Tackling the fear of algebra

The move from arithmetic to symbolic algebra is the biggest terror of secondary school mathematics, and many of our future scientists are lost over the edge at this fracture plane. Graphical work is popular but must support symbolic work, not pleasurably obscure it.

In an experimental programme, we encouraged a group of 13-14 year old students to record and express what they were doing in standard symbolic short-hand, and to share summaries of the results on an intranet web site. They were introduced to MathType, which was used not only for preparation of handouts but also for real time classroom explanations of simple, common sense events happening in Autograph.

MathType appealed to these teenagers. Its quality of output built their pride in their work; it was used to prepare their worksheets, and they had the experience of feeding back work of equivalent production values. Its ability to produce high quality web material gave them a high-status platform for displaying their achievements.

[Contributed by AbsentCat]