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Albany, NY – In today's Academic Minute, Dr. Michelle Bower of Landmark College explains how a teacher's perception of a student's math ability can negatively influence their actual ability.
Michelle Bower is an associate professor of mathematics at Landmark College where she teaches a variety of mathematics courses. She holds a Ph.D. in mathematics education from Illinois State University and has published and presented widely on issues related to the improvement of math education in secondary schools.
Dr. Michelle Bower - Mathematics and Learning Disabilities
During graduate school, we studied many, often competing learning theories; my colleagues and I joked that for all the billions of people in the world there could be billions of learning theories. Can any theoretical model really explain every student in different types of learning situations?
As many as 4 to 7% of school-aged children may have a learning difference with respect to math. The portion of the student population that I work with have diagnosed learning disabilities such as dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia, and other diagnoses. For some students these labels can become debilitating stereotypes that overshadow their abilities.
Learning mathematics is no harder than say learning to read or learning a new language. Yet, many mathematics students exhibit high anxiety. Society is willing to say "math is hard." Stereotyping through labeling students with learning disabilities often feeds these anxieties. Research indicates that some students are vulnerable to what has been termed "Stereotype threat." Studies suggest that if you are stereotyped with a difference and told that you can't do math, you will perform below other students whose difference hasn't been emphasized.
It is often assumed that students with learning disabilities exhibit more math anxiety. In a recent study that I conducted, I found that students with disabilities taking a core mathematics course were not as anxious about the course as the research implied. Moreover, research suggests that liberal arts colleges that create an accommodating environment may not feed into stereotype threat. Perhaps learning theories have deficits because basic psychological hurdles like stereotype threat mask student learning. Our first step will be to engage all students in learning mathematics in welcoming environments.