A discussion of different teaching approaches adopted during a mathematics tutorial

In this article four different teaching approaches used during a mathematics tutorial of a first year undergraduate class to computer scientists will be given. The four approaches were each implemented in an attempt to keep non-mathematicians interested in mathematical topics. It was found that “Chalk and Talk” was not the best form of imparting knowledge to the students in the group. The duration of each tutorial was two hours.

The teaching strategies used were:

• A class quiz;
• Group explanation of material to members of the individual’s group;
• Group explanation of material to members of the entire class; and
• Students teaching at the front of the class.

Each of the methods will be discussed with the relative merits and defects included for a comparison. It was found that each method worked better at the end of each module i.e. when the students were more familiar with the topics introduced on the module.