| Background Understanding the importance of preparing junior form students for a better transition to NSS curriculum, the Maths teachers of SMKMCF Ma Ko Pan Memorial College strengthened students’ academic literacy through infusing English into the Maths curriculum. They started a modular project by first identifying the problems students encountered when using English in Maths. They then studied the NSS curriculum and analysed the HKDSE paper, knowing the language required for learning Maths in senior forms. After data analysis, the Maths teachers worked together by choosing a topic on Statistics for students to apply the language skills needed in subject specific contexts. Relevant teaching and learning materials were developed to help students to practise and apply the language in the content subject, thus enhancing their language exposure and development. |
Objectives
- To increase students’ language exposure in Maths
- To develop students’ academic literacy in Maths
- To provide opportunities for students to use English to communicate in Maths lessons
Problems students encountered when using English to learn Maths
- Lack of subject specific vocabulary
- Lack of relevant language structures to express and organize ideas
- Lack of opportunity to use English to communicate during lessons
Strategies adopted
- To adapt the curriculum to create SPACE for infusing English into the Maths curriculum
- To provide the necessary language input (e.g. vocabulary and language structures) for expressing ideas & giving opinions
- To scaffold students’ learning through a step-by-step approach
- To use meaningful interactive activities to enhance communication among students
Unit framework & design
Subject |
Mathematics |
Level |
S1 |
Focus |
- Making a comparison
- Making judgment with reasons
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Language |
- Use of adjectives ( simple, convenient, accurate, etc)
- Use of question words (what, how, why, etc.)
- Giving an explanation with supporting reasons (e.g. I will choose the method of ... because…)
|
Topic |
Introduction of various stages of Statistics
- Steps of conducting a survey
- Comparing different kinds of data collection method
|
Strategies used |
- Reading input
- Providing students with articles about different kinds of statistics reports
- Language input
- Providing necessary language input to express ideas and communicate with others
- Writing output
- Asking students to choose a suitable way of collecting data with supportive reasons
- Designing a questionnaire for conducting survey
- Discussion and presentation
- Asking students to work in groups to compare different kinds of collection methods and present the findings in class
|
No of lessons |
6 periods |
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Implementation
Lessons 1 & 2 (Identifying the different stages of Statistics)
(T=Teacher Ss=Students)
No. of
lessons |
Learning and teaching objectives |
Teaching procedure |
Materials needed |
1 & 2 |
- to introduce the concept of statistics and its purpose
- to increase Ss’ language exposure through reading newspaper articles
- to provide opportunity for Ss to discuss in English
|
Pre-task:
- T shows Ss a newspaper cutting with some statistical findings. He asks Ss what it is and the purpose of doing this kind of statistics analysis. He then asks Ss to give some examples which relate to the use of statistics in our daily life.
While task:
Group activity 1:
- T divides Ss into groups of four. Each group is given some articles with statistical findings. Ss are asked to study the information and think about the steps of conducting a survey with the help of the following questions :
- Where do the data come from?
- What method can we use to collect the data?
- How have the data been processed?
- How can we make use of the data to present the findings?
Post-task:
- T recaps the different stages of statistics with Ss.
|
- statistical articles
|
Lesson 3 & 4 (Collection of data & comparing different kinds of collection methods)
No. of
lessons |
Learning and teaching objectives |
Teaching procedure |
Materials needed |
3 & 4 |
- to brainstorm the use of different data collection methods
- to provide opportunities for Ss to use English to elaborate their answers
- to support Ss to use English to communicate with classmates in English
- to provide language input for discussion
|
Pre-task:
- T brainstorms some contexts which people need to collect data for the purpose of making analysis. (e.g. finding the favourite brands of mobile phone teenagers used in HK)
- T then asks Ss to think about what data collection method can be used to collect the data with supporting reasons
While task;
Group activity 2:
- T divides Ss into groups of four. Each group is given some activity strips with the following information:
- different contexts for collecting data
- different data collection methods
- description of the collection methods
- match the collection methods with appropriate descriptions
- study the contexts given and choose one suitable method which suits the context
- identify the good points of using this method and its limitation
- To facilitate the discussion, Ss are given a list of key words and relevant language structures to be used when communicating with their classmates.
e..g.
- I’ll choose the method of …
- It’s because …
- But the limitation is that …
Post-task:
|
- matching activity strips
- language input WS
- follow-up activity |
Lesson 5 & 6 (Organization of data)
No. of lessons |
Learning and teaching objectives |
Teaching procedure |
Materials needed |
5 & 6 |
- to help Ss learn how to organize data
- to help Ss to use English to communicate & think critically
- to use English to express ideas and opinions in a communicative manner
|
Pre-task:
- T introduces the tallying method for the organization of data.
- Ts first discuss the criteria for designing questionnaires.
While task:
Group activity 3 :
- T asks Ss to work in groups of 4. They are given some pairs of questions. They need to study the information and decide which questions are more appropriate to use in questionnaires with supportive reasons.
- T then gives Ss a sample questionnaire as reference. Ss choose a topic they are interested in and design their own questionnaires.
Group activity 4
- Ss are divided into groups of four. They are asked to organize the data into a frequency distribution table. During collaboration, they have to give comments on the ways of organising data by making a comparison with other methods with supportive reasons.
Post-task:
- T revisits different stages of statistics and summarise the strategies of collecting and organizing data.
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- group_activity 3 WS
- group activity 4 WS |
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Acknowledgements
Mr Anthony Luk
Mr Eric Lau
Mr Benny Tang
Mr Michael Leung
SMKMCF Ma Ko Pan Memorial College
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