Keeping Records While Solving Problems A Study of Multilingual and First-Language English Speaking Students

Abstract

Creating written records while working on mathematics tasks may help students make sense of tasks and free cognitive resources for reasoning as they offload elements of the problem-solving process to paper. We investigated the extent of cognitive processes of multilingual learner (ML) and first-language English speaking (non-ML) students’ record keeping (RK) on tasks designed with and without supports for RK and the association between evidence of students’ cognitive process in RK (EC-RK) and the correctness of their solutions. Grades 7-9 (aged 12 to 16) students worked on RK-Supported or RK-Unsupported versions of three tasks, and we rubric-scored their solutions for both EC-RK and correctness. Overall, higher EC-RK scores were associated with greater correctness, confirming the utility of EC-RK for solving mathematics tasks. The presence of supports, though, did not increase the extent to which students’ RK reflects their cognitive processes, yet correctness of ML students’ solutions was associated with solving the RK-Supported versions of the tasks. This result suggests benefits of these supports for ML students apart from encouraging EC-RK.