Improved mathematical texts for better mathematical comprehension

The aim of the project is to explain students’ (lack of) understanding of mathematics texts. The overall questions to be answered concern the way the features of mathematics texts can be adapted to improve students’ comprehension, and the reading strategies they can use to that end.

Many students find it difficult to understand mathematics. For example, 15–20 percent of year 9 students fail the national test in mathematics – a higher figure than for other subjects. Research has shown that math textbooks do not enable students to discuss the mathematical content; the books focus more on ensuring that students remember and can repeat the procedures described therein. And this is despite the fact that understanding and working with writing systems of various kinds, such as words, mathematical symbols, graphs and diagrams, are central to meaningful mathematical learning.

The researchers therefore consider that we need to learn more about how students read mathematics texts, for instance whether and how they focus on certain kinds of graphic systems more than others. We also need to know more about how students should read mathematics texts, and how those texts can be designed in the best way. This knowledge can help teachers and textbook writers to avoid situations where mathematics is not meaningful to students.

The researchers have found there to be little research literature to help teachers and textbook writers. For example, research on mathematics textbooks concentrates mostly on how the texts are designed, rarely on how textbooks are used by students. Moreover, research on how students should read mathematics texts is mostly theoretical, or consists of discussion, without analysis of empirical data.

The project team believes that, as well as more research, there is a need for new research methods so researchers can acquire deeper knowledge about the way students read mathematics texts. Studies of eye movements can provide more objective information than other methods, since eye movements can reveal the parts of a mathematics text that students read first or the parts on which they spend most time. So eye movements can potentially be used to gain new insights, for example about how relationships between different graphic systems in a text impact the reading process.

The researchers will ask students to read different types of mathematics texts while their eye movements are recorded. They will also collect data on the students’ prior knowledge of mathematics before they read the text, and their comprehension of the text after reading it. This will enable the researchers to study whether and how the reading process and comprehension level differs between texts and students.

The project team has many years’ experience of research into reading and mathematics, along with experience of examining eye movements in didactic research.