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Running Head: PHILOSOPHY OF DISCIPLINARY LITERACY

Philosophy of Disciplinary Literacy

Racheal Molzahn

Arizona State University

September 5, 2020
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Philosophy of Disciplinary Literacy

Numbers may be considered a language, as many people are familiar with binary code.

Yet, without words, it can be difficult to determine what numbers mean in a given context.

Often, we see that math teachers will write their work in numbers without words to assist

students in understanding. These seem teachers, will explain what they are doing as they work.

This can cause confusion because students are not able to see the individual steps and what

happens in each step. Furthermore, when a student is asking the teacher a question, it can be

difficult for the student to pinpoint for the teacher the area in which they are confused. By

developing literacy in a mathematics classroom, students can more clearly describe where they

are confused using vocabulary to help the instructor. Another reason this would be useful would

be to minimize student confusion because they can look back at the description given in the area

for which they are confused. For these reasons and many more it is important to develop literacy

in a mathematics classroom.

In general, the expectation of literacy development is “students become experts in their

fields and are able to speak, write, listen, and read specific literature in the content area”

(Hendricks 2016, 2:03). This is no different when it comes to mathematics. In arithmetic, literacy

can be used in a lot of different ways than they may be in other traditional content areas. A

disclaimer regarding mathematic vocabulary is that “math vocabulary words generally are all

considered third tier words and only related to the one discipline” (Hendricks 2016, 4:54).

Having said that, there are quite a few words in mathematics that may have a different meaning

in everyday language. this can make it extremely difficult for students to gain a true

understanding of these vocabulary words, so it is important for instructors to take this education

seriously. One example of such a word would be rational. In mathematics, rational is a number
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That can be represented in a fractional or decimal way. These numbers should not repeat. In

everyday context however, rational relates to the reasoning or logic of a person. Now, delving

deep, we can see that these words are related. For that reason, it is the teacher's responsibility to

express this relation, or provide insight on the difference of the meaning of these words for

students to understand.

Math is more than just vocabulary. “According to Hendricks (2016, 2:26), “a lot of times

it's [mathematics is] reading text on how to solve an equation.” It is true that equations are an

inherent part of mathematics; however, I believe that there are ways for us to get around using

plug and chug equations. For example, let us consider trigonometric identities. These identities

are extremely specific and help mathematicians to move through problems quicker, yet as a

student, memorizing these equations does not have such an impact. oftentimes, students are

required to memorize these equations without insight on where they come from. This poses a

problem because students do not see a deeper meaning or purpose to the equation, leading them

to forget the content and not see why this is important. in this sense this leads us to and

understanding of “discourse, which is the language of discipline... That includes vocabulary and

how you communicate” (Hendricks 2016, 2:56). Understanding vocabulary helps students to be

able to talk math. By understanding the vocabulary, students are able to better determine where

they are confused and have an intelligent conversation with another student or the instructor.

This opens up the floor to discussion, which a lot of people do not see in mathematics. Having

discussions and debates about mathematics can help students see where they may be wrong and

learn where they can improve. The students can also delve into topics and gain a deeper

understanding through discussion and building a deeper meaning an understanding to vocabulary

and ideas. In doing so, teachers can facilitate group work and all our students to find ideas on
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their own, rather than relying on the teacher in memorization of these equations that were

previously mentioned. allowing students to work in groups means that the students will be able

to discuss and help each other when they are confused. Writing to learn mathematics is also

extremely helpful for students. Beers (2005, page 3) claims that “Putting learning into one’s own

words— that is, crafting communication that explains the invisible learning process—helps

students make the information their own”. Writing to learn is clearly imperative for true

understanding of mathematics, and it can also assist the teacher in understanding what it is that

students do or do not understand from a particular lesson. The teacher can then frame current and

future lesson to better assist their students’ understanding.

According to Armstrong, Ming, and Helf (2018), “mathematicians use mathematical

language to make sense of new ideas and information to organize that information in a

specialized way content literacy strategy can help mathematics students accomplish these goals”.

Similarly, to my previous point, students can not only gain perception and a deeper knowledge of

mathematical understanding by understanding vocabulary, they can also use these ideas moving

forward. when students have a deeper understanding of an idea, they can more easily relay these

ideas to ideas that they will encounter in the future making understanding mathematical concepts

simpler than just memorizing a given equation or a given process in solving this equation. For

this reason, it is important to establish problems that students can connect with and that portrays

strong ideas. These problems should delve deeply into ideas that will be portrayed throughout the

class, so that students can work on these problems and gain further insight for future problems.

One example of a problem of this sort would be the jellybean problem. The jellybean problem

revolves around the idea of proportionality. in this problem, students are too use pictorial as well

as mathematical and descriptive representations of what is happening in each given inquiry. an

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example of an inquiry would be to give the students the notion of a container full of 1200

Jellybeans. The students are then told to use this information to find what 2/3 of this amount

would be. Students must show their work an understanding, as well as providing a visual

representation and a description using words of their thought process. This is a good starting

point because students are able to obtain a better understanding of how to portray some simpler

concepts in these terms. The problem should then become increasingly more difficult, giving the

student capabilities of building up their understanding, while relating to the same idea. In turn,

this allows students to have a strong problem to fall back on regarding this idea for future topics.

In fact, spending too much time on prior knowledge and connections is actually a bad thing

because students seldom get what they need from spending time talking about some past event

(Shanahan, 2017, 57:05). Students just need a simple explanation when they are confused or a

simple definition if it comes to that. This will help students to be successful on more occasions

than just one. That being said, having a brief introduction with past knowledge is not a bad thing,

but must be directly connected to the new information that will be gone over.

Richard (2017) claims that “the process of explaining a concept to a real or fictional

‘other’ allows for information synthesis and solidification and uncovers gaps in understanding.“

By having students explain their thinking not only about the problem, but to other students we

are helping these students become stronger in the understanding, is specially based on Richard's

claim. One reason this is a benefit resides in the fact that students will not have to rely on the

teacher to help and provide an answer to a problem. In addition, this helps students have more of

a relationship with others in the class, so they can get help from someone else they trust, rather

than just the teacher. Having a relationship with others in the class is extremely beneficial

because then students have someone to confide in the information that they may or may not
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understand. It has also been noted that “developing literate mathematicians is best done in the

context of workshop-model instruction where the bulk of students’ learning time is devoted to

reading, problem solving, discussing, and writing as a mathematicians“ (Hoffer 2016, pg 12). By

incorporating the above tactics into a mathematical classroom, teachers are able to achieve this

state where students can learn on their own through these processes. Allowing student facilitated

learning brings not only better understanding, but a better environment and an improvement for

future endeavors of these students.

There are a lot of different ways to incorporate literacy into mathematics. It is true that a

common mathematical classroom may not be currently using these tactics for their benefit;

however, moving forward we should be ensuring that students are getting the best education

possible period to do that, we must provide the students with the best tactics, which may mean

getting out of our comfort zone as instructors. it should be our primary goal to assist students in

succeeding, not only in terms of mathematical knowledge, but in terms of developing and giving

them their best chance to become the best they can be. Teaching mathematical literacy may not

seem to make or break a successful life, yet the more opportunities someone has in that life, the

more likely they are to be successful. Additionally, mathematics is prominent throughout life,

from creating a budget to buy food and understanding the best deal, to understanding How is

statistical number, such as a percentage, can affect the meaning of a current issue.
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Sources

Armstrong, A., Ming, K., & Helf, S. (2018). Content Area Literacy in the Mathematics

Classroom [Abstract]. The Clearing House: A Journal of Educational Strategies, Issues

and Ideas, 91(2). doi:10.1080/00098655.2017.1411131

Beers, S., & Howell, L. (2005). Using writing to learn across the content areas. Alexandria, VA:

Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Hendricks, H. (Producer). (December 13). Disciplinary Literacy in Math [Video file]. Retrieved

September 5, 2020, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tFBbCXuuJM

Hoffer, W. W. (2016). Literacy for Mathematicians. In Developing literate mathematicians: A

guide for integrating language and literacy instruction into secondary mathematics (pp. 3-

14). Reston, VA: NCTM, National Council of Teachers of Mathematics.

Richard, L. (2007, February 23). Literacy in Every Classroom. Retrieved September 06, 2020,

from http://www.ascd.org/ascd-express/vol12/1212-richard.aspx

Teaching with Challenging Text [Video file]. (2017). Retrieved November 27, 2020, from

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhQWjX1RQas&feature=youtu.be