Rewriting the History of School Mathematics in North America 1607-1861

The focus of this book is the fundamental influence of the cyphering tradition on mathematics education in North American colleges, schools, and apprenticeship training classes between 1607 and 1861. It is the first book on the history of North American mathematics education to be written from that perspective. The principal data source is a set of 207 handwritten cyphering books that have never previously been subjected to careful historical analysis.

Nerida F. Ellerton was professor within the Mathematics Department at Illinois State University between 2002 and 2018. She holds two doctoral degrees-one in Physical Chemistry and the other in Mathematics Education. Between 1997 and 2002 she was Dean of Education at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia. She has taught in schools and at four universities, and has also served as consultant in numerous countries, including Australia, Bangladesh, Brunei Darussalam, China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, the United States of America, and Vietnam. She has written or edited 17 books and has had more than 150 articles published in refereed journals or edited collections. Between 1993 and 1997 she was editor of the Mathematics Education Research Journal, and between 2011 and 2016 she was Associate Educator for the Journal for Research in Mathematics Education. Since 2012 Springer has published six books which she co-authored with Ken Clements. She and Ken are joint editors of Springer's History of Mathematics Education Series.
M. A. (Ken) Clements's masters and doctoral degrees were from the University of Melbourne, and at various times in his career he has taught, full-time, in primary and secondary schools, for a total of 15 years. He has taught in six universities, located in three nations, and in 2019 he retired after being professor within the Mathematics Department at Illinois State University for 15 years. He has served as a consultant and as a researcher in Australia, Brunei Darussalam, India, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, South Africa, Thailand, the United Kingdom, the United States of America, and Vietnam. He served as co-editor of the three International Handbooks of Mathematics Education-published by Springer in 1996, 2003 and 2013-and with Nerida Ellerton, co-authored a UNESCO book on mathematics education research. He has authored or edited 36 books and over 200 refereed articles on mathematics education and is honorary life member of both the Mathematical Association of Victoria and the Mathematics Education Research Group of Australasia. He married Nerida Ellerton in 2005, and between them they have 7 children, 19 grandchildren, and 3 great-grandchildren.

Preface.- Table of Contents.- List of Tables.- List of Figures.- Abstract.- Foreword (by Jeremy Kilpatrick).- 1. The Historical Challenge.- 2. Development of a Tradition.- 3. Translating the Cyphering-Book Tradition to North America.- 4. Formulating the Research Questions.- 5. The Principal Data Set.- 6. Ending a 600-Year Tradition: The Demise of the Cypering-Book Approach.- 7. Conclusions, and some Final Comments.- References.- Appendices.