Dr. Nguyen Phuong Chi und Prof. Dr. Chu Cam Tho: An integrated approach in teaching mathematics at vietnamese schools

There is no doubt that mathematics is one of the important subjects in the school curriculum, because mathematical knowledge and skills are often used in other school subjects. However, in Vietnam, the subject "mathematics" is always taught independently, without any connection to other subjects. This leads to the fact that after leaving school, students lack of experience and confidences to apply mathematical knowledge to solve problems in the real life. To reduce this contradiction, teachers need to present mathematics in a wider context and encourage students to synthesize knowledge of mathematics and other curriculum subjects to solve problems. This is an integrated approach in teaching mathematics. 

In the talk it will be explained what "integrated teaching" means and why it is so important. Furthermore it will be discussed how mathematics can be integrated with other school subjects in the teaching process.  At the primary level the integrated teaching of mathematics and arts (the tessellation project) and the integrated teaching of mathematics and traditional culture (the geometry and folks games project) will be demonstrated. At the secondary level the speakers present the integrated teaching of mathematics and other sciences subjects such as chemistry and biology.