This book offers practical advice to teachers on the role of language in the mathematics classroom. An emphasis on writing and the use of language can help break barriers that many disadvantaged and underrepresented students face in learning mathematics.

This book is a study of the role of language from the Institute for Writing and Thinking. The Institute is a professional research and development center for college, high school, and middle school teachers. The view of language held by the Institute is, �language is not a �basic skill� to be learned by handbook rules and handout exercises, but as a liberal act in which individuals express themselves communally, construing and constructing our best knowledge of life.� Many of the papers in this book grew out of presentations at a conference on �The Role of Writing in Learning Mathematics and Science� held at Bard College in 1987.

Contents
Preface
Foreword: The Ordinary Experience of Writing, Leon Botstein
Part I. Defining Problems, Seeing Possibilities
Part II. Writing as Problem Solving
Part II. Classroom Applications: What Works and How
Part IV: Programmatic Policies and Practices
Part V: The Context of Learning
Part VI: Responses