Through the process of combining two seemingly unlikely bedfellows, mathematics and composition, two instructors explain how rhetoric connects the art of writing and the art of doing mathematics in an inquiry-based learning community. Combining these two courses in a learning community enables students and instructors to practice the deep thinking valued by each instructor and by a traditional liberal arts education while challenging both our and our students' individual, disciplinary, and rhetorical conventions and beliefs. Using student writing from our course, our assignments from mathematics and composition, and survey evaluation results, we demonstrate how engaging in inquiry-based education provides unconventional (and conventional) learning opportunities for both students and instructors. Furthermore, through our discussions of the four iterations of our Learning Community, we examine some ways interdisciplinary learning challenges structural, individual, and disciplinary expectations, conventions, and learning.Keywords: learning community, writing, English, composition, mathematical explorations, peer review, inquiry-based learning, meta-goals, Discovering the Art of Mathematics, Mathematics for Liberal Arts We have organized this article by dividing it into sections, using the same sorts of questions we encourage our students to embrace in some of the assignments we give-"Who? Where? When? What? Why?" and "How?" Our intended audience is both high school instructors (ELA and Mathematics teachers) and college-level composition and mathematics instructors/professionals who have ever wondered whether fruitful connections can be forged between composition and mathematics. We seek to examine both pragmatic and larger discursive ideas and strategies we used while referencing student voices and feedback. The reader familiar with and convinced of the ideas behind inquiry-based learning and learning communities in general can skip the "Why?" section and instead learn in the section "How?" about our specific implementation and tools.
WHO?Prof. Jen DiGrazia loves to teach writing and ask questions. Learning communities like the one described below help her to stay "fresh" in her field, to see writing as an endeavor that spans all disciplines and contexts. They encourage her to take the sorts of intellectual risks she hopes students will take in their own writing and thinking. She also has an abiding interest in queer theory and disability studies. She has a Master's Degree in English from Boise State University, and she earned her Ph.D. from University of Massachusetts's composition program. She currently coordinates the composition and first-year read programs at Westfield State University, and she continues to recover from her self-proclaimed mathematics phobia.Prof. Christine von Renesse loves teaching at all levels-from elementary school through college. She uses open inquiry techniques in all her classes, believing that this is the most effective and enjoyable way of learning and teaching. Her students...