Record Details

Excavating memories: A retrospective analysis of mathematics teachers’ foregrounds

Pythagoras

 
 
Field Value
 
Title Excavating memories: A retrospective analysis of mathematics teachers’ foregrounds
 
Creator Amin, Nyna
 
Subject Mathematics Education; Mathematics; Education foregrounds; memory work; development
Description This article offers a retrospective analysis of mathematics teachers’ experiences as learners in school to examine their foregrounds. Based on Skovsmose’s notion, foregrounds are perceptions of possibilities, impossibilities, hope and despair made by an individual whose life chances are compromised by socio-political adversities and economic deprivation. Since foregrounds are imagined it is not possible to be certain about how the future is realised without engaging in a longitudinal study spanning decades. One way to attempt to do so is through memory work, that is, by excavating the memories of persons who are already living in their foreground. Three mathematics teachers were recruited through snowball sampling to share their memories of teachers of mathematics, learning mathematics in schools and how they envisioned the future. The analysis revealed how exposure to mathematics teaching and learning when they were learners is implicated in shaping the foregrounds of teachers, and the ways in which teacher foregrounds are connected to personal and national development. The participants’ narratives confirmed that, although a foreground is shaped by prevailing conditions, a view to a viable future requires an optimism that goes beyond present situations.
 
Publisher AOSIS Publishing
 
Contributor
Date 2012-12-05
 
Type info:eu-repo/semantics/article info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion — snowball sampling; retrospective analysis
Format text/html application/octet-stream text/xml application/pdf
Identifier 10.4102/pythagoras.v33i2.178
 
Source Pythagoras; Vol 33, No 2 (2012); 9 pages 2223-7895 1012-2346
 
Language eng
 
Relation
The following web links (URLs) may trigger a file download or direct you to an alternative webpage to gain access to a publication file format of the published article:

https://pythagoras.org.za/index.php/pythagoras/article/view/178/246 https://pythagoras.org.za/index.php/pythagoras/article/view/178/247 https://pythagoras.org.za/index.php/pythagoras/article/view/178/254 https://pythagoras.org.za/index.php/pythagoras/article/view/178/245
 
Coverage Urban South African schools — 3 Black teachers; two females and a male; approx 28 years of teaching experience
Rights Copyright (c) 2012 Nyna Amin https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
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