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Teachers Unpack Mathematical Conventions via Script-Writing

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Scripting Approaches in Mathematics Education

Part of the book series: Advances in Mathematics Education ((AME))

Abstract

This chapter is focused on mathematical conventions and their unpacking. Conventions account for the choices of the mathematics community regarding the ways concepts are defined, named, and symbolized. By unpacking, I refer to the act of offering plausible explanations and arguments for the choice of conventions. A normative practice of unpacking conventions has not been established, which creates a special opportunity for teachers to engage in a special type of rhetorical persuasion: the one that is less biased towards the perspective of a more authoritative rhetorician. Script-writing can be used as a format for designing convention-unpacking tasks. Using responses of prospective teachers to such a task, I illustrate how scripted dialogues and reflections can be used to promote teachers’ knowledge.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    To recall, when f is a function from a set X to itself, the n-th iteration of f is defined as f n ≡ f ∘ f n − 1 for any natural n ≥ 2.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

    Igor’ Kontorovich

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  1. Igor’ Kontorovich
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Correspondence to Igor’ Kontorovich .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada

    Rina Zazkis

  2. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA

    Patricio Herbst

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Kontorovich, I. (2018). Teachers Unpack Mathematical Conventions via Script-Writing. In: Zazkis, R., Herbst, P. (eds) Scripting Approaches in Mathematics Education . Advances in Mathematics Education. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-62692-5_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-62692-5_9

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-62691-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-62692-5

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