Peter O'Donnell – Medium

Peter O'Donnell

Revisiting School Mathematics: Products and Factors

This is the second article in the series Revisiting school mathematics, which is intended for any reader whose experience with the subject…

Jan 23

Revisiting School Mathematics: Products and Factors

Jan 23

Revisiting School Mathematics: Addition and Subtraction

As part of my training as a vocational educator many years ago, I was required to teach a skill of my choice. Limited by a traditional…

Jan 18

Revisiting School Mathematics: Addition and Subtraction

Jan 18

Gift or grit? The question of why some of us are slim and some are not

I am genetically gifted — or so I have been told my whole life. I am a saccharophile, a paniphile, an oenophile, and a carbohydrate addict…

Jan 11

Image courtesy of Pch.vector at FreeP!k

Jan 11

–1² = –1, but why should we care?

The convention that tells us that –1² = –1 has always been troubling. As a mathematics teacher, I have recognised that almost all of us…

Jan 2

–1² = –1, but why should we care?

Jan 2

Published in
Age of Awareness

We teach algorithms in lieu of mathematics

Another day, another class. It was only mid-morning, but my pupil was struggling to arouse her synapses. The topic was familiar enough —…

Dec 28, 2023

We teach algorithms in lieu of mathematics

Dec 28, 2023

Published in
Age of Awareness

Why do we teach by rote? And how can we do better?

The morning was unremarkable. Having taken the first ten minutes to settle my eighth-grade physics class and direct their attention to the…

Oct 15, 2023

Why do we teach by rote? And how can we do better?

Oct 15, 2023

Published in
Age of Awareness

What outliers tell us about our school systems

It was eighth-grade mathematics. Our teacher sat at the front corner of the room, an orderly stack of test papers resting on her desk. One…

Oct 15, 2023

What outliers tell us about our school systems

Oct 15, 2023

Published in
Age of Awareness

Beyond PEMDAS: making sense of the arithmetic order of operations

Many of us will have encountered the mnemonic PEMDAS, sometimes Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally, or one of its synonyms¹ at some time…

Oct 1, 2023

Beyond PEMDAS: making sense of the arithmetic order of operations

Oct 1, 2023

Published in
Age of Awareness

Separating education from validation

“It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education,” “The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education,” or…

Nov 23, 2022

Separating education from validation

Nov 23, 2022

Published in
Age of Awareness

Rethinking the Body Positive

Self-acceptance is not synonymous with empowerment

Jun 18, 2022

Rethinking the Body Positive

Jun 18, 2022

Peter O'Donnell

Peter O'Donnell

School teacher and former high-performance coach with a background in engineering and computing, and an interest in sociology, economics, and geopolitics.

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