ABSTRACT

The analysis of the content of school textbooks, particularly in a time of cross-cultural borrowing, is a growing field restricted by the tools currently available. In this paper, drawing on the analyses of three English year-one mathematics textbooks, we show how two approaches to the analysis of sequential data not only supplement conventional frequency analyses but highlight trends in the content of such textbooks hidden from frequency analyses alone. The first, moving averages, is conventionally used in science to eliminate noise and demonstrate trends in data. The second, Lorenz curves, is typically found in the social sciences to compare different forms of social phenomena. Both, as we show, extend the range of questions that can be meaningfully asked of textbooks. Finally, we speculate as to how both approaches can be used with other forms of ordered classroom data.

摘要

对学校教科书内容的分析，尤其是在跨文化借贷的时代，是一个受当前可用工具限制的日益增长的领域。在本文中，通过对三本英语一年级数学教科书的分析，我们展示了两种对顺序数据进行分析的方法不仅是对常规频率分析的补充，而且还突显了这些仅在频率分析中隐藏的教科书内容的趋势。第一个是移动平均线，通常用于科学中，以消除噪音并显示数据趋势。第二种是洛伦兹曲线，通常在社会科学中发现以比较不同形式的社会现象。正如我们所展示的，两者都扩大了可以有意义地问教科书的问题的范围。最后，