabic, 1984 - . Fellow, Third World Academy of Sciences
(TWAS), 1988 - .
Research Areas: low and ultralow temperature physics
(theory); many-body theory; liquid 3He and 4He; 3He-4He mixtures; other
quantum fluids; thin films and low-dimensional systems; superfluidity;
physics education; history and philosophy of science; Arabic language;
culture.
Mr Colin
Hannaford:
I began to teach mathematics when I was thirty.
I was never a mathematician. I became a soldier in the British Army
when aged seventeen. The basis of my training was in engineering, and
this was so outstanding that I may claim some skill in virtually every
mechanical skill - beginning with blacksmithing! The Army paid to send
me to university, but it required only basic degrees. Soldiers do not
usually need PhDs.
Given this rather unusual background, my good fortune
as a teacher has been remarkable. Within three years of receiving my
certificate to teach, the most basic requirement, I was appointed a
head of mathematics in one of the official European Schools of the European
Union.
This meant that I now worked with the best qualified,
most experienced teachers of the European Union. I was teaching generally
intelligent multi-national pupils for the European Baccalaureate, a
final examination of many subjects, all at university entrance level.
This is an extremely difficult exam. As their teacher,
I was virtually autonomous. I could choose to teach them as I wished.
After seven years I had made two important observations. My pupils were
passing their Baccalaureate with amongst the highest grades of all the
twelve European Schools. This was what I aimed for. Far more important
was that I knew that very few really understood what they were doing.
I also realised that some in the middle years hated me intensely.
To learn why all three of these facts could be simultaneously
true - and were true for other mathematics teachers - took me on a ten
year odyssey through Europe and America. I believe we can now explain
why it is our schools are not making all our children healthy - as we
expect that they should - but make many of them very sick indeed: some
fatally - to themselves or to others. Mathematics should teach that
differences of opinion are natural, not threatening. It does not do
this and the result is serious social fracture and dysfunction.
Dr.
Gregory A. Hedger.
Dr. Hedger is in his second year as the Director of
Qatar Academy. He began his education career as a teacher in Minnesota,
USA, which was followed by 18 years abroad in Romania, Indonesia, Pakistan,
and the Cayman Islands before coming to Qatar. Dr. Hedger completed
an Ed.D. in Educational Policy and Administration from the University
of Minnesota in 2005. His family, which includes his wife Kirstin, and
three daughters, are with him in Qatar.
Michael
Hitchman.
Born and schooled in London, Michael worked for nine
years, as a Physical Education and Science teacher, in a large comprehensive
school in the UK. In 1989 he accepted a position at the prestigious
Dubai College (UAE) and so began his overseas educational career, which
has spanned almost 20 years. Following spells in China and Turkey Michael
returned to the Gulf in 2006, as Head of Senior School at Qatar Academy.
Married with two children, he completed his MA in Education at Bath
University in 2002.
Dr.
Hani Q. Khoury
Professor of Mathematics and Chair of the Mathematics,
Science, and Information Systems Department at Mercer University's College
of Continuing and Professional Studies, Georgia, USA. The grandson of
a Greek Orthodox Priest, Dr. Khoury was born in Nablus, Palestine, and
came to the United States in 1983 at the age of 18. He earned a Bachelor
of Arts degree in Mathematics and a Bachelor of Science degree in Systems
and Information Science in 1987, a Master of Science degree in Computer
Science in 1989, and a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Mathematics Education
in 1995, all from Syracuse University, New York.
In 1993, Dr. Khoury was selected as a Chancellor's
Advisor at Syracuse University. He served on the American Friends Service
Committee as a Third World Coalition committee member and a Disability
Issues subcommittee member (1988-1994). He also served as President
of the Georgia Chapter of the American-Arab Anti Discrimination Committee
(2000-2001). Dr. Khoury received the Excellence in Teaching Award for
the year 2000 at Mercer University's School of Education and the Professor
of the Year Award for the year 2008 at Mercer's College of Continuing
and Professional Studies. He has written several articles and has given
numerous presentations on the quest for justice and peace in the Middle
East and on empowering people with disabilities.
Dr. Khoury is a member of the task force sponsored
by the Qatar Foundation in Doha, Qatar, and by UNESCO charged with providing
a forum for international scholars to explore the implications of their
research for practical educational endeavors. The series began in 2004
with a forum dedicated to the Art and Science Partnership, and in 2006
the series explored Technology, Empowerment and Education. On March
12, 2007, Dr. Khoury participated in a third conference addressing the
Literacy Challenge in the Arab States. Currently he is serving as a
Governor's Teaching Fellow for the academic year 2008/2009 at the Institute
of Higher Education, University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia, USA.
Dr.
Jerome R. Ravetz:
Born in Philadelphia, United States in 1929. He
came to England as a Fulbright Scholar, and did his Ph.D. in mathematics
at Cambridge. Dr Ravetz is a leading authority on the social and methodological
problems of contemporary science. With Silvio Funtowicz, he created
the NUSAP notational system for assessing the uncertainty and quality
of scientific information, and also the concept of Post-Normal Science,
relevant when 'facts are uncertain, values in dispute, stakes high and
decisions urgent'.
For many years he taught the History and Philosophy
of Science at the University of Leeds. He has held positions at Utrecht
(Netherlands), Harvard, The Institute for Advanced Study (Princeton),
California (Santa Cruz), FuDan (Shanghai), EC. Joint Research Centre
(Ispra, Italy), Texas (Dallas), and Carnegie Mellon. He is currently
an Associate Fellow at the James Martin Institute for Science and Civilization
at the Saïd Business School in the University of Oxford.
His earlier seminal work Scientific Knowledge and
its Social Problems (Oxford U.P. 1971, Transaction 1996) now has a smaller
sequel, The No-Nonsense Guide to Science (New Internationalist 2006).
His other publications include a collection of essays, The Merger of
Knowledge with Power (Mansell 1990), and collaborations with Zia Sardar
(Cyberfutures, Introducing Mathematics).
Selections from his recent work are found on the website
www.nusap.net and on his personal website www.jerryravetz.co.uk.
Recent essays include 'Maturing contradictions of European Science',
'Global systems failures', and 'Towards a non-violent discourse in science'.
Appendix F
