Raising Achievement Through Reading and Writing Mathematics

1. Raising Achievement Through Reading and Writing Mathematics Neil Hatfield Northwest Missouri State University

2. Background • Developing communication skills in addition to guiding students through the mathematical landscape can be challenging. • I have observed various degrees of blending reading, writing and mathematics. • Results have been unclear.

3. Why? • Push for tougher standards. • Call from state Boards of Education for Reading/Writing across the curriculum. • A closer investigation into pedagogies that blend reading, writing, and mathematics together over a whole course is warranted.

4. Guiding Question • Can mathematical pedagogy blended with reading only emphasis, writing only emphasis, or emphasis in both reading and writing lead to improvement in student understanding of mathematical concepts?

5. Research Questions • Is there significant evidence to suggest that there is a difference in student mathematical achievement between the various pedagogies? • Is there significant evidence suggesting that students exposed to reading pedagogy scored higher than the students in the control group? • Is there significant evidence suggesting that students exposed to writing pedagogy scored higher than the students in the control group? • Is there significant evidence suggesting that students involved in the reading only class scored higher than the students in the control group?

6. Writing Research • Appears to be little research • Writing is an extremely organic process unique to each person • The writing process behaves in a similar fashion as the reading process…they are inextricably linked. • Rosenblatt, 1994

7. Writing Research, cont. • Writing allows for students to develop both academically and personally. • Students need a wide range of writing activities in various academic contexts with both overtly self-reflective and overtly subject-focused tasks. • Curtis and Herrington (2003) • 73% of students reported that writing was important or very important in understanding/applying the ideas of the course. • Sommers and Saltz (2004)

8. Writing Paradox • Sommers and Saltz found a paradox. • Novice writers viewed as experts • Students are required to write about material they are still coming to grips with, while at the same time, place that knowledge into a larger context. • Build authority not by writing from a position of expertise, but by writing into expertise. • Rosenblatt’s Transactional Theory

9. Reading Research • Key Action to create successful readers: get the students to engage actively with the text. • Proposed strategies for reading: • Reciprocal Teaching (Palincsar and Brown, 1984) • Transactional Theory (Rosenblatt, 1994) • Constructively Responsive Reading (Pressley and Afflerbach, 1995) • Others (Exner, 1996; Barton and Heidema, 2002; Pape, 2004; Friedman, Myers, and Wright, n.d.; Flood and Lapp, 1990) • Small episodes with limited number of participants.

10. Reading Research, cont. • Flood and Lapp (1990) provide a framework for working with “at-risk” students and reading comprehension. • Preparing for Reading Practices • Reciprocal Teaching Practices • Understanding/Using Text Structure • Questioning Practices • Information Processing Practices • Summarizing Practices • Voluntary/Recreational Reading

11. The Research Project • Using Math Skills 2 (Intermediate Algebra) • Control Group • Reading Only • Writing Only • Reading and Writing • Each group sans Control receives additional mathematics instruction from the researcher. Control group has another leader. • The Reading and Writing group does the same activities as both of the single emphasis groups.

12. Writing • Based on my own past experiences with writing. • Journal Prompts are Word 2007 forms • One-on-one approach • Provides differentiation • Preserves individual student voice • Example Journal Prompt • Example Journal Prompt

13. Early Writing Results • Very difficult to get students to complete the prompts. (Not surprising.) • May have been worthwhile to spend time in class building what a “good” response is. • Benefit: Allows for the detection of misconceptions that may not surface. • “F.O.I.L” as the [only] way to factor any trinomial. • Difficulty understanding the Distributive Property • “Addressing” misconceptions • Curse: students must actually read the teacher responses. • Benefit: Private, non-threatening atmosphere

14. Student Journal Responses • “F.O.I.L” Response • Distributive Property • “Good” Response

15. Reading • Two Mini-Strategies • Unknown Words/Symbols • Matching Homework to Examples • Four Full Strategies • Summarizing Text • Summarizing Text and working Examples • Guided (Structured) Reading • Student Personal Synthesis

16. Guided Reading • Blending of both Mini-strategies and the previous two Full strategies. • Instructor Prepared Reading Guides • Additionally • Activation of Prior Knowledge • Question-Generation • Reflective Thinking • Implements a gradual release of responsibility

17. Example Reading Guide • Reading Guide Example 1 • Reading Guide Example 2 • Reading Guide Example 3

18. Student Reading Work • Example 1 (Reading Strategy 1) • Example 2 (Reading Strategy 3) • Example 3 (Reading Strategy 3) • Example 4 (Reading Strategy 3)

19. Student Personal Synthesis • Result of the gradual release of responsibility. • Students generated their own reading strategy based off what they have learned. • Idea: to see what students apply after instruction in the various strategies.

20. Early Reading Results • In addition to “math” words/symbols identified as unknown, “non-math” words were also identified. • Students struggle with buying into the first two Full Strategies. • Repetition, monitoring and constructive support • Students seem to clasp onto the third strategy more readily. • Students also felt that it was helping them.

21. Results • The following slides contain some “rough” results. • The power of the tests is really low. • Further analysis is underway.

26. Implications • Continued research to refine methodology and remove confounding variables (primarily, researcher). • Provides insight into whole-classroom reading/writing instruction in a content area. • Provides a starting platform for the development of pedagogy. • Offers ideas for professional development.

27. Future Research • This study did not provide a clearer picture on the impacts of blending reading and writing with mathematics. • It does help to move the research forward from one-on-one interactions to whole classroom instruction. • We need to refine the blended pedagogies and conduct additional research.