Which textual features are difficult when reading and solving mathematical tasks? : Questions of Theme and Rheme

• In this study a combination of statistical and qualitative methods are used to explore the potential role the presence of, and interaction between, different semiotic resources have for how difficult mathematics tasks are to read and solve. The semiotic resources of interest are natural language, mathematical notation, and different types of images. Two different dependent variables are used: one that explains a general task difficulty and one that explains the tasks demand on a general reading ability. T-tests have revealed that tasks with four particular combinations of semiotic resources are solved to a significantly lower frequency than other tasks. Moreover, chi-square tests reveal that the same tasks are overrepresented in the group of tasks for which a general reading ability is not beneficial to use in the solving process. The results of those statistical tests do however only contribute an understanding of what presence of and cooccurrences of particular semiotic resources mean for the reading and solving of mathematics tasks.The second step in this study is therefore a qualitative analysis of a few tasks from two particular groups of tasks identified in the statistical analyses, namely i) tasks that are more difficult to solve and for which a general reading ability is not beneficial to use, and ii) tasks for which a general reading ability is highly beneficial to use in the solving process. The purpose of the qualitative analysis is to explore relations within and between the semiotic resources in tasks that are identified as extremes in the statistical tests (the ones mentioned above). Therefore the method for the qualitative analyses is based on theory about texture (Liu & O'Halloran, 2009) and Kress’ concepts translation and transduction (Kress, 2010). The results will contribute to an understanding of the role that multisemiotic features in task text have for aspects of task difficulty.

Subject headings

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Utbildningsvetenskap -- Didaktik (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Educational Sciences -- Didactics (hsv//eng)

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Utbildningsvetenskap -- Lärande (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Educational Sciences -- Learning (hsv//eng)

Publication and Content Type

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