PROCEEDINGS OF THE 17TH ANNUAL CONFERENCE ON RESEARCH IN UNDERGRADUATE MATHEMATICS EDUCATION
2014
Denver, Colorado
Noticing the Math in Issues of Social Justice
Page: 850
This preliminary report examines pre-service secondary mathematics teachers’ engagement with problems which contextualized mathematics in issues of social justice. A framework for Teaching Mathematics for Social Justice was employed and participant responses were analysed with respect to what mathematics they noticed and attended to in and after the problem solving. Results suggest participants had difficulty “seeing” the math in non-math contexts, and that their ability to notice the embedded mathematics was influenced by the specific social context as well as their orientation towards mathematics (both in general and regarding specific content). Implications for research and teacher education are described.