Dr. Rachael Kenney's Homepage

Assistant Professor

Mathematics Education

Purdue University

Welcome to the Purdue Faculty homepages. I am a Mathematics Education professor at Purdue University.  I have a unique position in the Mathematics Education program here because I hold a joint appointment with the Department of Mathematics in the Department of Science and the Department of Curriculum and Instruction in the College of Education.  Working in these two homes helps our program stay connected with our secondary mathematics education majors who receive their degree from the College of Science and their teaching certification from the College of Education.  It also helps us build important and useful connections among faculty in the two departments.  If you have questions about our program or just need to contact me, you can find me at:

Office:  Math 702 - 150 N. University St, West Lafayette, IN

Office Phone: 765-496-6053

Email: rhkenney@purdue.edu

For more information about the undergraduate or graduate programs in Mathematics Education and to find information about my wonderful colleagues in the program, visit the math ed webpages at: 

http://www.math.purdue.edu/academic/undergrad     (For Undergraduate Degrees in Mathematics/Mathematics Education)

http://www.teach.purdue.edu/    (For details about the teacher education component)

http://www.edci.purdue.edu/mathematics_education/       (For Graduate Degrees - Masters and Ph.D - in Mathematics Education)

ABOUT ME: 

Research

My research interests are focused on the following:  (a) Student and teacher symbol sense when interacting with mathematical statements in high school or college mathematics courses, (b) Use of technology for working with symbolic expressions in mathematics, and (c) Students' and teachers' anticipatory and reflective practices in learning and teaching mathematics.

Education

Ph.D.   Mathematics Education, North Carolina State University, 2000

  Dissertation: The Influence of Symbols on Pre-calculus Students’ Problem Solving Goals and Activities

  Advisors: Dr. Hollylynne Lee, Dr. Karen Hollebrands

M.S.     Applied Mathematics, University of Dayton, 2000

  Masters thesis: Shift Latin Squares and Local Permutation Polynomials

  Advisor: Dr. Weibke Diestelkamp

B.S.     Mathematics, University of Dayton, 1999

  Minor in English/ Secondary Teaching Certification

Publications in Refereed Journals/Proceedings

• McCulloch, A., Kenney, R., & Keene, K (In Press, April 2013). What to trust: Reconciling mathematical work done by hand with conflicting graphing calculator solutions. School Science and Mathematics Journal.
• Beisiegel, M., Chesler, J., Cox, D.C., Kenney, R., Newton, J.A., Stone, J.A. (In press). Reconsidering the Mathematics Preparation of Pre-service Secondary Mathematics Teachers. Notices of the AMS. 
• Kenney, R., & Kastberg, S. (In press). Links in learning logarithms. The Australian Senior Mathematics Journal.
• Tzur R., Johnson, H. L., McClintock, E., Kenney, R. H., Xin, Y. P., Si, L....Jin, X. (2013). Distinguishing schemes and tasks in children’s development of multiplicative reasoning. PNA, 73), 85-101.
• Cox, D.C., Chesler, J. Beisiegel, M., Kenney, R., Newton, J.A., Stone, J.A. (2013). The Status of Capstone Courses for Pre-Service Secondary Mathematics Teachers.  Issues in the Undergraduate Mathematics Preparation of Secondary Teachers, 4. Retrieved from http://www.k-12prep.math.ttu.edu/journal/curriculum/volume.shtml
• McCulloch, A., Kenney, R., & Keene, K. (2012). My answers don’t match: Using the graphing calculator to check. Mathematics Teacher, 105(6), 464-468.
• Tzur, R., Johnson, H., McClintock, E., Xin, Y.P., Si, L., Kenney, R., Woodward, J., Hord, C., & Jin, X. (2012). Children’s development of multiplicative reasoning: a schemes and tasks framework. Proceedings of The 36th Conference of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education (PME). Taipei, Taiwan.
• Chesler, J., Beisegal, M., Cox, D., Kenney, R., Newton, J., Stone, J. (2012). The Status of Capstone Courses in the Preparation of Secondary Mathematics Teachers. In S. Brown, S. Larsen, K. Marrongelle, & M. Oehrtman (Eds.), Proceedings of the 15th Annual Conference on Research in Undergraduate Mathematics Education (Vol. 1, pp. 1.108-1.122), Portland, Oregon. 
• McCulloch, A., Kenney, R., & Keene, K (2011). Deciding what to trust: Conflict resolution when checking with a graphing calculator produces a different solution.  In L.R. Wiest & T. Lamberg (Eds.), Proceedings of the Thirty-third Annual Meeting of PME-NA, Reno, NV: University of Nevada Reno.
• Kenney, R, Uhan, N., Yi, J., Kim, S., Gopaladesikan, M., Shamsul, A., and Hundia, A. (2011). Understanding and overcoming difficulties with building mathematical models in engineering: Using visualization to aid in optimization courses. In S. Brown, S. Larsen, K. Marrongelle, & M. Oehrtman (Eds.), Proceedings of the 14th Annual Conference on Research in Undergraduate Mathematics Education (Vol. 4, pg 4.116-4.119). Portland, Oregon.
• Kenney, R. (2010). Novice teacher reflections: A case study of novice teachers’ self-analyses of videos of their own teaching. Proceedings of the 13^th SIGMAA conference on Research in Undergraduate Mathematics Education, Raleigh, NC. Retrieved from http://sigmaa.maa.org/rume/crume2010/Abstracts2010.htm 
• Tzur, R., Xin, Y.P., Si, L., Kenney, R, Guebert, A. (2010). Students with learning disability in math are left behind in multiplicative reasoning: Number as abstract composite unit is a likely ‘culprit’. Education Resources Information Center (ERIC) #ED510991.  http://www.eric.ed.gov/. (refereed paper presented at the Annual AERA conference, Denver, CO.)
• Woodward, J., Kenney, R., Zhang, D., Guebert, A., Cetintas, S., Tzur, R., Xin, Y. (2009). Conceptually based task design: Megan's progress to the anticipatory stage of multiplicative double counting (mDC). In S. L. Swars, D. W. Stinson & S. Lemons-Smith (Eds.), Proceedings of the Thirty-first Annual Meeting of  PME-NA (Vol. 5, pp. 1378-1385). Atlanta, GA: Georgia State University. 
• Kenney, R. (2009). Linking college pre-calculus students' uses of graphing calculators to their understanding of mathematical symbols. In S. L. Swars, D. W. Stinson & S. Lemons-Smith (Eds.), Proceedings of the Thirty-first Annual Meeting of  PME-NA (Vol. 5). Atlanta, GA: Georgia State University. 
• Kenney, R. (2009). Pre-Calculus students interactions with mathematical symbols. Proceedings of the 12^th SIGMAA conference on Research in Undergraduate Mathematics Education, Raleigh, NC. Retrieved from http://sigmaa.maa.org/rume/crume2009/proceedings.html 
• Kenney, R. (2008). The influence of symbols on students’ problem solving goals and activities. Proceedings of the 11^th SIGMAA on Research in Undergraduate Mathematics Education (RUME) conference, San Diego, CA. Retrieved from http://sigmaa.maa.org/rume/crume2008/Proceedings/Proceedings.html 
• Kenney, R. (2007). Students' uses and interpretations of symbols when solving problems with and without a graphing calculator. In T. Lamberg & L.R. Wiest (Eds.), Proceedings of the Twenty-Ninth Annual Meeting PME-NA. Lake Tahoe, NV: University of Nevada Reno.
• Kenney, R. (2005). Students understanding of logarithmic functions. In G. M. Lloyd, M. Wilson, J.L.M. Wilkins, & S. L. Behm (Eds.), Proceedings of the Twenty-Seventh Annual Meeting of the North American Chapter of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education (PME-NA). Roanoke, VA: Virginia Tech.

Experience

Courses Taught at Purdue

Professional Affiliations

• Mathematical Association of America (MAA) 
• National Council for Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM)
• Indiana Council for Teachers of Mathematics (ICTM)
• North American Chapter of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education (PME-NA)
• Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators (AMTE)
• SIGMAA on Research in Undergraduate Mathematics Education (RUME)
• Hoosier Association of Mathematics Teacher Educators (HAMTE)