• The Mathematical Education
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• v.43 no.4
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• pp.337-347
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• 2004

Korea and China have maintained close relationships since the ancient times along with Japan, which also shares the common Chinese culture. The three major players in Northeast Asia have been recognizing their increasing importance in politics, economy, society, and culture. Considering those relationships among the three countries, it's necessary to compare and investigate their mathematics terminology. The purpose of this study is to investigate the similarities and differences between the terminology of school mathematics in Korean, Chinese and Japanese. The mathematics terms included in the junior high school of Korea were selected, and the corresponding terms in Chinese and Japanese were identified. Among 133 Korean terms, 72 were shared by three countries, 9 Korean terms were common with China, and the remaining 52 Korean terms were the same as Japanese terms. Korea had more common terms with Japan than China, which can be explained by the influences of the Japanese education during its rule of Korea in the past. The survey with 14 terms which show the discrepancy among 3 countries were conducted for in-service teachers and pre-service teachers. According to the result of the survey, preferred mathematics terms are different from one group to the other, yet the Korean mathematics terms were more preferred in general. However some terms in Chinese and Japanese were favored in certain degree. This result may provide meaningful implications to revise the school mathematics terms in the future.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.43-60
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• 2004

The aims of the study were to analyze the San-Sul-Kwa textbook under the rule of Japanese Imperialism(1909～1945). It was analyzed that the contents of San-Sul-Kwa were selected for the purpose of national interests of Japanese as a ruling country through four times of amendment of education and many kinds of drill and practice in terms of number and operations were emphasized toward entire grades. However, some parts of textbook over the period seem to have had significant affects on mathematics education of Korea since the period.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.219-232
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• 2013

Japanese mathematics, namely Wasan, was well-developed before the Meiji period. Seki Takakazu (1642?-1708) is the most famous one. Taking Seki's interpolation as an example, the similarities and differences are made between Wasan and Chinese mathematics. According to investigating the sources and attitudes to this problem which both Japanese and Chinese mathematicians dealt with, the paper tries to show how and why Japanese mathematicians accepted Chinese tradition and beyond. Professor Wu Wentsun says that, in the whole history of mathematics, there exist two different major trends which occupy the main stream alternately. The axiomatic deductive system of logic is the one which we are familiar with. Another, he believes, goes to the mechanical algorithm system of program. The latter featured traditional Chinese mathematics, as well as Wasan. As a typical sample of the succession of Chinese tradition, Wasan will help people to understand the real meaning of the mechanical algorithm system of program deeper.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.36 no.3
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• pp.37-57
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• 2023

In the history of elementary school mathematics education in Korea, the period led by the Government-General of Joseon during the Japanese colonial period cannot be omitted. As a way to grasp the real state of elementary school mathematics education at that time, there is a method of analyzing elementary school mathematics textbooks published by the Government-General of Joseon. However, the actual state of the publication of them was not sufficiently known. For this reason, this study surveys the actual state of the publication of those textbooks. To this end, real information on textbooks owned currently by various institutions and information on the publication of those textbooks in the official gazette and documents of the Government-General of Joseon were checked and organized.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.26 no.1
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• pp.11-20
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• 2013

The Taisei Sankei(大成算経 in Japanese) or the Dacheng Suanjing(in Chinese) is a book of mathematics written by Seki Takakazu 関孝和, Takebe Kataakira 建部賢明 and Takebe Katahiro 建部賢弘. The title can be rendered into English as the Great Accomplishment of Mathematics. This book can be considered as one of the main achievements of the Japanese traditional mathematics, wasan, of the early 18th century. The compilation took 28 years, started in 1683 and completed in 1711. The aim of the book was to expose systematically all the mathematics known to them together with their own mathematics. It is a monumental book of wasan of the Edo Period (1603-1868). The book is of 20 volumes with front matter called Introduction and altogether has about 900 sheets. It was written in classical Chinese, which was a formal and academic language in feudal Japan. In this lecture we would like to introduce the wasan as expressed in the Taisei Sankei and three authors of the book. The plan of the paper is as follows: first, the Japanese mathematics in the Edo Period was stemmed from Chinese mathematics, e.g., the Introduction to Mathematics (1299); second, three eminent mathematicians were named as the authors of the Taisei Sankei according to the Biography of the Takebe Family; third, contents of the book showed the variety of mathematics which they considered important; fourth, the book was not printed but several manuscripts have been made and conserved in Japanese libraries; and finally, we show a tentative translation of parts of the text into English to show the organization of the encyclopedic book.

• Research in Mathematical Education
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• v.10 no.3 s.27
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• pp.151-167
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• 2006

The open approach to teaching school mathematics in the United States is an outcome of the collaboration of Japanese and U. S. researchers. We examine the approach by illustrating its three aspects: 1) Open process (there is more than one way to arrive at the solution to a problem; 2) Open-ended problems (a problem can have several of many correct answers), and 3) What the Japanese call 'from problem to problem' or problem formulation (students draw on their own thinking to formulate new problems). Using our understanding of the Japanese open approach to teaching mathematics, we adapt selected methods to teach mathematics more effectively in the United States. Much of this approach is new to U. S. mathematics teachers, in that it has teachers working together in groups on lesson plans, and through a series of discussions and revisions, results in a greatly improved, effective plan. It also has teachers actively observing individual students or groups of students as they work on a problem, and then later comparing and discussing the students' work.

• Proceedings of the Korea Society of Mathematical Education Conference
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• 2006.10a
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• pp.45-62
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• 2006

The open approach to teaching school mathematics in the United States is an outcome of the collaboration of Japanese and U.S. researchers. We examine the approach by illustrating its three aspects: open process (there is more than one way to arrive at the solution to a problem; 2) open-ended problems (a problem can have several of many correct answers), and 3) what the Japanese call 'from problem to problem' or problem formulation (students draw on their own thinking to formulate new problems). Using our understanding of the Japanese open approach to teaching mathematics, we adapt selected methods to teach mathematics more effectively in the United States. Much of this approach is new to U.S. mathematics teachers, in that it has teachers working together in groups on lesson plans, and through a series of discussions and revisions, results in a greatly improved, effective plan. It also has teachers actively observing individual students or groups of students as they work on a problem, and then later comparing and discussing the students' work.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.53-69
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• 2017

This paper demonstrates how a nineteenth century Japanese votive temple problem known as sangaku from Okayama prefecture can be solved using traditional mathematical methods of the Japanese Edo (1603-1868 CE). We compare a modern solution to a sangaku problem from Sacred Geometry: Japanese Temple Problems of Tony Rothman and Hidetoshi Fukagawa with a traditional solution of ${\bar{O}}hara$ Toshiaki (?-1828). Our investigation into the solution of ${\bar{O}}hara$ provides an example of traditional Edo period mathematics using the tenzan jutsu symbolic manipulation method, as well as producing new insights regarding the contextual nature of the rules of this technique.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.26 no.5_6
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• pp.329-343
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• 2013

Japanese mathematics, namely Wasan, was well-developed before the Meiji period. Takebe Katahiro (1664-1739) and Nakane Genkei (1662-1733), among a great number of mathematicians in Wasan, maybe the most famous ones. Taking Takebe and Nakane's indefinite problems as examples, the similarities and differences are made between Wasan and Chinese mathematics. According to investigating the sources and attitudes to these problems which both Japanese and Chinese mathematicians dealt with, the paper tries to show how and why Japanese mathematicians accepted Chinese tradition and beyond. As a typical sample of the succession of Chinese tradition, Wasan will help people to understand the real meaning of Chinese tradition deeper.

• Journal for History of Mathematics
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.89-111
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• 2021

This paper is a continuation of the study on the history of the Japanese school of Finsler geometry. We had studied on the birth of Japanese school of Finsler geometry. In this paper, we find out what motivated Japanese to embrace Finsler geometry and we collect the history and analyze trends of Japanese school of Finsler geometry since its founding by M. Matsumoto.