Abstract

The readability of their mathematics textbook is of prime importance to the College or University level students. These students are no longer taught mathematics concepts as they were at school in a teacher-controlled environment. They must be able to confidently turn to their textbook for meaningful explanations of the mathematics they are learning. However many students find reading their mathematics textbook a fruitless task. They were never taught how to read mathematical text or indeed that reading such text needed special reading skills. Consequently they find that they do not understand the language it is written in and are constantly faced with vocabulary that is at the same time familiar yet has taken on a different meaning. Much research has been conducted into the problems with the ambiguities between Mathematical English and Ordinary English at the school level, but this study is an investigation into the ambiguities in language encountered by students who have returned to studies after several years in the work force. Do their added years of experience make their reading of mathematical text easier or harder? How much teacher input is still necessary? Can they learn the mathematics from the textbook alone? It is in an attempt to seek answers to these questions that this study was undertaken.