On Learning Processes and the National Mathematics Advisory Panel Report

Abstract

This article is a response to Foundations for Success: The Final Report of the National Mathematics Advisory Panel (2008) and to one of the task group reports on which it was based, the report of the Task Group on Learning Processes. The author uses Maxwell’s two views of causality—regularity and process—to explore three major issues raised in the report: the nature of what is learned, how learning occurs, and the transfer of learning. She proposes alternative recommendations to those offered by the Panel, by drawing upon the mathematics education literature, which was largely excluded from the reviewed research. Furthermore, by neglecting research grounded in a process view of causality, the report excludes perspectives and findings that would have illuminated what it means to develop conceptual understanding in mathematics—one of three valued outcomes cited by the Panel.