The cinematic art of teaching university mathematics: chalk talk as embodied practice

Abstract

This article explores the multimodal nature of teaching university mathematics in international contexts. It focuses on the 'cinematic' art of teaching, applying a multimodal approach in the analysis of the pedagogical genre of 'chalk talk' as embodied disciplinary practice. The research draws on rhetorical genre studies and theories of situated learning and communities of practice. The data considered for the study consist of audio/video recorded lectures, observational notes, and semi-structured interviews collected from 50 participants teaching in 7 countries. Participants differ in linguistic, cultural, and educational backgrounds, teaching experience, and languages they use for instruction. The study suggests that a multimodal treatment of chalk talk as an embodied disciplinary pedagogical practice of teaching mathematics in the undergraduate lecture classroom allows researchers to further uncover the complexity of this genre. Better understanding the embodied pedagogical practices of the international mathematics CoP may lead to new insights regarding disciplinary-specific pedagogies. key wordsgenre, multimodal analysis, disciplinarity, professional practice, university mathematics multimodal communication The cinematic art of teaching university mathematics: chalk talk as embodied practice Janna Fox and Natasha Artemeva C a r l e t o n U n i v e r s i t y , C a n a d a

I See What You Are Doing: Student Views on Lecturer Use of Tablet PCs in the Engineering Mathematics Classroom

“…The whiteboard is a traditional technology familiar to both students and staff for which usage approaches have been refined over time, and which has become a standard technology for the classroom teaching of mathematical disciplines (Fox & Artemeva, 2011). There were 130 comments from 122 students.…”

“…The term "chalk and talk" is commonly used to describe such teaching methods, which have been criticised as being transmissive, teacher centric and ineffective (Bates, 2014). However, these criticisms have generally been made without consideration of the disciplines involved, and Fox and Artemeva (2011) determined that in the context of mathematics education what they termed a "chalk talk" approach can be "pedagogically interactive, meaningful, and engaging" (p. 87), even when it is essentially transmissive. A valuable component of the lecture can be the explicit modelling of expert thinking (Bates, 2014;Bergsten, 2007;McKeachie & Svinicki, 2013) which, in the context of mathematics education, Greiffenhagen (2008, p. 11) described as "situations in which an experienced mathematician demonstrates mathematical expertise to novices as an important part of their progressive induction into professionally competent autonomous mathematical practice".…”

Metadiscourse and Topic Introductions in an Academic Lecture: A Multimodal Insight

“…In another study, Lee and Subtirelu (2015) make use of Hyland's (2005) model to examine the metadiscourse employed by native English speakers in content university lectures for native speakers and English for Academic Purposes lessons for nonnative speakers. In addition, multimodal studies on academic lectures are currently receiving growing attention (Crawford-Camiciottoli and Fortanet-Gómez 2015;Ruiz-Madrid 2015, 2016;Fox and Artemeva 2013;Fortanet-Gómez 2015, 2016;Thesen 2016). As far as metadiscourse from a multimodal perspective is concerned, Thompson (2003), for example, compares the use of text-structuring metadiscourse in university lectures and English for Academic Purposes published listening materials while also analyzing the role of intonation as a resource to structure lectures.…”

“…For instance, Fox and Artemeva (2013) explore the multimodality of 'chalk-talk' in mathematics lectures; Bannink and Van Dam (2013) look into discursive uses that generate student involvement in 'first lectures'; and especially Crawford-Camiciottoli and Fortanet-Gómez (2015) compile a series of multimodal studies into conference presentations and academic lectures. Nevertheless, and despite this amount of work, multimodal insights into university lectures are still scarce and further research is needed in order to better understand the complexity of this genre.…”

Technologies for Engineering Education

“…Fox and Artemeva [8] argue that chalk talk "can also be pedagogically interactive, meaningful, and engaging as a way into disciplinary doing and being". Bergstein [9] discusses factors that can bring a richness to the mathematics lecture.…”