Writing in Mathematics: An Alternative Form of Communication for Academically Low-Achieving Students

Abstract

Classroom communication figures prominently in current math reform efforts. In this study, we analyze how one teacher used writing to support communication in a seventh-grade, low-track mathematics class. For one school year, we studied four lowachieving students in the class. Students wrote in journals on a weekly basis. Using classroom observations and interviews with the teacher, we developed profiles of the four students, capturing their participation in class discussions. The profiles highlighted an important similarity among the four students: marginal participation in both small-group and whole-class discussions. However, our analysis of the students' journals identified multiple instances where the students were able to explain their mathematical reasoning, revealing their conceptual understanding, ability to explain, and skill at representing a problem. In this respect, journals potentially facilitate another important form of classroom communication. The promise of writing is that it offers an alternative to the visions of classroom communication that are strictly oral in nature.

Journaling as a Test Preparatory Measure in Secondary Mathematics: Successful Student Strategies

“…Baxter, Woodward, and Olson (2005) studied four low-achieving students and their journal entries for a year and found that journals were a valuable method for student-teacher communication. They felt that journals particularly increased the amount of communication between low-achieving students and the teacher.…”

“…Some educators have used writing as a means to adjust attitudes toward and perceptions of math (Sewell, 2006;Furner & Duffy, 2002;and Mason & McFeetors, 2002). Others have assessed student thinking (Baxter, Woodward, & Olson, 2005;Burns, 2005;Gordon & Macinnis, 1993;and Countryman, 1992) or used writing as a learning mechanism for new concepts and skills (Marlow, 2006;O'Connel, Beamon, Beyea, Denvir, Dowdall, Friedland & Ward, 2005;Williams, 2003;Brandenburg, 2002;Cooley, 2002;Koirala, 2002, Burns & Silbey, 2001McIntosh & Draper, 2001;Baker, 1999;and Fuqua, 1997).…”

Supporting mathematical reasoning through reading and writing in mathematics : making the implicit explicit

“…It is addressed as an important competence in learning school mathematics in research (see f. e. Kilpatrick, 2001;Lithner, 2008;Niss, 2003) and in several countries' curricula (National council of teachers of mathematics, 2003;Skolverket, 2011). Reasoning in school mathematics is considered an essential practice, both to facilitate students' meaning making in mathematics and to make the learning visible for students as well as for teachers (Baxter, Woodward & Olson, 2005). Earlier studies (Bieda, Drwencke & Picard;Sidenvall, 2015;Stylianides, 2009) have pointed out that the opportunities for students' reasoning can be very limited when relying on the mathematics textbook.…”

“…However, reasoning in mathematics education is also stressed as an important competence in school mathematics by several researchers (Hanna, 2000;Kilpatrick, 2001;Lithner, 2008;Niss & Højgard Jensen, 2002). For example, in direct relation to the mathematics curriculum and the school classroom, Baxter et al (2005) and Cobb (2002) highlight that students' reasoning can potentially contribute to visualizing important aspects of how students have interpreted the specific mathematical content being processed. Further, it is stressed that by letting students argue and explain their thinking, the comprehension of mathematical content is being supported (Boaler & Staples, 2008).…”

“…In the intervention, this was reflected in the students' written texts; initially, their notes just contained a few words or digits. But to be able to use several semiotic resources in school mathematic is stressed as essential, and by reasoning students' understanding and misunderstanding can be shown (Baxter et al, 2005), which not a single symbol or word can do. To develop the students' mathematical reasoning the student need to have structures to what mathematical reasoning involves.…”