Integrated Case Studies in Teaching Introductory Mathematics Courses at College

Abstract

This article discusses how to integrate the directed case method to promote concept, process and application learning in an introductory mathematics course. A pretest and posttest design was applied to measure the gains on mathematics content and attitudes towards mathematics for both control and innovative sections. The innovative sections of Introductory Mathematics did much better on the posttest than the control sections even though the innovative cohort of students scored slightly lower on the pretest than did students in the control sections. As for the Attitude Toward Mathematics Inventory, the Innovation sections had “better” attitudes toward math at posttest when compared to their counterparts in the Control sections. In fact, taken together, the data suggest that a student’s perception of mathematics best aligns with their interest in and enjoyment of mathematics and self-confidence in mathematics at the outset of the course. The small changes noted by use of Case studies-based learning were influenced by the small numbers in this study. However, the trend toward a positive learning impact suggests that additional cases, introduced to address other challenging concepts, may influence learning and the enjoyment of mathematics.