Beyond templates 2: exploring students’ approaches to learning on a mathematical writing course

This is the second of two articles on Developing Students’ Learning through Mathematical Writing (a Maths, Stats & OR Network (MSOR Network) funded mini-project) at Queen Mary, University of London (QMUL). These articles report on the Mathematical Writing (MW) course at QMUL, devised by Professor Franco Vivaldi. The investigation into student learning on the MW course was carried out by staff in the Thinking Writing (TW) initiative at QMUL which works to develop the teaching and assessment of writing (see http://www.thinkingwriting.qmul.ac.uk/).

In this article, we begin by describing the MW course (see MW course page - http://www.maths.qmul.ac.uk/~fv/teaching/mw/ ). We then discuss the aim of our study and research methodology. The rest of the article focuses on a case study of one student’s learning on the course. We explore this case in detail in order to explicate interpretation of the data.

Details of the course

The Mathematical Writing (MW) course at QMUL aims to move students away from a reliance on using templates to solve mathematical problems – a practice typical of A level and some first year university studies - towards a deeper understanding of underlying mathematical concepts. It is also essential preparation for any student who wants to do a final year project. At the time of the study, the MW course was delivered to a cohort of 71 students.

The course consisted of:

• Three lectures a week – the third lecture (on Fridays) gave feedback on the weekly coursework;
• A web book – which covers the course syllabus in detail. (see http://www.maths.qmul.ac.uk/~fv/books/mw/mwbook.pdf );
• Weekly exercise classes – with help from the lecturer and post graduate teaching assistants (PGTAs)
• Weekly coursework – which can be viewed at http://www.maths.qmul.ac.uk/~fv/teaching/mw/ ; and,
• Lecturer’s office hours – where students could come along with queries.

The coursework was handed in on Friday, and marked and returned to students the following Thursday. The next day, in the Friday lecture, the lecturer went over the coursework and explained possible solutions. The writing tasks engaged students in explaining mathematical concepts and underlying theory. Examples of writing tasks are:…