Johnson, Art 1946-

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Johnson, Art 1946-

PERSONAL:

Born March 15, 1946, in Lowell, MA; son of Arthur V. and Bessie Johnson; married Juanita Roberts (a teacher), December 26, 1970; children: Alexa Britt, Candace Raven. Ethnicity: "White." Education: Tufts University, B.A., 1967; University of Massachusetts at Lowell, M.Ed., 1977; Northwestern University, graduate certificate, 1979; Boston University, Ed.D., 1997. Religion: Jehovah's Witness.

ADDRESSES:

Home and office—Nipper Enterprises, Inc., 219 Christian St., Cheraw, SC 29520. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

Author and educator. Nashua School District, Nashua, NH, math teacher, 1967-99; Boston University, Boston, MA, visiting professor, 1999—. Speaker at conferences in the United States, Canada, and Hungary; consultant to New Hampshire State Department of Education, 1988-98.

MEMBER:

National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, Association of Math Teachers of New Hampshire (representative to Math Teachers in New England, 1981-90).

AWARDS, HONORS:

Named New Hampshire Teacher of the Year, 1992; Presidential Award, 1992, for excellence in Mathematical Teaching; Tandy Prize, 1995.

WRITINGS:

Classic Math: History Topics for the Classroom, Dale Seymour (Palo Alto, CA), 1994.

Building Up to Bubbles, Didax (Rowley, MA), 1997.

Building Geometry, Dale Seymour (Palo Alto, CA), 1997.

Geometry Tools for a Changing World, Prentice Hall (Upper Saddle River, NJ), 1998.

Famous Problems and Their Mathematicians, Teacher Ideas Press (Englewood, CO), 1999.

(With Susan H. Chapin) Math Matters: Understanding the Math You Teach, Grades K-6, Math Solutions (Sausalito, CA), 2000, 2nd edition, 2007.

(With D. Pugale and H. Slovin) Geometry 6-8, National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (Reston, VA), 2001.

Weigh-Too Mathematics for Grades 3-5, Extra Measures (Chicago, IL), 2002.

Weigh-Too Mathematics for Grades 6-8, Extra Measures (Chicago, IL), 2002.

Geometry Explorations with View Thru' Geometric Solids, Extra Measures (Chicago, IL), 2002.

(With L. Boswell and R. Evans) Afterschool Achievers Math Club: Grade 6, with instructor's guide, Great Sources Education Group (Wilmington, MA), 2003.

(With L. Boswell and R. Evans) Afterschool Achievers Math Club: Grade 7, with instructor's guide, Great Sources Education Group (Wilmington, MA), 2003.

(With L. Boswell and R. Evans) Afterschool Achievers Math Club: Grade 8, with instructor's guide, Great Sources Education Group (Wilmington, MA), 2003.

Weigh Too Equation Balance, Classroom Products (Bloomington, IL), 2004.

(With A. Bellman and L. Bass) TI-83/84 PLUS Activities, Prentice-Hall (Needham, MA), 2004.

(With L. Bass, R. Charles, and D. Kennedy) Geometry, Prentice-Hall (Needham, MA), 2004.

(With Leonard M. Kennedy and Steve Tipps) Guiding Children's Learning of Mathematics, 10th edition, Thomson/Wadsworth (Belmont, CA), 2004, 11th edition, 2008.

(With K. Norris) Teaching Today's Mathematics in the Middle Grades, Allyn & Bacon (Boston, MA), 2006.

Also author of In Another Voice: Teaching Mathematics to Limited Proficient English Students, Allyn & Bacon (Boston, MA). Contributor to books, including Mathematics for Students, Volume 2, Macmillan (New York, NY), 2001; Putting Research into Practice, Prentice-Hall (Needham, MA), 2004; and Empowering the Beginning Teacher of Mathematics in Middle School, National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (Reston, VA), 2004; Empowering the Beginning Teacher of Mathematics in High School, National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (Reston, VA), 2004. Contributor to journals, including Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School and Mathematics Teacher.

SIDELIGHTS:

Art Johnson has written several books on mathematics and its history for middle and high school students and their teachers. He once commented: "When I was in elementary school I enjoyed all my school subjects, but I especially liked mathematics. The numbers and shapes obeyed specific rules and never deviated from their relationships to each other. They followed the rules, and you could depend on that. English and history were different. The rules of grammar weren't always true in the great books I read, never mind about poetry, which can seem to follow no form at all. History had a flow through time, but events didn't always turn out as they should have. There were anomalies everywhere I looked. Nothing like the beauty and elegance of mathematics.

"As I grew older I was convinced about the superiority of mathematics to English and history. There was a certain clarity to mathematics that English and history could never have. But here I am, a writer who writes about the history of mathematics, among other topics. What happened? How did I ever get to be a writer, and about mathematics history, no less?

"I think it has to do with having something to say, and being excited about it. I still find many areas of mathematics engaging, and I hope to convey that feel- ing to others through my writing. While not everyone is going to find mathematics compelling, I hope I can help them appreciate that mathematics matters.

"Sometimes I think I will wake up and it is all a dream. I am actually writing, and about my beloved mathematics. What could be better?"

Johnson's Famous Problems and Their Mathematicians presents sixty mathematical conundrums, biographical information about the mathematicians famous for solving them, and brief write-ups for classroom use that are "engaging and are quite suitable as in-class material or homework problems," according to Thomas S. Downey of Kliatt. Johnson was praised by reviewers for presenting a broad range of offerings, including information on male and female mathematicians, problems ranging in difficulty from the easiest (appropriate for fifth graders) to the most difficult (which may be useful in high school classrooms), and both obscure and famous problems, such as Fermat's last theorem, Goldbach's conjecture, the four-color map theorem, and Konigsberg bridges. Throughout, Johnson succeeds in sharing "the excitement and mystery of math … and demonstrates how the discoveries can be applied to everyday situations," noted a contributor to Curriculum Review. Most importantly, Downey commented that Johnson's brief mathematical summaries make it "much easier for teachers to include some interesting historical context into their classes."