"i Would Rather Die": Reasons Given By 16-year-olds For Not Continuing Their Study Of Mathematics

Research in Mathematics Education "I would rather die": reasons given by 16-year-olds for not continuing their study of mathematics Margaret Brown a , Peter Brown a , and Tamara Bibby b a Department of Education and Professional Studies, King`s College London; b Institute of Education, University of London (Received 1 st July 2007; final version received 3rd January 2008)

Improving participation rates in specialist mathematics after the subject ceases to be compulsory at age 16 is part of government policy in England. This article provides independent and recent support for earlier findings concerning reasons for non- participation, based on free response and closed items in a questionnaire with a sample of over 1500 students in 17 schools, close to the moment of choice. The analysis supports findings that perceived difficulty and lack of confidence are important reasons for students not continuing with mathematics, and that perceived dislike and boredom, and lack of relevance, are also factors. There is a close relationship between reasons for non-participation and predicted grade, and a weaker relation to gender. An analysis of the effects of schools, demonstrates that enjoyment is the main factor differentiating schools with high and low participation indices. Building on discussion of these findings, ways of improving participation are briefly suggested. Background and aims Recent reports have stressed the serious shortage in the UK economy of people qualified in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), with the rising demand outstripping a declining supply (Roberts 2002). The Smith (2004) report in particular stressed the national need for more young people to study mathematics for longer. Meanwhile entries for General Certificate of Education (GCE) Advanced (A-level) mathematics examinations at age 18, where mathematics is studied normally as one of only 3 or 4 specialist subjects, fell by 28% between 1982 and 2003. By the end of this period only 7% of the age group were studying A-level mathematics (Matthews and Pepper 2005). The UK government therefore set targets for an increase of 21% in the number of A-level passes in mathematics (Her Majesty`s Treasury 2006). Some of the decline followed the introduction of Curriculum 2000, which split the A-level course into modules at Advanced Supplementary (AS-level), usually taken at age 17, after which some students continue no further, and A2-level, usually taken at 1 M. Brown et al. age 18. Despite an upturn in 2005-2007, and the fact that mathematics is now the second most popular GCE subject (Matthews and Pepper 2007), the number of mathematics A-level students has not yet climbed back up to the 2001 figure. The long-term trend of falling participation also affects other developed countries (Holton et al. 2001), although most countries do expect all students to continue with some study of mathematics until they leave school. The authors of this paper had access to an existing large-scale data set gathered as part of a project funded by the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA) on alternative forms of General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) examinations, taken by almost all students at age 16 (Stobart, Bibby & Goldstein 2005). In view of the policy interest, we decided to analyse the relevant part of the data to see whether it provided any useful insights into students` motives for discontinuing with mathematics at age 16. There are a number of related studies which explore student participation in and/or attitudes to mathematics, both inside and outside England. Students` choice of subjects has been shown to be significantly influenced by their attitudes to the subjects and performance in them (Dick and Rallis 1991, Johnston 1994). Osborne et al. (1997), in a comprehensive research review of participation in STEM subjects, reported that the main reasons why students chose to discontinue their study of mathematics was that it is perceived to be `hard`, `boring` and `useless`. This is consistent with findings from more recent studies about attitudes (e.g. Nardi & Steward 2003, Kyriacou & Golding 2006). Osborne et al. also highlighted the case of girls, whose participation was and continues to be significantly lower than that of boys, in spite of similar attainment at age 16. Several studies have specifically addressed reasons for the gender effect, most recently Mendick (2006). Finally, in parallel with our analysis, the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority were also carrying out a large-scale longitudinal research project on participation in A-level mathematics (Matthews & Pepper 2007). Rather than summarising in detail at this point findings in these and other studies we will integrate these with the reporting and discussion of our own results. We will report more briefly on our results where they support those of others, and at greater length where they add something new. Methods The data for the research was taken from a Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA) study evaluating the 2005 pilot and trial of new two-tier GCSE maths examinations (Stobart, Bibby and Goldstein 2005). The broader study included a four page questionnaire given to students immediately after they had taken their GCSE examinations and before they had received the results. This research is based on answers given by the students to a small part of the questionnaire that was not analysed as part of the main study. 2 Research in Mathematics Education The sample consisted of 1997 students in the GCSE cohorts from 17 schools. Of these students 1510 were predicted to get grades A*-C and thus form the pool from which future AS-level students could be drawn. The choice of schools was dictated by the three national bodies licensed to award GCSE qualifications which were involved in the QCA study. Each awarding body had been asked to find a set of schools which were willing and able to participate in the study and which were broadly representative of the spread of schools they served. The combined group includes a wide range of schools with respect to their geographical spread across England and Wales and their size range (106 - 410 pupils in the GCSE cohort). There was one single sex school (boys`) and two faith schools. The boys` school is excluded from analysis of gender differences. However the sample of schools is not completely representative as it is somewhat above average in terms of overall attainment. The percentage of pupils in the 14 English schools achieving five or more A*-C grades in GCSE examinations ranged between 30 - 85% with a mean of 65%, compared to a national English average that year of 57%. This bias was also evident when the distribution of predicted grades in mathematics was compared with national GCSE results. Comparable data was not available for the three Welsh schools. Therefore while the sample is large and varied, it is likely that the results of the survey are rather more positive than would be expected of the whole population of schools in England and Wales. Predicted GCSE grades were used in the analysis below and are important as they would have been available to students while they were choosing AS-level subjects. (Clearly the awarded grades will have affected students` eventual choices but we do not have this information; nor do we have any data on the closeness of awarded and predicted grades.) In addition to information about school, gender and predicted grade, the relevant questionnaire items available for analysis were: Circle any words that fit you Words that describe how I feel about maths (add other words if you would like): Enjoy Like Hate Bored Frightened Excited Anxious Worried Difficult Easy _______ ________ _________ __________ Are you planning to stay on at school or college next year? Yes / No If you are, what courses/ subjects are you intending to study? 3 M. Brown et al. Did you or have you ever considered studying maths at AS or A2 level? Yes / No Why/ why not? We undertook the analysis of these questions in the following stages: 1. We found the proportion of students who had ringed, or written in, each descri ptive attitude word/ phrase. Where there seemed no clear distinction in meaning, words were grouped together (e.g. `worried` and `anxious`). 2. Choices of subjects for AS-level were analysed only in terms of whether or not students included mathematics in the subjects they intended to study. 3. Proportions of students who had considered and not considered taking mathematics were found. The reasons given for their decision were coded iteratively, and finally grouped into to what appeared to be the major distinct themes. The proportion providing each category of reason was calculated. 4. After the analysis of results for the full sample, there was a re-analysis by predicted grade and by gender for individual students, and also by school. Findings and discussion 1. Results for individual students There was a very clear relation between the predicted grade and the likelihood that students intended to continue with mathematics, or had considering doing so. (Table 1) The data in Table 1 show that the proportions of predicted A* and A grade students who take mathematics is relatively high but the differences of about 20% between those who considered and those who intended participating suggests that there is some potential for increasing the proportion of high attaining students who select mathematics as a specialist subject. However the greatest potential for increase comes from those predicted at grades B and C where there is a significant drop in both the percentage considering and in the proportion of those who considered who expressed a firm intention to continue. To relate this data to the cohort, about 93% are entered for mathematics GCSE, and in 2005 of those entered 4% received grade A*, 9% grade A, 18% grade B and 23% grade C. 4 Research in Mathematics Education Matthews & Pepper (2007) note that in terms of recruitment, mathematics A-level students have the highest mean GCSE score of all major subjects and that in 2005/6, 78% of them had a grade A or A* in GCSE Mathematics, while only 19% had B and 3%, C. They relate the drop at grade B to both the policies of schools and colleges in accepting students (although they found that the majority do accept grade B) and in the perception of students that mathematics is only for a `clever core` (Matthews & Pepper 2005) or an `elite` (Nardi and Steward 2003) . Table 2 indicates categories of reasons given for not considering taking up mathematics by students at each grade. As noted earlier this was a free response question; students` reasons were grouped iteratively into categories which were then labelled by us. (Table 2) The results in Table 2 demonstrate that many of the categories of reasons given for not continuing with mathematics are also strongly grade-related. In the discussion which follows the categories are further grouped under headings of `difficult`, `boring/don`t enjoy` and `not useful/not needed`, which also happen to correspond broadly to the descri ptions `hard`, `boring`, and `useless` used earlier by Osborne et al. (1997). Where possible sub-categories of responses are identified; these are sometimes illustrated by quotes from student responses selected as being most able to typify that sub-category. Sources of quotes are identified by gender, school number and predicted grade, respectively. Maths is difficult. Or, as one student put it: Its just too damn hard (M-3-A ) From Table 2, we can see that at all predicted grades but A*, the most prevalent reason that students wrote for not continuing with mathematics was the perceived difficulty of the subject. Thus rejection on grounds of difficulty is common even amongst those predicted to do well enough to achieve a grade A, which would place them between the 4 th and 12 th percentile of the cohort (see also Matthews & Pepper (2005)). The issue of `difficulty` is problematic; at one extreme it can be used as a dismissive label for a complex set of experiences which might be too painful to think about. One potential analytic stance would be to ask: where do messages of `difficulty` come from? Are they always a reflection of real or anticipated struggle or failure? Certainly our findings correspond to those of Matthews & Pepper (2005) and Kyriacou and Goulding (2006) in suggesting that many messages about difficulty in relation to future struggle come from outside: from the experiences of friends and family and from teachers. Amongst many students perceptions had been informed by those who had already taken AS-level or were currently on the course, including older siblings: 5