Chapter 11: Negotiating Critical Pedagogical Discourses: Contexts, Mathematics, and Agency

Mathematics education counts in society. However, society does not necessarily count in mathematics education. This disjunction challenged Annica during her years working as a mathematics teacher in Sweden's upper secondary schools. Relating society and social issues to her school's mathematic curriculum became a central concern to her practice in Ericaskolan,¹ a Swedish school offering an upper secondary 3-year social science program. As part of Annica's doctoral studies, she entered into collaboration with Elin (a fellow mathematics teacher) in order to introduce elements of a critical pedagogical discourse into the classroom. While continuing to follow the compulsory national curricular framework, the new pedagogy introduced project blocks that, in addressing the mandated mathematical curriculum, also permitted changing some key elements in the activities and relationships among participants. In this chapter, we explore the possibilities and limits when imagining and implementing a new pedagogical discourse that is heavily inspired by the concerns of critical mathematics education, and that intends to bridge the gap between students' experiences in society and the mathematics classroom.