Search by entering one or more keywords or a phrase in quotes.
Search results
Your search returned 239 results
Solving equations involving logarithms and exponentialsThis leaflet shows how simple equations involving logarithms or exponentials can be solved. (Engineering Maths First Aid Kit 3.8)
Solving equations using logsLogs can be used to solve equations when the unknown occurs as a power. This leaflet explains how.
Streaming Undergraduate Physicists for Mathematics Teaching in Year OneMany departments of mathematics, physics and engineering now use some form of diagnostic test to assess the basic mathematical skills of new undergraduates [1]. Results reveal that a typical cohort consists of students with a diverse range of mathematical backgrounds and capabilities. Tests also help to identify those students who lack both confidence and competence and are deemed to be at risk of failing or dropping out in Year One.
It is now commonplace for those teaching first year mathematics to be faced by an inhomogeneous student cohort and all are in accord that it has become almost impossible to teach them effectively together. It is against this background that streaming of first year undergraduate physicists into two more homogeneous groups has been introduced at the University of Leeds. The aim is to provide more effective teaching and mathematics support that will get students up to speed and mathematically prepared for their second year.
Student perception of the impact of mathematics support in higher educationNi Fhloinn, E., Fitzmaurice O., Bhaird, C. M., & O'Sullivan, C. (2014). Student perception of the impact of mathematics support in higher education. International Journal of Mathematical Education in Science and Technology, 45 (7) 953-967., DOI:10.1080/0020739X.2014.892161
Mathematics support in higher education has become increasingly widespread over the past two decades, particularly in the UK, Ireland and Australia. Despite this, reliable evaluation of mathematics support continues to present challenges for those working in this area. One reason is because ideally, properly structured support should function as an integral part of the overall educational experience of the student, in tandem with lectures and tutorials. When this occurs, it makes it difficult to isolate the impact of mathematics support from these other entities. In this paper, the results of a large-scale nationwide survey conducted with first-year service mathematics students in nine higher education institutes in Ireland are considered, exploring studentsâ?? perceptions of the impact of mathematics support upon their retention, mathematical confidence, examination performance and overall ability to cope with the mathematical demands they face. Students were extremely positive about the effectiveness of mathematics support in all of these areas, providing valuable insights into the value of learning support in mathematics.
Student Proctors: A Peer Support SystemThe date of the formal introduction of student proctors within the Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences is unclear. However, we have certainly been using student proctors for more than ten years. The purpose is to offer students the opportunity to learn from their peers in a one-to-one situation. Within the Faculty three departments have a student proctor programme each of which runs in much the same way but with differences which reflect the different custom and practice of each department.
Student Support and the Bridging Course at University College LondonUniversity College London has established a wide selection of teaching resources to support a dramatic increase in the number of entrants to the Mathematics Department. This includes a diagnostic test for all entrants, a workbook for students to complete before the first semester and an integrated system of tutorials, lectures and a problem class. An intense Bridging Course also provides students with a valuable and comprehensive perspective of university mathematics.
Study Advice Services incorporating the Mathematical Advice and Co-ordination Service at The University of HullMathematical Advice and Co-ordination Service (MACS) was established in 1995 within the Faculty of Mathematics to support students within their studies at the University and to help prepare them to go into the world. Funding was made available for an initial period of 3 years and was then continued on a year-to-year basis. The emphasis has changed over the years and most of the work is now linked to students�¢?? current problems but also includes help for those facing employers�¢?? tests at interview. The University accepted that the concept of student support offered in Mathematics needed to be extended into other areas and, through The Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), established the Student Advice Service (SAS). The SAS is now a permanent feature of the University serving any member of the student body (and indeed staff) who might benefit from what it offers. The remainder of this case study considers only the mathematical part of the SAS, though many of the comments apply to the other areas of the SAS (Academic English, Study Skills and ICT).
Summer internships in sigma-swMatthew Taylor, Ollie Bond, Callum Anderson and Andrew Kennedy. (2012) Summer internships in sigma-sw. MSOR Connections 12(1), 23-27. DOI: 10.11120/msor.2012.12010023
We report on the experience of Loughborough Universityâ??s Eureka Centre for Mathematical Confidence in establishing a small pilot project to provide one-to-one mathematics support for neurodiverse students who attend other local universities and where no such provision is available. We outline the background to the scheme and report on the three students involved.
Support Offered to Natural Science Students at Cambridge UniversityNine years ago members of staff within Physical Sciences at Cambridge University began recognizing that some students were having problems not only with the Mathematics Courses but also with applying material from A level in the context of their scientific subjects. The mathematics workbook was introduced to assist students with revision prior to starting university.
On completion the student is asked to fill in a questionnaire that helps to define the problem areas. This is presented to their supervisor. The supervision system is a fundamental feature of Cambridge teaching and one of its main strengths. The student sees a supervisor â?? most commonly in a group of two undergraduates, sometimes in a group of three and only exceptionally one-on-one â?? to discuss his or her work for at least an hour once a week. Such support is ongoing and essentially provides individual attention to those students who lack fundamental mathematical skills.
Supporting students making the transition from school to university– A national and local view of the maths skills crisis in the UKThe authors have first-hand experience of supporting students with weak maths skills making the transition from School to University within a Business School. In this paper the authors will summarise the key messages and recommendations to emerge from the literature in the light of their own experiences and research findings. We will also give an overview of the types of open source software that are currently available for maths skills support in the UK, and consider ways in which such on-line resources might be utilised in order to encourage and enhance students’ development of maths skills in a Business School context.
Cottee M., Relph A. and Robins, K. (2013) Supporting students making the transition from school to university– A national and local view of the maths skills crisis in the UK.
http://library.iated.org/view/COTTEE2013SUP
Teaching Mathematics to 'Science with Management' Students Using A Graphic CalculatorThe introduction of the graphics calculator has provided the fourth year students taking Science with Management Studies with an interactive learning tool. This case study reviews its introduction into the course Discrete and Continuous Models at Napier University.
Teaching mathematics to first year engineering students with a wide range of mathematical abilityThe approach to teaching Maths to Year 1 students in the Department of Engineering underwent a major reorganisation prior to the start of the 2002/3 session. The aim was to provide an optimum framework within which students studying four different engineering disciplines could be taught Maths within the resource constraints imposed by student numbers, and to cope with the extremely wide range of their Mathematical abilities on entry to these degree programmes. After much discussion, students are now taught their Year 1 Maths topics in two different cohorts, streamed according to initial Maths ability, and using different approaches in terms of the depth of understanding expected. This also involves the use of different assessments. This approach has been much more popular and created far fewer difficulties than the previous system which divided the students into two groups according to degree programme.
Teaching Mathematics to First Year Undergraduate Chemists in the Context of their DisciplineNew entrants to chemistry degree programmes are given a 24 hour course in mathematics if they do not have an A level qualification in the subject. This concentrates only on the skills necessary to successfully complete the first year physical chemistry course; these include simple statistics, functions, partial differentiation and integration. The course is taught using chemically relevant examples, in an order related to the chemistry course rather than traditional mathematics courses.
Teaching Students to Write Mathematics: video and other resourcesTeaching students to write mathematics correctly is often neglected part of a mathematics degree. A workshop was convened by Kevin Houston to consider approaches to teaching this topic. A DVD was produced with videos of talks by Kevin Houston (University of Leeds), Franco Vivaldi (Queen Mary, University of London) and Mike Robinson (Sheffield Hallam University), along with further reading and sample teaching resources. At this website you can download and burn your own DVD or view the videos and other materials online. This website is not made available under a Creative Commons licence.
The Education Drop-in Centre at the University of GlamorganThe education Drop-in Centre at the University of Glamorgan was established during the academic year 1996/97. Its aim has always been to provide generic study support for students with writing and study skills as well as mathematics and statistics skills. Since its creation the Centre has been through a variety of changes in terms of staffing and layout. It has grown steadily each year and now comprises of two sites and seventeen staff, three full-time administrators and fourteen part-time tutors. The Centre is seen to play a key part in retaining students and has become part of the fabric of the University.
The impact of maths support tutorials on mathematics confidence and academic performance in a cohort of HE Animal Science studentsStudents embarking on a bioscience degree course, such as Animal Science, often do not have sufficient experience in mathematics. However, mathematics forms an essential and integral part of any bioscience degree and is essential to enhance employability. This paper presents the findings of a project looking at the effect of mathematics tutorials on a cohort of first year animal science and management students. The results of a questionnaire, focus group discussions and academic performance analysis indicate that small group tutorials enhance students’ confidence in maths and improve students’ academic performance. Furthermore, student feedback on the tutorial programme provides a deeper insight into student experiences and the value students assign to the tutorials.
van Veggel N, Amory J. (2014) The impact of maths support tutorials on mathematics confidence and academic
performance in a cohort of HE Animal Science students. PeerJ 2:e463 http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.463
The impact of the mathematics support centre on the grades of first year students at the National University of Ireland Maynouth(FOR COPYRIGHT REASONS YOU MAY NOT BE ABLE TO ACCESS THIS LINK DIRECTLY.)
This paper, by Mac an Bhaird, Morgan & O'Shea, is an analysis of first year students' grades in the academic year 2007-2008. We compared the grades of students who attended the MSC and those who did not. To compare students of similar abilities, we split the groups (First Arts and First Science) up into smaller groups depending on their grades (Leaving Cert) at the end of second level. There was a significant difference in all sub groups. We then expanded by comparing the grades of students depending on the results of their proficiency tests. Again there was a significant difference. All students seems to benefit from support but this is particularly true for 'at-risk' students.
Teaching Mathematics and Its Applications (2009) 28,117-122 doi:10.1093/teamat/hrp014
The laws of logarithmsThis leaflet explains and illustrates the laws governing the manipulation of logarithms. (Engineering Maths First Aid Kit 2.20)
The laws of logarithmsThere are rules, or laws, which are used to rewrite expressions involving logs in different forms. This leaflet states and illustrates these rules.
The laws of logarithmsThere are a number of rules known as the laws of logarithms. These allow expressions involving logarithms to be rewritten in a variety of different ways. The laws apply to logarithms of any base, but the same base must be used throughout a calculation.
The logarithm functionThis leaflet provides a table of values and a graph of the logarithm function. (Engineering Maths First Aid Kit 3.7)
The Mathematics Learning Support Centre at Loughborough UniversityThe Centre was established in 1996 within the Department of Mathematical Sciences in order to underpin the Department's service teaching commitment to engineering undergraduates. In the first instance funding had been made available through an internal university learning and teaching initiative for a period of two years. Because of its early successes the Centre became a permanent feature in 1998 and now serves any student in the university who might benefit from additional resources, over and above those normally provided, to help them in their learning of basic mathematical techniques.
The Maths Revision Booklet as Part of a Programme of Support at University of Newcastle upon TyneComputer-based diagnostic testing has been used for new engineering students for some years at University of Newcastle upon Tyne. Follow-up support has been available only in some departments. In summer 2001, new students were issued (in advance or on arrival) with a â??Maths Revision Bookletâ?? covering the basic maths topics that we didnâ??t intend to teach. Following the diagnostic test, lunchtime classes were offered for six weeks, based on the booklet, for those students who wished to attend.We report on the student opinion, analysis of diagnostic and examination performance.
The number 'e' - Trevor HawkesTrevor Hawkes discusses the number 'e', its relationship to other numbers - 0, pi and i - and its relevance to everyday life. This resource is released under a Creative Commons license Attribution-Non-Commercial-No Derivative Works and the copyright is held by Skillbank Solutions Ltd.
The number 'e' - Trevor HawkesTrevor Hawkes discusses the number 'e', its relationship to other numbers - 0, pi and i - and its relevance to everyday life. The video is released under a Creative Commons license Attribution-Non-Commercial-No Derivative Works and the copyright is held by Skillbank Solutions Ltd.
The Study Support Centre, The Robert Gordon University, AberdeenThe Study Support Centre (SSC), within the Robert Gordon University (RGU), aims to provide students with assistance in Mathematics, Writing & Communication skills, Information & Communication Technology applications, Statistics, Study Skills and support for dyslexic students. The SSC offers students independent assistance through individual and small group tuition outwith their normal programme of study, as well as Computer Assisted Learning (CAL) packages, specialist software for special needs students and text based self-learning materials. The SSC has created a basic mathematics diagnostic assessment, which we give to first year students in many Schools. Currently, in collaboration with the School of Engineering, an engineering principles diagnostic assessment is being designed and implemented.
