The use of personal response systems to renegotiate the didactical contract in tertiary mathematics education

Abstract

Challenges experienced by first-year students transitioning from secondary to tertiary mathematics education are examined through the lens of the didactical contract. The didactical contract describes the expectations of both lecturer and students about their mutual obligations towards teaching and learning. First-year students’ beliefs about the nature of mathematics and mathematics teaching/learning need to be challenged to renegotiate the didactical contract at tertiary level. The study focuses on how to elicit and confront transitioning students’ beliefs in order to support their learning and influence a shift in the didactical contract. A Likert scale questionnaire was deployed at the beginning of students’ first year to gauge their beliefs about mathematics and mathematics teaching/learning and redeployed near the end of the first semester (or term) to observe possible changes in their beliefs and hence the didactical contract. The intervention consisted of personal response system (PRS) sessions regularly incorporated into the traditional transmission mode lecture to flip the classroom and create a student-centred learning environment, aimed at influencing students’ beliefs in order to make them aware of their own learning and their responsibility for learning. Questionnaire data were quantified and compared for the before and after surveys. There is evidence of a shift towards students taking ownership of their learning and a renegotiation of the didactical contract. Qualitative data generated by focus group interviews confirm the role of the PRS sessions in influencing student beliefs and the didactical contract.