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INTERDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY RESEARCH IN BUSINESS
subjects, they develop the ability to use mathematics to extend and apply their
knowledge in other fields.
In school curriculum, mathematics is a compulsory subject and taught with a spirit to
increase the critical thinking, logical reasoning and should provide ease for the real
world life. The ability to see mathematics in the world that surrounds and shapes us, and
to recognize the power of mathematics to critically investigate and act on that world, are
key components of critical perspectives on teaching and learning mathematics (Turner,
Gutiérrez, Simic-Muller, and Díez-Palomar, 2009).
Researches (Maccini and Hughes, 2000; Quinn and Spencer, 2001; Owen and Fuchs,
2002;) documented that many secondary school and college students have learning
difficulties and show poor performance in mathematics.
Currently, the students of Humanities group and Science group learn same book of
Mathematics.
Before 1994, there was General Mathematics for Humanities group and Elective
Mathematics for Science group. Punjab Textbook Board (1993, p.i) advocated the
General Mathematics in the following words:
General Mathematics is for those students who would not study mathematics in
next classes. They may discontinue their study after matriculation or will study
social sciences subjects at college level. The aim of teaching General
Mathematics is to trained students to use mathematics in practical life and will be
able to use mathematical rules for learning social sciences‘ subjects…. As the
students of General Mathematics do not learn advanced mathematics so they do
not need to learn inductive and deductive reasoning.
In 1992, the idea emerged to combine the two types of mathematics into one. The
General Mathematics and Elective Mathematics were emerged together and new course
of integrated mathematics was introduced in 1994 (Punjab Textbook Board, 1994).
Integrated Mathematics mainly Consist on such topics which are not useful for business
Mathematics , because these topics are not related with business applications. Students of
Humanities Group remain puzzle while dealing with these topics because they think
algebra and theorems are abstract things. Many students come to the study of early
algebra with poor understandings of arithmetic (Thompson & Fleming, 2003). Sfard
(1994) discussed algebra as ―generalized arithmetic‖ consisting of the ―operational‖ and
―structural‖ phases‖. Algebra is perceived as uninteresting and based upon symbolic
manipulation with limited meaning and little relevance to every day life (Boaler, 2000;
Kaput, 1995; MacGregor, 2004; Stacey & Chick, 2004).
Usmani et al. (2007) made analysis of the Secondary Mathematics and concluded that:
We noted that there were too many formulas and theorems given in the
textbooks—which the students would be forced to rote memorize in order to
succeed in the exams. Making students memorize dozens of formulas is not
desirable. We are of the view that the students should have at least a basic
understanding of how the formulas that they are dealing with were derived and in
what sort of situations they can be useful. We would recommend that more focus
COPY RIGHT © 2011 Institute of Interdisciplinary Business Research 191
JANUARY 2011
VOL 2, NO 9