Theme

Digging Deeper: Teaching Mathematics for Understanding in and beyond the classroom

For the past ten years and more of the South African National Senior Certificate (NSC) reports, the Mathematics national pass rate has never exceeded 60%, thereby limiting the quantity and quality of passes, and the number of learners proceeding to tertiary institutions to successfully complete a qualification in the Mathematics, Science, Engineering, Technology and related fields.

Demystifying mathematics, bringing mathematics in context, back to basics and many other slogans, are all endeavours to express the believe that we all have to dig deeper, and work harder and smarter to improve the standard and state of mathematics educational achievements in South African Schools. The Mathematics Teaching and Learning Framework for South Africa, with its emphasis on teaching mathematics for understanding, is another endeavour to improve not only the through-put rate, but also the quality and quantity of Mathematics passes in South Africa.

Conceptual understanding, mathematical proficiency, problem solving and other terms, expressions and processes, have been put forward as possible remedies to the poor mathematics performance of the South African learners in both local and international assessments. How then do we dig deeper to not only do research and give sound advice, but also teach mathematics for understanding in and beyond the classroom? How do we speak with one loud voice to be heard by decision makers regarding research findings and recommendations, as well as better and consistent implementation thereof?

Sub-themes for the conference:

  • Developing pre-service and in-service teachers to teach mathematics for understanding in the classroom.
  • Digging deeper through problem solving: Integrating problem solving in mathematics classroom activities.
  • Digging deeper through assessment: Balancing assessment tasks in mathematics with a special focus on setting level 3 (complex procedures) and level 4 (problem solving) questions.
  • Mathematics across the curriculum: The integral role of mathematics in other subjects, across the grades, and
  • Teaching Mathematics for beyond the classroom: The importance of mathematics for high-level scarce-skills fields.