Language as an including or excluding factor in mathematics teaching and learning

Abstract

This article explores the power of language to either include or exclude certain groups of students from genuine opportunities for mathematical sense-making. The substantial increase worldwide in the number of students learning mathematics through a language other than their primary language makes this a particularly urgent issue. This paper focuses on the South African situation, where, because English is widely perceived as the language of opportunity, it is, by grade 4, overwhelmingly the chosen language of learning and teaching. The epistemological and pedagogical consequences of this choice are evidenced in the poor performance of the country's students on national and international assessments of mathematical proficiency. Drawing on research literature around language immersion education models and the extent to which these align with certain key principles of second language acquisition, this position paper motivates for a stronger and more sustained commitment to providing students, particularly those from marginalized and vulnerable communities, with opportunities for becoming both bilingual and biliterate. Empirical data from two South African grade 4 mathematics classrooms are used to illuminate aspects of the mathematical sense-making challenges students and their teachers face without such commitment.

The Analysis of Grade 8 Fractions Errors Displayed by Learners Due to Deficient Mastery of Prerequisite Concepts

“…These authors report that only 31% of students in South Africa's TIMSS 2015 cohort 'always or almost always spoke the language of learning and teaching at home', achieving significantly better scores than those whose home language was different from the language used at school (Reddy et al, 2016, p. 8). These findings are consistent with those of Robertson and Graven (2020). In their study, Robertson and Graven (2020) noted that a prime cause for South African students' underachievement was that 'the pivotal role of language in education is neglected in curriculum and in teacher training programmes, resulting in limited language awareness, and consequently inadequate teaching methods that lead to language difficulties across all curriculum areas'.…”

“…Studies show that one of the reasons for this poor performance is Language of Learning and Teaching (Prediger, 2019;Prediger, Erath, & Moser Opitz, 2019;Robertson & Graven, 2020). Less than 5% of South Africans are English first language speakers and the rest of the population is notably heterogeneous.…”

“…This diversity within the group of second language learners complicates the matter of learning Mathematics via a second language even more. In South Africa's case, the indigenous African languages struggle to 'compete' with English in terms of their social, educational, political and economic traction within and beyond the country's borders (Robertson & Graven, 2020). As 'minority' languages, they risk being overshadowed, even completely replaced, by the more prestigious language of power, social status and commerce (English) -which is also a widely spoken international language.…”

“…This paper presents an analysis of grade 8 fractions errors displayed by learners due to deficient mastery of prerequisite concepts. The poor performance of South African learners in internationally benchmarked literacy and numeracybased exams has been well documented in the literature (Jojo, 2019;Robertson & Graven, 2020;Sibanda & Graven, 2018;South African Institute of Race Relations, 2020;Spaull, 2019;van der Berg & Gustafsson, 2019). One of the topic areas that learners display numerous errors in in Mathematics is fractions (Lemonidis & Pilianidis, 2020;Reinholda et al, 2020).…”

Grade 11 Students’ Reflections on their Euclidean Geometry Learning Experiences

“…The role of language in learning mathematics is a widely researched topic (see for example, Craig & Morgan, 2015;Mulwa, 2014;Naziev, 2018;Robertson & Graven, 2019). According to Robertson and Graven (2019), language can "either include or exclude certain groups of students from genuine opportunities for mathematical sense-making" (p. 77). Thus, by not teaching students the terminology of Euclidean geometry, teachers exclude some students from understanding geometry concepts.…”