Professors and researchers from across the globe are at NIU today for the 10th annual conference meeting of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education.

The academic conference, which started Wednesday and will continue through Saturday at the Holmes Student Center, will host scholars from Israel, France, Canada, Mexico and the United States.

Deborah Booth, a conference coordinator, said there will be between 160 and 180 people in attendance and that this also will be the first time NIU has served as conference host.

Carol Lacampagne, NIU mathematics professor and co-coordinator, said the conference has been held at universities such as Northwestern, Califonia at Berkeley, Montreal and Michigan State.

Lacampagne said the conference is geared toward discovering new ways to facilitate learning and implementing completed research techniques and theories in the classroom.

With the great number of researchers from around the world, Lacampagne believes this will be “a great opportunity” not only for NIU faculty, but for mathematics graduate students as well.

Magdalene Lampert from Michigan State University is scheduled to speak this morning on the role of professors.

Lampert will be the first of two speakers to make presentations at the conference. James Greeno of Stanford University will speak on “The Situated Activities of Learning and Knowing Mathematics” Friday morning.

Booth said 60 research papers will be presented during the conference along with four symposiums.

Faculty from the NIU psychology department and College of Education also are expected to attend.