1 MATH ANXIETY CASE STUDIES: FROM DISTRESS TO SUCCESS Fred Peskoff & Leonid Khazanov Borough of Manhattan Community College/CUNY

Questions to Consider How do you think a student with math anxiety would respond to the situation? Which coping strategies do you think should be used to resolve the problem? 2

3 Case Study I: Mario Mario is taking an introductory statistics course. For the first four weeks of the semester, he was able to complete his weekly homework assignments with little difficulty. He is now attempting his fifth homework assignment on probability. After successfully answering the first three questions, he gets stuck on several problems in a row. His answers “don’t match those in the back of the book” and he cannot figure out why.

4 Case II: Ida Ida is sitting in her introductory algebra class. The teacher is reviewing homework problems on the board. Ida successfully completed the assignment the night before, but nonetheless listens attentively. She is a serious student who attends class regularly and prides herself on taking careful, clear notes. After the review, the instructor introduces subtraction of polynomials. Ida feels “completely lost and confused.” She copies the rules and problems from the blackboard but has no idea what she is writing.

5 Case III: Diana Diana is enrolled in a precalculus course. She hasn’t studied mathematics since she graduated from high school ten years ago. Although the work seems somewhat familiar at the beginning of the semester (she at least “remembers having learned it”), Diana decides to go to the math lab for tutoring. She asks the tutor to review graphing straight lines. The tutor’s response is: “you should already know this before taking the course.”

6 Case IV: Serena Serena was a student in an experimental section of elementary algebra where at-risk students were assigned personal coaches (tutors). She was one of the at-risk students. Serena was reluctant to meet with her coach. She failed the second quiz and became extremely anxious as the midterm was approaching.

7 Case V: Tina Tina was a student in an elementary algebra class. She had a very poor mathematics background. Even the very first topic (signed numbers) confused her. She told the instructor that she could not understand a word of what he was teaching.