SCI Project Showcase Series: Students' use of Mathematics in Science

Abstract

There is widespread agreement that mathematics is essential to the practice of science. While there is an increasing body of research which demonstrates that many students struggle to use mathematics within science, there has been little research on how students think and reason with mathematics in science. In this talk, I will describe a study funded by the SCI that we conducted in 2023 where we examined patterns in students’ discourse to identify different approaches used as they collaboratively solved quantitative science problems. We gave small groups of undergraduate bioscience and 15-16 year old school students (n=21) a series of quantitative science problems and video and audio recorded their responses. We analysed the data using a commognitive approach, focusing on word use, visual mediators, conversational narrative and problem solving routines. We identified four patterns in the discourse as students solved quantitative problems: science-dominant reasoning; equation-searching; mathematics-dominant reasoning and use of a schema. We found that all four patterns could lead to successful problem solving. We further argue that using such a commognitive approach has great potential for exploring students’ mathematical reasoning in science. I will also share what we learnt from this collaborative project and how we are planning to take the ideas forwards in the future.

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