Progression within mathematics degree programmes
Year: 2015
Type: book-chapter
Abstract: Several independent research projects report that the enjoyment of mathematics by many\nundergraduate mathematicians decreases as they progress through their degree programme\nand this decrease is accompanied by increasing disillusionment and disengagement with\ntheir course and alienation from mathematics itself. These are students who choose to study\nmathematics at university and who are relatively well-qualified. Moreover, it is often the\ncase that students who report such feelings are not failing students – indeed many are\ndoing rather well. Of course, many other students find their undergraduate experience of\nmathematics to be extremely rewarding but the prevalence of studies reporting disaffection\nsuggests that this is an issue worthy of exploration within a book on transitional issues\naffecting undergraduate mathematicians.\nThis chapter will review the evidence for this phenomenon and unpick the reasons students\ngive for their changes in attitude to mathematics. After establishing the context for the\nchapter we present a brief review of the literature in this field. The evidence suggests\nthat this state of affairs can be attributed, at least in part, to the mismatch between\nstudents’ hopes, expectations and aspirations and the reality of learning mathematics\nat university level. Sometimes, traditional pedagogies and practices can exacerbate this\nsituation. We will go on to provide several examples of ways in which some lecturers\nand departments have attempted to modify practices in order to improve the student\nexperience of university mathematics. We summarise the findings of selective activities and\nprojects that provide pointers in the hope that they might inspire or provoke a discussion\namongst individual lecturers and more widely within departments about ways in which\ndisillusionment, disengagement and alienation might be ameliorated so that the experience\nof undergraduate mathematics is truly rewarding for all who choose to study it.
Authors: Tony Croft, Michael Grove
Language: English
Subfield: Education
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Quality education
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2178205410