M&L Maths&Languages

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Twinned mathematics research workshops are excellent opportunities for transdisciplinary teaching.

The Maths&Languages project is a project funded by the KA2 Erasmus+ framework of the European Union. The project was initiated with the desire to share, improve and develop the MATh.en.JEANS approach with (and for) mathematics teachers, foreign language teachers and researchers all over Europe by pairing 10 high-schools in Europe.

Background of the project

The MATh.en.JEANS (MeJ) association has implemented mathematics research workshops for high-school students since 1989. The objective is to make mathematics less abstract by putting students in a researcher’s position and investigating exciting research topics. More than 4,000 school pupils participated in these activities in 2016-2017.

The MatLan project (2014-2016) contributed with a series of new dimensions to the MeJ experience, including:

  • the assessment of students' skills (transversal skills and mathematical competences) developed at MeJ’s workshops;
  • the inter-cultural aspect;
  • multilingualism;
  • and, the possibility for including the MeJ workshop (non-formal education) in schools’ curriculum (in formal education).

The Maths&Languages project (2017-2020), as a full-scale test for the MatLan approach:

  • goes further in integrating foreign language teaching into the MeJ research workshops with the total involvement of a teacher from this discipline;
  • benefits from the experience of teachers with diverse backgrounds and different nationalities to optimise the approach throughout the three years of the project;
  • assesses students’ skills developed at the Maths&Languages workshops in mathematics and in foreign languages;
  • creates a guide for setting up an M&L workshop;
  • disseminates the guide for setting up an M&L approach in the partner countries and beyond.

Main objectives of the project

  1. For high-school students: Improve their level of foreign language and mathematics; create a real European “young researchers” community; enable them to discover research and university studies through contact with researchers; encourage them to pursue scientific higher studies giving them an insight of “real” mathematics.
  2. For teachers: Implement mathematics research workshops for high-school students in a foreign language; enhance/improve their ability to develop CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) activities and lead transdisciplinary programmes; share experiences and practices of teaching with colleagues in other curricular area; improve their teaching practices by cooperating with European colleagues.
  3. For schools: Develop an interdisciplinarity or transdisciplinarity by giving an example of a successful project; encourage cooperation with schools in other countries; reinforce their links with local universities; enhance capacities to engage in European projects.
  4. For teachers, schools and MATh.en.JEANS: Set-up and test the M&L approach; test and promote the Maths&Languages mathematics research workshops (M&L workshops) as CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning) activities; provide the MATh.en.JEANS association with feedback on its method from teachers coming from different school systems.

To meet these objectives, the ten partnering schools have been carefully selected based on their characteristics and the motivation and skills of their respective teams. Moreover, to bring to light the strong link between secondary schools and university studies and research in the project, nine universities (or research institutes) have been integrated in the project as associated partners.

 

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