Monograph No. 6: Reading In Mathematics
December 1980
Publication of the Mathematics Council of The Alberta Teachers’ Association
69 – 70
Teaching Children How to Read Mathematics
Raymond C. Schmelter
Reading the materials of elementary school mathematics is so specialized that a child must be taught how to do the reading. In mathematics, ideas are communicated by using a special language. Some sentences may be vocalized using the word attack skills needed for ordinary written English. Other sentences cannot be vocalized using these skills because they contain more than alphabetical signs. An example of a sentence containing a mixture of alphabetical and mathematical signs is given below.