Read about the background of the project here

Learning about teaching argumentation for critical mathematics education in multilingual classrooms (LATACME) is a complex project that investigates mathematics education practices both at the teacher education level and at the school classroom level. It looks at the implementation of practices by teacher educators (TEs), preservice teachers (PTs) and teachers at different year levels as well as how school students make sense of the learning opportunities provided to them. It involves teacher educators as researchers on their own and others’ practices, with the aim of improving the mathematics teacher education. Changing teaching practices is a long-term process (Ball, 1990a) and so it is important to stop and consider how far we have come with answering our main research question, “what supports and hinders PTs’ learning about how to teach ACME in multilingual classrooms”?

Certainly, pandemics have an impact on PTs’ potential learning. Nevertheless, the list below highlights some important outcomes from the research. More information can be found in the research publications on this website:

1. In engaging PTs in considering how best to teach mathematics in a multilingual classroom, focusing on Norwegian fluency highlights what school students cannot do, rather than what they can do.
2. TEs introducing PTs to appreciating and making use of the resources that multilingual school students bring to their mathematics learning is complex and difficult to achieve.
3. Mathematical argumentation and argumentation using mathematics are complex for PTs to integrate into their teaching, because there are many different aspects that need school students need to bring together.
4. PTs can struggle with implementing modelling tasks in classrooms because they need to give control of the learning to the school students.
5. Critical mathematics education contexts can be integrated into modelling tasks, but unless this a goal for the lesson, then it will not happen out of the school students’ own imagination.
6. Programming in schools requires PTs to learn how to programme, how to teach programming and how to facilitate school students to identify the connection between mathematics and programming.
7. Programming as a form of problem solving can contribute to school students developing their mathematical argumentation as well as aspects of critical democratic competency, outlined as an outcome in the Norwegian school curriculum.

In alignment with our findings, we have begun to develop tasks and activities that can be used by TEs and PTs to develop competencies in relationship to the different aspects in the curricula for mathematics teacher education and school teaching. In this final year, our focus is on trialling these tasks to consider how they might support PTs to increase their learning about argumentation for critical mathematics education in multilingual classrooms.