Abstract
Upon observing with concern that the majority of high school students experienced severe language related difficulties when solving contextualized differential equations, the researcher then decided to investigate the kinds of such challenges and their impact on students’ learning of differential equations. A sample of 10 mathematics students was selected from one urban high school in one province in Zimbabwe. Written tasks and follow up interviews were employed as data collection tools for the study. Content analysis technique was applied to the written responses and interview transcriptions to obtain a revealing picture of how the kinds of the language related challenges interfere with the growth of mathematical content. The study revealed that the students struggled with interpreting and formulating differential equations from given mathematical situations. Further, interpretation of given initial conditions posed a challenge to the learners. A major consequence of these language related challenges was that the students could not generate complete solutions and lack of interplay between conceptual and procedural fluency was one of the insights generated from this study with regards to the learning of differential equations. The study findings have important implications for instruction in high school mathematics lessons such as the need to develop and foster the students’ abilities to engage in adaptive reasoning and use multiple modes of presenting content in order to promote students’ understanding of contextualized differential equations.
Highlights
The researcher presents and discusses findings pertaining to the research question: How do language related challenges experienced by students impede their learning of differential equations at Advanced level? Data from task sheets and follow up interviews were used to address this research question
From students’ written responses and follow up interviews the researcher identified various sorts of language related difficulties experienced by students in their learning of contextualized differential equations
From our discussion of results pertaining the research question, How do language related difficulties experienced Advanced level students interfere with their the learning of differential equations?, the following conclusions were drawn
Summary
Reccomini et al [1] have underscored the important role played by language in mathematics learning so much such that the attention of many mathematics educators need to focus on content-specific vocabulary of mathematics. The concept of a differential equation is a crucial requisite for solving a variety of problems in applied mathematics, physics and economics. International Journal of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics 2019; 5(1): 20-31 to understand and relate to the context of the problem and in some instances they found it difficult to identify basic related ideas that form the gist of the problem solving process. These observations have been confirmed by literature. The overarching question that guided the study is stated
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
