Journal 3: Speaking Math

Speaking Math
by Janet Graham and Ted Hodgson
Learning and Leading with Technology
February 2008

Janet Graham, a mathematics teacher at Osbourn High School, a multi-ethnic school in suburban Washington D.C., is currently employing a new strategy when it comes to teaching math. Most of us are familiar with the traditional drill and rote memorization associated with math education in the past, but not many of us could imagine using online chat and discussion threads to conceptualize math problems. However, Grahams secondary geometry and intermediate algebra classes are doing just that. They answer questions online through small chat groups and whole class discussion threads. Graham uses Moodle, a CMS software, to host their chat discussions, which doesn’t allow math symbols. This forces the students to use math vocabulary to build their understanding of the class concepts. The program also allows the instructor to print all the chat and discussions at their convenience to review. Little research has been done on the topic, but some initial benefits have been found. First, the chat groups allow English learners to model and mimic their classmates’ grammatical structure, making the participation in class discussions less frightening. They are allotted the time to plan well-constructed responses. Also, there has been an increase in subject related vocabulary and although it wasn’t required, Graham often has seen students chatting about math after school hours.

Questions:

1. In the examples of student chats, there are many cases where students use shorthand to convey their message (“i agree with u jess”). Should the teacher require the use of proper English in the chats?
I think that the teacher should enforce the use of proper English within the chats and the discussion board. Even though this is not and English class, encouraging students from moving away from shorthand and going towards proper spelling will help them cross-curricularly. They should have a netiquette discussion before beginning the program.

2. What situations would this method be the most effective in?
Since this method requires the use of computers by all of the students at the same time, it would be most effective if all the students had access to a computer. Since this isn’t a reality in most places, I think that the classroom itself should have enough computers for each student, that way they don’t have to take a whole class period to do their discussions. It could be something that they do for the first ten minutes of each day instead of picking up everything and going to the computer lab or the library and wasting valuable time.