We Don't Speak Italics!

None of us speak in ITALICS, so why do we expect our young students to suddenly be able to in their exams?

As Maths Teachers we strive to explain complex mathematical concepts simply, and I'm sure that doesn't include writing on the board using italics.

Yet the text books and exam papers (across all the exam boards in the UK) insist on using a mix of a sans serif font (no little tails or feet on the ends of letters) with the occasional serif font and yes, masses of italics.

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Why is this?

Turns out it is simply convention in the Maths community; italics are mainly used to represent variables (letters for unknown values) but numbers are in a normal font.

Greek letters are handy in Advanced Maths settings, but we can't even manage consistency here: lower case is in italics, upper case in normal fonts.

And before the Physicists start screaming at their screens, 😉, they too have no formal rules - Physics constants should typically be upper case and (usually, but not always) italicised, but units need normal fonts.

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Am I being pedantic for the sake of complaining?

No. I want to speak up for the thousands upon thousands of young people trying to understand complex and often, abstract, ideas, who are left to translate what their Teacher taught them into something looking very, very different in their textbooks and on exam papers.

The focus needs to be on their understanding of concepts - we TEACH Maths to build problem-solving and critical analysis skills.

But, we TEST them on their ability to translate at speed and only then, if successful, demonstrate their Maths capability.

I've yet to come across a teenager, within a Maths setting, who relies on the letter being in italics to tell them it is a variable. So, in this niche environment, Maths convention becomes a null argument.

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What about the 1 in 10 of the population with dyslexia?

Dyslexia is a continuum across the range of intellectual abilities that affect ACCURATE and fluent word reading and spelling; many are not diagnosed (British Dyslexia Association)

Incredibly, of the 60,000 pupils that sat one of the SQA Maths exams last year, up to 6,000 having not had a formal diagnosis and therefore no adaptations to the paper, most likely started their exam at a significantly unfair disadvantage.

But it doesn't need to be like this. Simple and consistent changes to the font - sans serif, upright (no italics), 12 -14 point, and adjusting the letter spacing will at least begin to level the playing field for most Students.

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The Good News

Here at ILS we already have the skills needed to produce complex Maths formulas in a format that automatically addresses this. In fact, we insist on ensuring we are dyslexia-friendly in all our materials.

So let's all appeal to the UK exam boards (to start with!) - SQA, AQA, WJEC, OCR and Pearson Edexcel - to reconsider their approach to the exam papers so they only examine mathematical capability!

Perhaps the new Qualifications Scotland will allow a fresh perspective for the SQA in starting a discussion around equitable access to Maths exam papers? Let's hope.