Teaching Mathematics and Statistics at La Trobe
Find out what makes Mathematics and Statistics teaching at La Trobe distinct (and better!)
Practice classes
Less Listening, more doing.
At La Trobe students spend 60% of class time doing maths as opposed to the norm of 20%. A typical first year one semester maths subject at Australian universities consists of four lectures and one tutorial or practice class. At La Trobe, students attend two lectures, two practice classes and one tutorial. A similar pattern continues through second year and even to third year, where at least one third of class time is spent actively doing maths. This approach not only means that students get to do mathematics under academic supervision, it means that La Trobe students get more access to staff than at other Australian universities (and the staff workloads are correspondingly higher!).
Tutorials
A distinctive tutorial program.
In first and second year mathematics subjects at La Trobe, the students attend tutorials in dedicated rooms lined with blackboards. The students work singly or in pairs with teaching materials specially designed for board work. The subject material is carefully integrated with the lecture material so that the students are exposed to new material in a hands-on manner. The tutor circulates around the class answering questions and offering advice. In some cases, blackboard tutorials are replaced by tutorials in computer labs, but the role of the tutor and the relationship between the subject matter and the lecture material remains the same. This is completely different to the conventional maths tutorial where either the tutor works through problems or students sit at desks working on their assignments or on routine problems set by their tutors.
Tailor-made teaching materials.
Almost every mathematics subject at La Trobe has its own printed notes which are completely integrated with the printed teaching materials for practice classes and tutorials. By this means we are able to decrease the number of lectures and increase the number of hands-on classes. It also means that students do not have to slavishly transcribe lecture notes because lectures closely follow the printed notes. This is very different to the usual situation where a text (often not Australian and so not well co-ordinated with secondary school maths) is used. In the conventional situation the text is not often closely linked to the lectures and the other teaching materials are usually problem-based; the overall effect being one of fragmentation. A further benefit of this approach at La Trobe has been the capacity to incorporate staff research results into the teaching materials. At La Trobe research does inform the teaching of mathematics because the teaching materials are the intellectual property of the academics!
Tutorial sessions
Everyone teaches.
One of the underlying principles of teaching mathematics at La Trobe is that lecturing staff must be involved in all aspects of the teaching program. For example, the academics delivering the lectures in a first year subject must take a tutorial and supervise at least one practice class in their subject. This is quite unlike some Australian institutions where the senior staff deliver lectures but do not take tutorials etc and don’t mark assignments or even exams in some cases. Again research informs teaching because, from professors down, everyone is involved in our whole teaching program. In this way the approach to the subject driven by the sense of enquiry of an active researcher is communicated to the students.