Previous research on whether pre-service teachers change their views of mathematics and its teaching during their education has mixed results. We pursued a descriptive understanding of the effect of teacher education on the views of teacher education graduates, through using data from ten interviews with Swedish secondary mathematics pre-service teachers. The soon-to-be graduates’ views of mathematics had not changed substantially, and they rarely communicated clear views. The static and dynamic groupings of views coexisted, although dynamic views dominated. We further found indications of a communication view of mathematics. Respondents generally displayed a multifaceted view of mathematics teaching, to which teacher education had contributed. Their views corresponded more frequently with images of the desired teacher as knowledge-transforming and interested. We argue that a multifaceted view of teaching is a welcome outcome for teacher education. 

A research-based teacher education rests on research on the practices of teacher education. We undertook a survey of the opportunities to learn mathematics pedagogy and to teach mathematics perceived by students in their last year of teacher education. Questionnaires were distributed to 753 students graduating in June 2020 from 13 Swedish universities, and the response rate was 11.2%. Overall, new graduates perceived good opportunities to learn mathematics pedagogy, but there were substantial variations in opportunities to learn specific competencies of teaching, such as analysing learners’ answers or leading a mathematical discussion. A similar unevenness in perceived opportunities to learn from the practicum experience was found. These results point to less-than-optimal opportunities to learn core practices of mathematics teaching. We recommend that institutions take a more systematic approach to programme coverage, and to create opportunities to use theory/research to deconstruct practice and to inform rehearsing ‘approximations of practice’ in campus-based activities. 

Instructional technology implementation is increasingly being addressed in teacher education, though research literature on its implementation remains limited. This literature analysis draws the Anthropological Theory of the Didactic to map what and how instructional technology is integrated into preservice mathematics teacher education and to identify conditions that facilitate or hinder the adaptation. Drawing from 22 peer-reviewed articles published between 2010 and 2022, the study maps empirical studies of instructional technology integration in mathematics teacher education. Key findings reveal that preservice teachers consistently engaged in lesson planning, practiced teaching peers in 13 cases, and taught actual learners in three instances, while reflection occurred in seven cases. However, the underlying reasoning (logos) behind the didactical practices were not presented to the preservice teachers, remained implicit, or were not clearly linked to the praxis. Furthermore, the decomposition of teaching practices was an underused pedagogical practice. Learning opportunities included rehearsals, the use of exemplary curriculum materials, teamwork, and constructive feedback. A key challenge in adapting the didactical praxeologies was the participants’ lack of prior experience with technology. The analysis highlights the need to make the reasons behind teaching practices explicit and calls for more intentional integration of teacher education pedagogies to enhance learning outcomes. 

Within the commognitive perspective, ritual and explorative routines are used in a very particular way to distinguish students’ routines according to whether they are driven by social reward or by generating a substantiated narrative. Explorative routines in this theorisation may refer not to inquiry-based activity but to the result of a student’s routine moving from being process-oriented to becoming outcome-oriented, a deritualisation. Choice of tasks as well as a teacher’s moves offer students different opportunities to engage in rituals, explorative routines and deritualisations. Through nuancing the space spanned by opportunities to engage in rituals and explorative routines respectively, we describe and contrast classroom practices in three lessons from three contexts. The lessons share a commonality in encouraging explorative routines as a starting point, yet being adapted towards ritual activity through decreased openings for student agentivity, fewer invitations for students’ own substantiations or both. We argue that such adaptations are driven by the teachers’ commitment to reach mathematical closure in a lesson, to balance considerations of the classroom community and individual students and to meet curricular requirements. Our model helps interrogate the nature and relevance of hybrids of explorative routines and rituals. 

The purpose of this study is to configure the landscape of empirical mathematics educational research onproblem-solving in teacher education, and thereby disentangle how mathematical problem-solving is understoodand used. The method consists of a configurative review of empirical mathematics education research onproblem-solving in teacher education. A two-dimensional model is presented to illustrate how different aspectsof problem-solving in teacher education are connected to and complement each other. Using the model, theconfiguration results in the proposition of four major categories of research on problem-solving in teachereducation. The result indicates an almost equal distribution of research which views problem-solving as an aimfor mathematics education versus research which views problem-solving as a means for learning mathematics.However, within the former, roughly three quarters of the articles focus on content knowledge, and only a quarteron pedagogical content knowledge. Implications for teacher education and future research are discussed.

Matematikundervisning av idag har en påverkan även utanför klassrummets ramar, inte minst genom matematikens relevans inom kultur, ekonomi, politik och i relation till makt. Sociopolitiska perspektiv i matematikdidaktisk forskning ger insikter om hur utbildningen i matematik är social och politisk. Forskning utifrån dessa perspektiv föreslår både kritiska ifrågasättanden och ännu-inte-tänkta möjligheter för innehåll, undervisning, politik och vidare forskning. Denna bok introducerar, för en större svensk publik, de forskningsinriktningar och strategier som sociopolitiska perspektiv har att erbjuda. I boken illustreras detta på flera sätt. Kapitlen beskriver aktuell forskning om matematikutbildningens sociopolitiska utmaningar i flera olika sammanhang, t.ex. klassrum, fritidshem, läroplaner, matematiklärarutbildning och till och med matematikutbildningsforskning. På detta sätt vidgas perspektiven till grupper av människor, institutioner och krafter, vilka utgör ett nätverk för matematikutbildningspraxis. Kapitlen presenterar annorlunda filosofiska och empiriska studier, baserade på teoretiska verktyg från filosofi, samhällsvetenskap och kulturstudier, kritiska studier av utbildning samt sociokulturellt-politiska studier av matematikutbildning. Metodologiska och analytiska strategier som text- och diskursanalys och fallstudier av praktik används. På detta sätt illustreras möjligheter att forska i matematikutbildning utifrån sociopolitiska perspektiv. Kapitlen använder diverse skrivstilar vilka bjuder in läsaren i forskningsvärlden. Därmed får läsaren möta olika sätt att tänka på matematikutbildningens roll i skapandet av det moderna svenska samhället. 

Detta inledande kapitel lyfter fram nya trender inom sociopolitisk forskning i matematikdidaktik. Den matematikundervisning som pågår i klassrum är alltid sammanflätad med olika samhälleliga fenomen, så som social kontext, normer och styrdokument, men också kollegor och media. Centrala problemställningar och forskningslitteratur i de sociopolitiska studierna i matematikdidaktik presenteras. Detta fungerar som en bakgrund för tematiseringen av boken och dess kapitel. 

‘Good teaching’ remains disputed, but few studies have empirically studied variations in views of good teaching as reflected in teacher education. This study performed a content analysis of criteria for student teacher lesson observations stated in protocols from universities in six countries. Similarities across the protocols were the absence of images of the charismatic and the technical-professional teacher, and the dearth of teleological aspects. The degree to which protocols reflected a knowledge base, had clear implementation requirements, valued reasoned judgement, and valued transformation of content varied. On the basis of this range of images of the desired teacher, we suggest four categories of teacher images: the knowledgeable teacher, the knowledge-transforming teacher, the efficient teacher, and the constantly improving teacher, and further discuss the possibility of an inspired teacher.

Few people who did not grow up speaking Zulu have learned the language later. There are limited resources for second language Zulu learning, whether textbooks, readers, or computerised resources. We set out to develop software for this purpose, to support learners’ independent learning. Drawing on research on language learning, we used a number of principles that then informed the design of the programmes. In this paper, we reflect on the applicability of the principles and the difficulties in structuring an application for an agglutinative language.

As with any programs in teacher education, Swedish mathematics teacher education is influenced by changing political winds, developments in Information and Communication Technology (ICT), culture, history, PISA results, research-based program designs, and a fair amount of passion. Content and outcomes are nationally determined and include the requirement of a strong research foundation, but this is often not how practcing techers work, which exerts its own pull on teacher education. The specific implementations of programs take different forms at the universities that offer mathematics teacher education. In order to provide a comprehensive yet meaningful ntroduction to both the current system and current practices, we describe the overall organization of Swedish mathematics teacher education, and then offer short cases of implemented programs. To ensure inclusivity, the various parts are written by mathematics educators from the respective institutions. In this way, both variation across mathematicas teacher education for diffrent grade levels and variation across different institutions working with the same national directives can be distinguished. Issues such as the academization of teacher education are problematized, as are other forces that constitute the crosscurrents in Swedish mathematics teacher education.