EMS Mackie

Report in The Scotsman on 5 February on Dr John Mackie's lecture to the Edinburgh Mathematical Society given in the Mathematical Institute, Chambers Street, Edinburgh on Friday 4 February 1938.

The Teaching of Mathematics

A revision of the methods of school teaching of mathematics was urged by Dr John Mackie, rector of Leith Academy Secondary School, at a meeting of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society held at the Mathematical Institute, Chambers Street, last night. Dr Mackie made a plea for more discursive methods and for explanations of a more popular nature. he urged that future teachers of mathematics should be taught the philosophy of their subject, and should be aware of its wider implications - "even," he added, "if this makes a number of them unhappy and dissatisfied with the existing state of affairs."