In many countries, centralised educational systems introduce mathematics education reforms in a top-down manner (Potari et al., 2018). These reforms often fail to gain traction for a multitude of reasons, not least the failure to appreciate the central role of the teacher in classroom practices and their agency in misinterpreting, subverting, and even disregarding reformed curricula (Remillard, 2005). Teachers through their teaching practices interact with the curriculum in a number of ways. For instance, teachers may act as curriculum-transmitters embracing a fidelity approach by prioritising content transmission; they may act as curriculum-developers implementing an adaptation approach by adjusting the curriculum or they may act as curriculum-makers adopting an enactment approach by designing the curriculum in action drawing on student experience (Shawer et al., 2009; Shawer, 2010). Inherently, these approaches describe distinctive ways that teachers may act and interact with the curriculum incorporating their values, feelings, thinking and beliefs. Therefore, by engaging in these certain kinds of practices, a teacher is negotiating a way of being in that context - their identity (Wenger, 1998). As such, identity and practice mutually shape who a teacher is.

The teacher–curriculum relationship is interwoven with teaching practices and teachers’ identities. This relationship is dependent upon the individual teacher and curriculum, and is located in a particular context (Remillard, 2005). Remillard explains that by virtue of this relationship, a distinction emerges between the written curriculum and the enacted curriculum. Drawing on the work of Clandinin & Connelly (1998), she argues that teachers are not just conduits or implementers of curriculum, rather they act as agents by working with students to construct the enacted curriculum. She also refers to the work of Ben-Peretz (1990) to indicate that curriculum development occurs in two phases. The first phase concerns the work of curriculum writers where the official curriculum reform is materialised through the creation of curricular plans, guides and resources for teachers. The second phase elicits the work of teachers as they read, evaluate, adapt, alter or translate these curricular materials into events in their mathematics classrooms. Remillard (2005) opts to describe teachers as designers in the second phase of curriculum development owing to the creative and improvisational work of mathematics teaching.

In a top-down approach to curriculum reform, teachers have little or no involvement in phase one of curriculum development. In such cases, teachers may be positioned as receivers of curriculum knowledge (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1999). They are expected to implement reforms determined by an external body, without being actively involved in their design or organization (Vähäsantanen & Eteläpelto, 2009). This has been the case in many countries where curricular reforms have adopted performative, managerialist agendas through the tighter coupling of teaching practices to standardised assessment of students (Buchanan, 2015; Day, 2002; Sachs, 2003). These kinds of reforms which consist of the implementation of national curricula, national tests, criteria for assessing the quality of schools and the publication of schools’ results in these assessments in the public domain erode teachers’ autonomy and challenge teachers’ individual and collective professional and personal identities (Day, 2002). This new discourse of accountability has implications for teacher professionalism as it has changed what it means to be a teacher and how teachers understand themselves (Buchanan, 2015; Day, 2002).

Teachers draw on their pre-existing identities which have been continuously formed and reformed over the course of their careers to interpret, learn from, evaluate, and appropriate new mandates for their teaching in their schools and classrooms (Buchanan, 2015). Even in such cases where teachers are excluded from phase one of curriculum development, they do not submissively accept the curriculum reform and its associated goals nor the intended changes it requests in their work and identities (Vähäsantanen & Eteläpelto, 2009). How teachers negotiate their identities in such circumstances is an issue of agency. It is based on the professional actions that teachers take within contexts that mediate that action (Buchanan, 2015). Consequently, teachers’ agency is significant in the implementation of mathematics curriculum reform and in the negotiations of teachers’ professional identities (Vähäsantanen & Eteläpelto, 2009).

In other approaches to curriculum reform, teachers may be afforded the opportunity to act as co-constructors of the curriculum through increased participation in phase one of curriculum development. Teachers acting as co-constructors during phase one may affect teacher professionalism and the identities that teachers enact in their mathematics classrooms. It is rare, however, for teachers to act as co-constructors during phase one of curriculum development.

This chapter, therefore, seeks to investigate the constructs of ‘teacher as co-constructor’ and ‘teacher as receiver’ by examining issues surrounding teacher professional identity, teacher professionalism, reform agendas and classroom practices.

Identity

Teacher professional identity stands at the core of the teaching profession; it provides a framework for teachers to construct their own ideas of ‘how to be’, ‘how to act’ and ‘how to understand’ their work and their place in society (Sachs, 2005). We will now offer a brief elaboration on existing identity theories that led to our perspective on the concept and how this can be applied in the context of mathematics education reform. We will start by addressing the fundamental dualisms which are encountered when theorising about identity.

  • Essentialism vs. constructionism

Identity theories diverge between essentialist and constructionist paradigms (Benwell & Stokoe, 2006). Essentialist theories view identity as a property of the person - that is, identity is a product of minds, cognition, or socialisation practices (Bamberg et al., 2011; Benwell & Stokoe, 2006). Conversely, constructionist theories view identity itself as a socially constructed category in discursive activities (Bamberg et al., 2011).

  • Agency vs. structure

Identity theories differ between granting primacy to agency or structure (Benwell & Stokoe, 2006; Penuel & Wertsch, 1995). The ‘agency’ view posits that people are free to construct their identity as they wish. The ‘structure’ perspective positions individuals as subjects whose identity construction is constrained by various forces (Benwell & Stokoe, 2006). Penuel and Wertsch (1995) argue that both components should be brought together to form a sociocultural approach to identity formation that overcomes this dualism.

  • Continuity vs. discontinuity

The final dualism in identity theories which Benwell and Stokoe (2006) address is between people generating a stable identity and yet, simultaneously contending with identity being fluid, fragmentary and contingent on the sociocultural context. This dualism is concerned with the degree of continuity that is required to maintain a unitary identity and the degree of development that is required to change one’s identity (Bamberg et al., 2011). To overcome these entrenched dualisms in identity theories, we look towards discourse and identity.

Discourse and Identity

Benwell and Stokoe (2006) argue that discursive approaches to identity, from a broadly socio-constructivist perspective, address and advance identity theorising beyond these dualisms. These authors refer to the work of Butler (1990) who conceptualises identity as a discursive practice and performance that is interpreted by other people. As such, a discursive view theorizes and operationalizes how language and other communicative means in text and context enable the enactment of socially situated and recognizable identities (Bamberg et al., 2011; Gee, 2011a).

Socially Situated and Recognisable Identities

Individuals talk and act as members of various social and cultural groups. Socially situated identities incorporate the particular ways members of various social and cultural groups speak and act (Gee, 2011b). More specifically, socially situated and recognisable identities involve the enactment and recognition of big ‘D’ Discourses. Gee (2011a) uses the term big ‘D’ Discourse when referring to “distinctive ways of speaking/listening and/or reading/writing […] coupled with distinctive ways of acting, interacting, valuing, feeling, dressing, thinking, and believing […] coupled with ways of coordinating oneself with […] other people and with various objects, tools and technologies” (p. 177).

Members of each group also draw on a suite of typical stories, or figured worlds, to go about the business of communicating, acting, and living as recognisable group members (Gee, 2011b). These figured worlds consist of images, metaphors, and narratives, and are populated with identifiable persons and practiced identities (Holland et al., 1998), which in turn shape members’ identities and relative positions and relationships within the group. Through the lens of figured worlds, Holland, Lachicotte, Skinner and Cain (1998) assert that the agency of individuals is manifested through their improvisation in response to the voices of others in group discourse and thus, provides the opportunity for the making of new activities, new worlds and new ways of being.

Identity and Learning

From a narrative discursive perspective, Sfard and Prusak (2005) delineate between current and designated identities. Current identities refer to stories which are about the current state of affairs. Designated identities refer to narratives which are expected to be the case in the future. These stories and narratives can be told by the person themselves and others. The storytellers who hold powerful and authoritative positions are referred to as significant narrators.

Policymakers act as significant narrators for teachers’ identifying stories. Through mathematics curriculum reform materials, policymakers circulate discourse on teachers’ socially expected identities. These can become a dominant frame for the teachers’ own designated identities. At a time of curriculum reform, teachers are expected to bridge the gap between their current identities and the expected identities circulated through curriculum reform discourse. In effect, they must enact different Discourses leading to changes in their socially recognisable identities; however, teachers can use their agency to improvise in different ways to form their responses.

Teacher Agency and Curriculum Reform

Buchanan (2015) describes teacher’s agency as the capacity of a teacher to take actions to be the kind of teacher that they want to be. These actions are mediated by the discourse of reform policies and the school’s commitments to implementing the reform policies. The teacher’s professional identity underpins their response to reform policies and their implementation of these policies in the school context. Buchanan found that in cases where the teacher’s professional identity aligned with the school culture, commitments and practices, the teacher exhibited agency by stepping up and mentoring other teachers and leading professional development sessions. Buchanan noted that in a school that was committed to the accountability regime of new policies, a teacher who viewed herself as fitting with these commitments engaged in stepping up by supporting the implementation of the new policies.This demonstrates that in the reform context, professional identity negotiations are easiest for teachers whose existing professional identity is in alignment to the socially expected identity emerging in the reform discourse (Vähäsantanen & Eteläpelto, 2009).

Buchanan (2015) also found that in cases where a teacher’s professional identity does not fit with the school’s commitment to reform policies, the teacher can exhibit their agency by pushing back. Thus, professional identity negotiations are more difficult for teachers whose existing professional identities are in conflict with the socially expected identity circulated through the curriculum reform discourse (Vähäsantanen & Eteläpelto, 2009). Buchanan (2015) concludes that teachers use their identities to interpret and engage with new social practices, and their agency to find ways to be the kind of teacher that they want to be. In doing so, they improvise to form their own pathway through the curriculum reform process.

The Teacher’s Trajectory Through Curriculum Reform

Wenger’s (1998) notion of trajectories can be used to understand teachers’ improvisations and pathways through curriculum reform. The notion of trajectory indicates that each teacher’s pathway is a process of becoming that is a continuous motion connecting past, present and future with a field of other influencing voices.

Vähäsantanen and Eteläpelto (2009) examined the trajectories of teachers through the curriculum reform process and found some distinctive pathways. Teachers may employ an empowerment pathway whereby the teacher experiences continuity and a strengthened sense of professional identity, owing to a positive and approving disposition prior to and during the curriculum reform. Teachers who are critical of reform may adopt a critical but adaptive pathway. This incorporates both continuity and conflict in one’s professional identity as one is resistant to change but adjusts to the situation as a matter of deliberate strategy.

Teachers who approach a curriculum with an open mind, and opt to wait to interpret the experiences during the reform before making a decision, are said to follow the open and expectant pathway. Teachers may experience a successful transformation pathway, resulting from initially being resistant to reform before becoming positively disposed towards the change. Teachers who are initially positive towards reform before being disappointed by it, as it does not meet their expectations, are described as following a struggling pathway. Vähäsantanen and Eteläpelto (2009) conclude that these positions and negotiations are ultimately based on the teachers’ emotion towards and interpretations of their experiences during reform.

We suggest that these pathways illustrate some trajectories which teachers may take as they are expected to move from their current identity to the expected identity in the context of mathematics curriculum reform. Next, we explore several theories and concepts which are useful for characterizing what takes place along these pathways.

Theories and Concepts Which Help to Frame the Transformation of Teachers’ Identities

It is important to recognise the power of social institutions relative to individuals, while at the same time recognising the potential of individuals to change the environments that condition their lives. Understanding the means by which these bidirectional influences occur may have bearing on understanding and improving the role of teachers in mathematics curriculum reform. Activity theory (Roth & Lee, 2007) and the concepts of figured worlds and Discourses can help us to examine the interplay of identity and agency which contributes to the success and expansion of teachers’ ability to act productively in reform contexts.

Potari et al. (2018) examined the teaching, research and policy components of the curriculum reform process by characterising them as interacting activity systems (Engeström, 2001), in which peoples’ actions are constrained by specific rules and mediated by specific artefacts. They observed that conflict arose when members of the teaching, research and policy communities relied on different artefacts and rules when trying to act sensibly within the system. This conflict was sometimes resolved by brokers, described by Pinto and Cooper in Chap. 28, as participants who belong to more than one of the interacting communities.

The division of labour in an activity system creates different positions for participants to inhabit (Daniels, 2007). These different positions are likened to practiced identities in figured worlds which are taken up, constructed and resisted through continued participation. Figured worlds provide the opportunities to develop new activities from within the larger activity system (Rainio, 2008). Social practices can be reshaped by their participants, so that they can reposition themselves and reshape their identities (Edwards, 2008). Figured worlds provide an elaboration on the subject and agency within activity systems, while activity systems account for the regulation of practices, positions and identities within such social worlds.

A teacher’s socially situated identity is then the nexus of figured worlds, position and voice in the configuration of the activity of teaching at specific moments in the history of persons and collectives (Ottesen, 2006). For teachers, artefacts become real to the activity of teaching through their use in the processes of production and meaning making. In the context of curriculum reform new artefacts, such as curriculum materials, do not simply move in and occupy empty slots in ongoing activities; instead, the tools, and the activities in which they are used, are re-constructed and given meaning through the actions of the teachers and other stakeholders (Ottesen, 2006). For example, curriculum reform policies incorporating strict teacher accountability can establish a dominant discourse which positions teachers, through their actions in that particular figured world, in such a way that they must align their practices with those which are defined as legitimate, and thus reshape their professional identities (Buchanan, 2015). For such curricula reforms, the ways in which the supporting curriculum artefacts that the teachers work with are reconstructed seldom incorporates the teachers’ voices and consequently, these artefacts may not be used productively or as intended. In contrast, policies which make space for teachers’ voices and actions in curriculum reform and implementation may afford teachers greater agency and efficacy, and lead to more effective and aligned implementation.

Mathematics Curriculum Reform Materials

In the context of school mathematics, curriculum reform materials act as mediating artefacts (Brown, 2009). They co-ordinate the community with one another through their material and conceptual form. The possibilities for engagement with these artefacts is determined by the community’s participants’ practiced identities (Daniels, 2007). The types of engagement teachers experience with these artefacts reflects their socially situated identities and has implications for how they put these artefacts into use. In some contexts, the socially situated identities of teachers results in their engagement with curriculum reform artefacts being that of a receiver. For example, in the context of the Literacy and Mathematics Strategy (LEM) in Chile, once the support that was provided to the teachers, which showed them how to teach in manner befitting the curriculum, was removed, the teachers abandoned the reformed practices. In other cases, for example, as part of the Arithmetic and Comprehension at Elementary School (ACE) curriculum in France, teachers enacted different Discourses and produced alternative socially situated identities through engaging with curriculum reform materials as co-constructors. In ACE, teachers, mathematics lecturers and mathematics education lecturers worked as a team to develop, implement and refine a mathematics curriculum. The resultant ACE curriculum, which is evidence- and research-based has shown to positively impact student learning. What the LEM and ACE curricula reforms have demonstrated is that what curriculum reform materials, such as review documents, curriculum guidelines, teacher guidelines, syllabi, textbooks and other teaching resources, become to teachers is determined by how they are used in practice. For LEM, without the opportunities to co-create curriculum reform materials, the teachers failed to sustain the reformed teaching approaches as part of their practice. For ACE, the teachers’ role in the co-construction of the materials resulted in sustained implementation, review and refinement. Thus, the production, form and use of curriculum materials requires consideration.

Designated Curriculum and Instructional Materials

Remillard and Heck (2014) demarcate between the designated curriculum and instructional materials. The designated curriculum, which is part of the official curriculum, provides teachers with instructional directions to guide them towards addressing the curricular aims and objectives. Instructional materials, such as textbooks and mathematics tasks, are the resources designed to support and supplement the teacher’s instruction. In some cases, the designated curriculum comprises a range of materials to shape the content, pacing, processes and tools of mathematics teaching. In other education systems, the official curriculum is instead communicated through aims, objectives and assessments.

These approaches range in terms of the agency and expected identities they afford teachers. An official curriculum incorporating a designated curriculum and instructional materials provides detailed structures for teachers to operate within. It authors comprehensively the socially expected identities of teachers and negates their sense of agency. Other official curricula with lower degrees of specificity may offer the teacher greater affordances in their instructional practices and designated identities; however, even in these cases, the content and form of consequential assessments may constrain teacher’s enacted identities and negate their sense of agency.

Remillard (2005) reports that traditionally the authors of the official curriculum have sought to speak through teachers. This top-down perspective views the teacher as an conduit for the curriculum (Kilpatrick, 2009; Remillard, 2005). They are seen as receivers who have no role in co-constructing the curriculum (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1999; Kilpatrick, 2009). Instead, their job is to adopt a fidelity approach and enact curriculum transmission strategies, such as using the teachers’ guide as a single-source of pedagogic instruction (Shawer, 2010).

According to Remillard (2005), in more recent times, official curriculum writers have explored ways to speak to teachers. This perspective follows a curriculum adaptation approach whereby teachers apply the actions of macro strategies through their use of micro strategies to act as curriculum developers in their classroom (Shawer, 2010). Shawer describes that the teacher as developer engages in curriculum planning and experimentation through flexibly drawing on curriculum materials to adapt lessons and tasks.

Choppin et al. (2018) describe another approach that may be adopted to reduce that the distance between the authors of the official curriculum and the teacher. This approach involves the official curriculum writer speaking with teachers. In this way, teachers are co-constructors of the curriculum materials in use as they collaborate with curriculum developers to act as designers beyond their own classroom. Each of these approaches to developing the curriculum reform materials has implications for teacher professionalism.

Teacher Professionalism

Historically, there has been much scholarly debate regarding whether teaching can be classified as a professional or semi-professional job (Demirkasımoğlu, 2010). Krejsler (2005) explains that the functionalist approach within the sociology of professions characterises full-scale professions based on meeting requisite criteria. This criterion is premised on the development and upkeep of social values, and is largely based on law and medicine. From this perspective, a profession is characterised by the fact that:

Its knowledge and practice are based on systematised theory; the professional has authority in the sense that she/he knows best about his/her field; the professionals exercise formal as well as informal control over the development of knowledge within their field and over education of future professionals; the profession is guided by an ethical codex that regulates relations between colleagues and with clients; its members understand themselves within a comprehensive professional culture of common norms, symbols, and language. (Hall, 1969, cited in Krejsler, 2005, p. 342)

Based on this definition, teachers are designated as semi or quasi professionals given their restricted professional autonomy as a result of being directed and shaped by administrators to achieve organisational goals (Demirkasımoğlu, 2010). As such, teachers operate within a school framework that is subjected to a largely bureaucratically regulated administration upon which they have little or no influence (Krejsler, 2005).

Sachs (2016) explains that there have been several attempts to classify teacher professionalism. These classifications differ between conceptualising professionalism as an occupational value based on trust, competence, occupational identity, and cooperation; as an ideology premised on occupational dominance and monopoly control of work; and as a discourse of occupational change and managerial value (Evetts, 2011).

Hargreaves (2000) demarcates between teachers being professional and teachers being a professional. For teachers, being professional refers to the quality of their practice, including their conduct, demeanour and standards; this is defined as professionalism. For teachers, being a professional concerns them with how they are seen by others and in particular, the status and regard in which they are held; this is defined as professionalisation. Hargreaves explains that although professionalism and professionalisation are conveyed as complementary projects, this is not always the case in teaching.

Drawing on anglophone culture, Hargreaves distinguishes between four historical ages of teacher professionalism, namely, the pre-professional age, the age of the autonomous professional, the age of the collegial professional, and the post-professional or postmodern professional. Teaching in the pre-professional age was seen as a managerially demanding, but technically simple job. Teachers learn to teach by watching others teach and after they serve their practical apprenticeship, they no longer collaborate and can only improve through trial and error. Effectively, as teachers carry out the directives of others, they are seen as virtually amateurs in this age.

Teachers in the age of the autonomous professional had greater status than those in the pre-professional age. The autonomous age was marked by teachers having the authority to choose the teaching methods they believed were best for their students. This age was not unproblematic as it led to individualism, with teachers being isolated and unable to make lasting changes in their teaching practices. The age of the collegial professional followed, emanating from the heightened complexities of schoolings brought about by the proliferation of teaching methods and curricular reforms.

In response to imposed changes and associated uncertainties, there are increasing efforts to develop strong professional cultures of common purpose. Hargreaves indicates that, since 2000, teacher professionalism may be moving into the new era with contrasting possible outcomes. One potential outcome is the age of the post-professional whereby teachers’ professionalism will be eroded and discarded. The de-professionalisation of teaching would return teachers to the pre-professional age.

An alternative outcome is the age of the post-modern professional which would see teachers working collaboratively with colleagues and other communities to augment the idea of the collegial professionalism. For this to occur, teachers must draw on the ages of the autonomous and collegial professional to ensure that they receive competitive salaries, restore public faith in the profession, obtain the requisite time to adequately plan and collaborate with colleagues and, set and meet professional standards of practice. Consequently, the role of the teacher in curriculum reform and the discourse on teacher professionalism circulated through the curriculum reform process significantly impacts who teachers are and how they are regarded by others.

Teacher Professionalism and Teacher Professional Identity

Sachs (2001) argues that democratic and managerialist discourses on teacher professionalism are shaping the professional identities of teachers. Reform initiatives within managerialist discourse promote competition through the allocation of funds based on teachers’ and schools’ performance on externally defined measures. Emerging from this discourse is the entrepreneurial teacher professional identity which is characterised by being individualistic, competitive and complying with externally set performance indicators of high-quality teaching.

By contrast, democratic professionalism is underpinned by collaboration and co-operation between teachers and other educational stakeholders. The activist teacher professional identity emerging from this discourse is underpinned by equity and social justice. The activist identity is built on co-operative and collaborative action with the effective communication of aims and recognition of each individual’s and collectives’ expertise in an environment of trust and respect (Sachs, 2000). This approach was evident in the development of the ACE curriculum, with teachers positioned as co-constructors of the curriculum.

By contrast, according to Buchanan (2015), the discourse of accountability circulated in many curricula reforms has positioned teachers as technicians and moved teacher professionalism toward the age of the post-professional. This is an example of where a reform agenda targeting teacher professionalism does not result in heightened teacher professionalisation. Thus, externally determined reforms have the capacity to diminish teachers’ ability to raise standards and challenge their professional identities, rather than improve the quality of teaching and learning (Day, 2002).

Summary

For school reform to occur, there must be changes in one’s sense of the way things should be done - that is, changes in how the various stakeholders in curriculum reform talk and act as members of their social and cultural groups. Thus, professional Discourses must be altered to implement reform initiatives in schools (Toll, 2001). This is complex as there are competing Discourses of change among and between teachers and policymakers. It is almost unrealistic to call for policymakers and teachers to change their ways of being powerful within their communities; instead, it may be beneficial to develop a meta-Discourse in school settings (Toll, 2001). This meta-Discourse would provide an awareness of the competing Discourses in educational change. With this awareness, the emphasis would not be on superiority of one’s own Discourse, but rather, on the differences between the Discourses.

Curriculum reform in this manner requires intricate work that aims to create a middle ground to afford space for negotiation (Clandinin & Connelly, 1998; Toll, 2001). The purpose of this middle ground would be to move away from reform as a war-zone with buy-ins and buy-outs, and towards negotiation, improvisation, imagination and possibility (Clandinin & Connelly, 1998). For reform to succeed long term, teachers’ professionalism and identities must be transformed through sustained, critical dialogue, mutual trust and respect (Day, 2002). Reform, then, would no longer be about urgent problem solving and control determined by external bodies distanced from the classroom, but instead, used as a research instrument premised on a willingness to listen, negotiate and change (Clandinin & Connelly, 1998).

The goal of such an approach would be to make a new figured world of mathematics curriculum reform that produces new Discourses for teachers and policymakers alike, and provides teachers with opportunities to transform their professional and socially situated identities (Clandinin & Connelly, 1998; Holland et al., 1998). This would result in a shift in reform ownership to a middle ground between those situated outside of the school and those working in the classroom (Coburn, 2003). A move from teachers as receivers to teachers as co-constructors.