Because mathematics is usually communicated in universally understood symbols it may appear that it does not require a lot of language but, in fact, its reasoning processes are very dependent on vocabulary and syntax. You may be able to write sums in symbols but you need words and grammar to speak them and understand them when they are spoken. As a consequence, when students do mathematics in a foreign language, the language itself adds layers of difficulty to something that is already abstract and opaque. The result, as research shows, is that students don’t perform at mathematics as well as they could. The objective of the Mathspeak project is to produce a language learning resource for secondary school students which will enable them to perform in mathematics in a foreign language at the same level they do in their native language. Mathspeak products will develop users’ receptive skills to the point that language problems cease to obstruct their understanding of mathematics and enable them to verbally express mathematical concepts, appropriate to their age groups, put number problems into words and handle mathematical terminology with confidence. It is expected that between 100 -150 teachers and students will directly take part in the various Mathspeak project activities. Student participants will be foreign language learners and participating teachers will be involved in mathematics and foreign language education. The participants will influence the content and style of the language course the project will produce. The Mathspeak project is a partnership between educational practitioners and the creators of educational materials. The project will be managed using the PRINCE2 methodology and it is expected that its carefully monitored creative synergy will result in something of high quality that will last and be a major help to students wanting to progress through the academic system. It will provide teachers of languages and of mathematics with the means to address a neglected but vital area and, it is hoped, influence educational policy makers by drawing attention to the educational issues surrounding the language of mathematics.
Because mathematics is usually communicated in universally understood symbols it may appear that it does not require a lot of language to understand it but, in fact, its reasoning processes are very dependent on vocabulary and syntax. You may be able to write mathematics in symbols, but you need words and grammar to speak sums and equations, read about them and understand them when you hear them. When students do mathematics in a foreign language, the language itself adds a layer of difficulty to something that is already abstract and opaque. The result, as research shows, is that many secondary and tertiary level students, though they may be good at maths in their own languages, perform at below their level of ability when doing it in a foreign language. Conference attendees, academics and policy makers have asserted that the language of mathematics requires special attention and that there are very few resources available for teaching it. This was the background to the Mathspeak project. We set as our primary aim, the production of a language learning resource for secondary school students living in foreign European countries where they were not native speakers. Mathspeak would supplement foreign language learning by focussing exclusively on the language of mathematics. It would develop users’ receptive skills to the point that language problems ceased to obstruct their understanding of mathematics and enable them to verbally express mathematical concepts, appropriate to their age groups, put number problems into words and handle mathematical terminology with confidence. We put together a team which mixed educational practitioners with the creators of educational materials. The idea was that schools in various European countries would supply teachers and students to pilot the material whose feedback would influence the content and style of the course material. There is a well-known, though by no means universal, resistance to mathematics, especially amongst young people. So, in order to address this resistance, catch and maintain students’ interest in the language of mathematics, the writers took advantage of the current popularity of graphic novels and used comic strips to put over the teaching points. They took the form of light-hearted sketches peppered with fantasy and humour. The material was written one mathematical-themed unit at a time. Each unit was made available to the Mathspeak project partners through the AdminProject portal. The units were in three forms: 1. The finished English version comic strips, 2 A set of comic strips with no text (the blanks), 3. A document with text only for translation. When the translation was complete it would be transferred to the blanks by the IT experts at Danmar Computers. Partners were supplied with tests for the purpose of getting objective data about whether or not students were learning from the course. Most of the partners also used the original English version for the purposes of teaching English as a foreign language. They fed back assessments of the materials which informed further writing. Unfortunately, the Coronavirus pandemic intervened. In the middle of the project, schools closed. Though the Mathspeak project was temporarily suspended, our plans for piloting were seriously disrupted. Even when work restarted, our partner schools remained closed. Some partners were able to continue piloting in a limited way by incorporating Mathspeak into their online teaching. Other partners did not have this facility available. However, the writing and translating continued and the material was completed. 32 students participated in the piloting process, which was not an unsatisfactory number in the circumstances As schools have slowly returned to comparative normality, teachers have begun to use Mathspeak and, as we had hoped, news of it is spreading to other institutions. We are continuing to promote it and thereby bring it and the educational issues surrounding it to the notice of policy makers and syllabus designers.