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The Learner's Perspective Study (LPS) offers an extremely rich source of data for analyses of classroom situations. In this paper we focus on events in mathematics classrooms through the lens of the Theory of Didactical Situations in Mathematics, namely, on the situation of institutionalization. During the phase of institutionalization, the teacher tends to help pupils to transform a piece of their knowledge from the means of resolving a problem to a reference for further uses in new situations. A detailed analysis of transcripts of communication between a Czech teacher and her 14- to 15-year-old pupils resulted in the classification of institutionalization into four types, as follows: asking additional questions referring to statements from the stage of validation with the aim of adding new knowledge to the repertoire; presenting a mathematical proof of a statement from validation; asking pupils to solve a similar problem; and setting problems for pupils, whose solution will allow them to apply the acquired knowledge. These are presented and illustrated in the paper. The combination of video-recordings from three cameras (one recording the teacher, one a pair of pupils and one the whole class), together with interviews with the teacher and the pair of pupils, materials prepared by the teacher, and pupils' productions, allows us to gain a deeper understanding of the role of institutionalization in mathematics education.

The aim of the paper is to show whether the systems of mathematics teacher education in two countries whose historical development may seem quite similar (the Czech Republic and Hungary were parts of the Habsburg Monarchy, and they were part of the Eastern European communist block) are also very similar, or whether each country follows its own, unique path. In this paper we build on the general need for more international comparative studies in the area of teacher education. We present a historical review of development of mathematics teacher education in both countries and analyse and compare current teacher education programs, their structure and organization, the demands on mathematics teachers and their qualifications for teaching at various levels. In the paper we pinpoint a number of aspects resulting in differences in the two systems, including historical development and traditions, (de)-centralization, globalization and international cooperation, etc. The comparison based on these aspects shows that the systems in both countries are very different. The analysis described in this paper could become the starting point for further research using the data from international surveys (e.g. PISA). Such research would enable us to make conjectures about the effects of various ways of organizing teacher education.

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With the myriad theories generated through research over the years, a continuing challenge for researchers is to navigate the multitude of theories in order to communicate their research, integrate empirical results, and make progress as a field by building upon empirical research. The Social Unit of Learning project was purposefully designed so that researchers from multiple disciplines with different theoretical perspectives could work together to examine the complexity of the mathematics classroom. In this paper, we reflect on the multiple analytical accounts generated from the project, drawing from the notions of complementarity and commensurability. Two parallel analyses, applying the commognitive framework and the theory of representations respectively, are used as illustrative examples for discussion regarding complementarity and commensurability. The paper addresses two focal questions, as follows: in what ways do divergence or contradiction in incommensurable analytical accounts reflect methodological discrepancies or fundamental differences in the underpinning theories? Furthermore, in what ways do the accounts generated by the parallel analyses predicated on different theories lead to differences in instructional advocacy? The answers to these questions provide empirically-grounded insights into the consideration of incommensurability in educational research, and suggest ways in which researchers and practitioners might apply the notion of complementarity to reconcile or exploit incommensurable analytical accounts that have resulted in different instructional advocacies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Orbis Scholae is the property of Charles University Prague, Faculty of Education and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article offers information on the Learner's Perspective Study (LPS), the research direction aiming at international comparative research in mathematics education. It aims to carry out teacher-focused studies by stressing the learner's perspective. It is also designed to realize research studies reporting on national norms of teaching practices with an in-depth analysis of mathematics classrooms in Australia, Germany, Japan and the U.S. It enables to take into account the teacher's purposeful selection of instructional strategies.

The results of recent educational research support the notion that the key to increasing students' knowledge is the competence of their teachers. On the basis of our long term experience from cooperation with a group of primary school teachers we discuss the concept of pedagogical competences needed in (mathematics) education, the possibilities of their cultivation and development and qualified joint reflection as a competence and as a way to competence cultivation. As the cooperation in our team influenced the participating teachers in different ways, we will illustrate their development by a selection of episodes from their teaching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we analyze the current state of the didactics of mathematics in the U.S. as it relates to research on equity. The sociopolitical turn in U.S. mathematics education resulted in a push for critical mathematics pedagogies (CMPs) in which predominantly marginalized populations of students explore social injustices through mathematics. We argue that mathematics education for equity must access broader populations of students and develop students' ethical reasoning skills to build an ethical and equitable future. To address didactical limitations in U.S. mathematics education, we introduce the Ethical Reasoning in Mathematics Framework (ERiM) as a tool to analyze high school students' ethical reasoning in real-world mathematics tasks. Using data from the initial phase of a Design Research project with students of privilege, we show how the ERiM Framework can be used to design lessons that elicit students' critical math consciousness (CMC). We end the article with design implications and recommendations for future research on the didactics of equitable mathematics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A characterization of recent Nordic research in didactics of mathematics is presented based on the 32 research reports from the Nordic and Baltic countries in the proceedings from NORMA17 (The eighth Nordic conference on didactics of mathematics). Recent Nordic research in didactics of mathematics is observed from several aspects such as choice of problem, theory, method, result, and target for the message. The analyses of the papers on different levels and from a manifold of perspectives build up an image of what Nordic research in DM (didactics of mathematics) contains and represents currently. The closeness and cooperation between researchers in the Nordic countries is characteristic as well as the breadth and variation in the choice of questions, theories, and methods. Research activity seems to flourish most in Norway. Small-scale studies as well as larger projects are visible. A variety of messages about mathematics teaching and learning for all age groups are directed to students, mathematics teachers, teacher educators, and policymakers. Quantitative and qualitative empirical studies dominate. Conceptual or theoretical investigations are rare. Studies of outcomes of interventions, including teaching approaches and experiments are most common, followed by studies of learning and cognition, including problem-solving. There is a need for surveys and overviews as so many new results are exposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the construct of challenge being recognized as an essential element of mathematics instruction, concerns have been raised about whether such approaches benefit students with diverse academic needs. In this article, we focus on the beliefs and instructional practices of teachers teaching students in the first three years of school (5 to 8 years of age). These teachers participated in professional learning focused on challenging mathematical tasks differentiated through their open-ended design and the use of enabling and extending prompts. The instructional practices are explained using the Theory of Didactical Situations. Questionnaire data from pre-intervention (n = 148) and post-intervention (n = 100) groups of teachers indicated that teachers in the post-intervention group held more negative beliefs than those in the pre-intervention group about the capability of instructional approaches involving a priori grouping of students by performance levels. Interviews with ten teachers from the post-intervention group revealed and characterized the ways teachers employed open-ended tasks with enabling and extending prompts to engage all learners. Findings reveal that teachers knowing their students as individual learners accompanied by knowledge of a range of teaching practices to differentiate instruction are central to engaging all learners. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main aim of the present study is to analyze the differences that may exist when students address the resolution of verbal problems in their mother tongue and in the language of instruction when these are different. We understand that knowing the type of verbal problems and their semantic structure can be helpful for students' contextual and mathematical understanding and will allow teachers to improve instruction during the first years of elementary education in bilingual schools specialized in the area of second language acquisition as well as in CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning). This study shows how children, as they are acquiring a greater command of the second language, show similar effectiveness to those students who work on mathematics in their mother tongue. This transversal study was conducted on 169 bilinguals studying in international schools. The sample was made up of 80 1st grade students (39 girls, mean age of 7.1 years and 41 boys, mean age of 7.3 years); and 89 2nd grade students (38 girls, mean age 8.2 years, and 51 boys, mean age 8.2 years). The exploratory analyses let us show how 1st grade students demonstrate lower effectiveness in solving problems when they do it in a second language, compared to 2nd grade students whose effectiveness is higher in carrying them out. It is also relevant that in first graders, the largest number of errors are found in the simplest tasks as students' effectiveness is less when they are taught in a second language, since it takes them longer to create effective resolution models. This fact will allow us to reconsider appropriate strategies and interventions when teaching mathematics in bilingual contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]