Introduction

Though nearly as common as dyslexia, dyscalculia is neither well-known nor well-understood among educators and clinicians. Dyscalculia is a specific and persistent difficulty in understanding numbers which can lead to a diverse range of difficulties with mathematics. It will be unexpected in relation to age, level of education and experience and occurs across all ages and abilities.

Ruth Murphy from The Disability Support Service (DSS), Deirdre Casey from the Academic Learning Centre (ALC) and Julie Crowley from the Mathematics Department have worked together over the last two years to raise awareness of Dyscalculia within MTU. As part of this project we worked together with lecturers, students and external experts to create guidelines to support students with Dyscalculia. Although these resources are specifically developed with Dyscalculia in mind we hope that they may also be beneficial for a broad range of students in accordance with Universal Design for Learning practices.

Student Guidelines

As part of this project we worked together with lecturers, students and external experts to create guidelines to support students with Dyscalculia. Although these resources are specifically developed with Dyscalculia in mind we hope that they may also be beneficial for a broad range of students in accordance with Universal Design for Learning practices. Here are some tips for students with dyscalculia.

Staff Guidelines

As part of this project we worked together with lecturers, students and external experts to create guidelines to support students with Dyscalculia. Although these resources are specifically developed with Dyscalculia in mind we hope that they may also be beneficial for a broad range of students in accordance with Universal Design for Learning practices.

These are the guidelines for lecturers to support students with dyscalculia.

Raising Awareness Around Dyscalculia workshop

On Tuesday, 12th January 2021, 10:00-11:30 the Raising Awareness around Dyscalculia workshop was help online. Speakers included

• Hilary Maddocks, Mathematics & Statistics Learning Support Tutor, Loughborough University, UK
• Student from MTU Cork
• Ruth Murphy, Disability Support Service, MTU Cork

The objective of this workshop was to raise awareness about dyscalculia among the MTU community and identify best practice approaches to support our students with dyscalculia. Following universal design for learning (UDL) principles that promote increased accessibility in teaching and learning we hope that this raised awareness will in fact benefit all students who interact with maths and numbers as part of their studies at MTU Cork.

In recent years students with dyscalculia have presented in different MTU Cork programmes of study and have struggled with completing core maths modules or using maths within modules of their course such as Science and Business subjects. Staff in MTU Cork were surveyed about their awareness of and questions about Dyscalculia. In addition, students with the Disability Support Service (DSS) were surveyed on their experience of dyscalculia in college. The results of these surveys were used to inform the design and content of this workshop and their findings were presented during the workshop itself.

A major focus of this workshop was on ways in which lecturers or tutors can support students with Dyscalculia to succeed. Hilary Maddocks has worked for many years supporting such students at Loughborough University. The student perspective was also presented as we heard from an MTU Cork student about her experiences of learning with Dyscalculia, and the DSS gave some background.

A recording of the workshop is available here 

For more details please visit https://tlu.cit.ie/winter-2020_21 

Maths Anxiety:

On the 11th of April 2022, Maths Anxiety expert Sue Johnston-Wilder ran an online workshop for MTU students and staff called “Tackling Maths Anxiety”. A recording of the workshop is available below.

Dyscalculia Diagnosis Information:

The Disability Support Service has information on how someone can get diagnosed with dyscalculia on their webpage 

https://www.mycit.ie/access_disability/disability-support-service/dyslexia-diagnosis

Contact Info:

Please do not hesitate to contact us about the project: ruth.murphy@mtu.ie, maried.casey@mtu.ie and julie.crowley@mtu.ie

This is a TLU Development Fund project sponsored by the Teaching and Learning Unit, Office of the Registrar and VP for Academic Affairs in partnership with the Academic Learning Centre, Disability Support Service and the Department of Mathematics. https://tlu.cit.ie/