Monograph No. 6: Reading In Mathematics
December 1980
Publication of the Mathematics Council of The Alberta Teachers’ Association
57 – 62
Why Johnny Can’t Visualize – The Failures of the Behaviorists
James H. Jordan
The following occurrences can be recalled by most college mathematics instructors: Trigonometry students are unable to set up the problem about telephone poles casting shadows down a hillside; Calculus II students find the riddle about drilling a hole through the center of a ball bearing incomprehensible; Algebra students find it difficult to derive an equation from the riddle about rowing with and against the current; Calculus III students are unable to get the proper limits of integration when changing from rectangular to polar coordinates.