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Mathematics and the nationalcurriculum: primary teachers’attitudesRex Stoessiger a & Paul Ernest aa School of Education , Exeter University , St Luke's,Heavitree Road, Exeter EX1 2LU, EnglandPublished online: 09 Jul 2006.

To cite this article: Rex Stoessiger & Paul Ernest (1992) Mathematics and the nationalcurriculum: primary teachers’ attitudes, International Journal of Mathematical Education inScience and Technology, 23:1, 65-74, DOI: 10.1080/0020739920230107

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INT. J. MATH. EDUC. SCI. TECHNOL., 1992, VOL. 23, NO. 1, 65-74

Mathematics and the national curriculum:primary teachers' attitudes1

by REX STOESSIGER† and PAUL ERNEST

School of Education, Exeter University, St Luke's,Heavitree Road, Exeter EX1 2LU, England

(Received 4 January 1991)

This paper reports on the attitudes of 901 primary school teachers in Englandand Wales towards the new national curriculum in mathematics, as well asEnglish and science. It was found that most teachers perceive themselves to becompetent to teach this new curriculum in mathematics (and English) but not inscience. It is argued that this is because the national curriculum in mathematicsrepresents a codification of existing content and practice. A comparison with atext widely used in the mathematical preparation of primary school teachersprovides supporting evidence for this view. With the exception of computer-based mathematics and increased attention to probability and statistics (datahandling), the national curriculum in mathematics reflects the curriculum whichhas been taught in most primary schools for two decades.

1. IntroductionIn England and Wales the 1980s have been a decade of intense interest in

mathematics education. The decade began with the Committee of Inquiry into theTeaching of Mathematics which resulted in the publication of Mathematics Counts[1] in 1982, and ended with the publication of Mathematics in the NationalCurriculum [2] which contains the attainment targets and related information forimplementing the national curriculum in the subject. In between came a number ofother significant reports including The Teaching and Learning of Mathematics [3] andMathematics from 5 to 16 [4].

Of the various reports the two which seem to have created most interest are thefirst and last [1 and 2]. Both these publications are intended to improve mathematicseducation, but they propose to do so in very different ways. The emphasis in [1] is onthe teaching and learning of mathematics. It emphasizes practical work, problemsolving, investigative work and mental arithmetic and it includes important sectionson the recruitment and training of mathematics teachers. The national curriculum,in contrast, is an attempt to improve mathematics education by detailing thecurriculum to be followed by all state schools in England and Wales, coupled with anassessment strategy to show the levels that individual children might attain. Thecurriculum has been specified as a number of 'statements of attainment', at levels ofincreasing difficulty. The accompanying Department of Education and Sciencecircular (No. 6/89) states that these statements of attainment will 'provide theobjectives for what is to be learnt in each subject... ' . Assessment will be conductedat various 'key stages', in particular when children are 7, 11, 14 and 16+ years old.

The influence of the Cockcroft Report [1] upon thinking about the mathematicscurriculum has already been well established (see, for example, Ernest [5]). The

† Centre for Advanced Teaching Studies, Education Department of Tasmania.2

0020-739X/92 $3.00 © 1992 Taylor & Francis Ltd.

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66 R. Stoessiger and P. Ernest

interim report of the National Curriculum Working Group [6] expressed its debt tothe Cockcroft Report [1] in these words:

The Cockcroft Report ('Mathematics Counts') published in 1982 had aprofound effect on thinking about mathematics education. Our recommend-ations have been much influenced by it and we endorse and approvedevelopments in the classroom such as practical work, problem solving andinvestigative work which have already taken place because of it [6] (p. 2).

The teaching and learning of mathematics [3] based on 285 inspections of primaryschools by HMI between 1982 and 1986 also recognizes the impact of Cockcroft

The work in the most successful schools reflects the influence of the CockcroftReport, particularly in the approaches to the teaching and learning ofmathematics [3] (p. 13).

The influence of the national curriculum in mathematics is, of course, yet to bedetermined and it may well be the middle or end of the current decade before itsimplementation can be fully judged. However the reactions of primary teachers tothe planned national curriculum have been investigated [7] and we have been able touse the results from this work to make some predictions about how the nationalcurriculum may, or may not, improve mathematics education in primary schools.3

2. The Leverhulme primary projectThe Leverhulme Primary Project, in 1989, surveyed 901 teachers about a range

of aspects pertaining to the national curriculum. The Project's rationale, researchdesign, instrumentation and findings are reported in [7] and will only be describedvery briefly here. A questionnaire was developed to elicit teacher views on teachingsome statements of attainment from the national curriculum, their self-perceivedcompetence to help children achieve particular statements of attainment, theirconcern about their own professional skills and their attitudes towards implementingthe national curriculum in general. Mathematics was one of the subject areas forwhich specific information was sought. In order to obtain this, a selection ofattainment statements was made for a number of subjects. The particular statementsrelating to mathematics on which teachers were assessed, are shown in Table 5,which is referred to below.

Teachers were asked to respond to these statements, on a four point scale,according to their self-perceived competence in helping children achieve thesecomponents of the national curriculum. These particular items were selected fromthe mathematics national curriculum as a whole for the following reasons. Theysample most of the 14 different attainment targets, hence testing a spread of topics.They are also all from within the expected range of levels of attainment in juniorschools (levels 2 to 5).

2.1. SampleThe teacher sample was obtained from a combination of schools volunteering to

participate by responding to an invitation in the magazine Junior Education and arandom selection drawn from the Primary Education Directory. This methodensured that the sample was stratified by geographical distribution, type and size ofschool. In all, 152 schools returned questionnaires with responses from 901

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Attitudes to the national curriculum (in mathematics) 67

individual primary teachers. Over three-quarters of the teachers (78%) hadresponsibility for some aspect of the curriculum, with 15% being responsible formathematics, 15% for English and 13% for science. The responses of the 901teachers, as they relate to mathematics education, form the basis for the presentpaper.

2.2. Teacher viewsThere were very positive self perceptions of the teachers in this study towards

implementing the mathematics components of the national curriculum. It needs tobe stressed that the data refers to teacher self perceptions not some measure of actualcompetence. Teachers were asked to indicate how competent they felt to teachvarious subjects of the national curriculum. They rated their competence on a fourpoint scale.

Key to responses1. Yes, I feel I am competent with my existing knowledge and skills.2. Yes, I feel competent with some help from colleagues.3. Maybe, I'd feel competent with in-service and help from colleagues.4. No, I feel I would not be competent without substantial inservice support.

Table 1 shows the results.On this scale 68% of respondents rated themselves as competent for mathematics.

This is substantially less than the 81% who rated themselves competent for Englishbut much more than the 34% who so rated themselves in science. It is disappointingthat almost one third of the sample do not rate themselves as competent to teachmathematics. But much more alarming is the two-thirds who do not rate themselvesas competent to teach science.

This difference could be due to the fact that English and mathematics have beentaught for many years in primary schools, whereas science has not. (We will return tothis conjecture below.) It could also be argued that these results reflect the differencein backgrounds of primary teachers, in particular the different proportions whofollowed different subject specialisms during their initial training. Table 2 shows thedistribution of subject specialism for the teachers in the survey.

Certainly the self-perceived competence of teachers with regard to Englishreflects to some extent their initial training specialism and this could conceivably

Subject %

EnglishMathematicsHistoryGeographyArtPhysical educationReligious educationScienceMusicDesign and technology

81685448484745342714

Table 1. Percentage of teachers in sample feeling 'competent' to teach the subjects in thenational curriculum.

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68 R. Stoessiger and P. Ernest

Subject

EnglishHistoryArtGeographyScienceMathematicsMusicPEDesign and technologyOther

Specialism(%)

16111-41009-78 07-46-96-20-3

19-4

Table 2. Subject specialism of teachers in the sample.

Subject

ArtDesign and technologyEnglishGeographyHistoryMathematicsMusicPhysical educationReligious educationScience

Females

1-69*2-72119*1-681-621-382-41*1-761-74*208

Males

1-912-37*1-321-601-631-422-741-712-181-90*

* Significantly more confident (statistically significant at 5% level).

Table 3. Male and female teachers' self-perceived competence for different subjects.

explain the higher rating for this subject. However, the difference betweenmathematics, history and science (for example) cannot be explained in this way. Veryfew teachers have a mathematics background, less in fact than those who have abackground in science, art, geography and history.

In addition the higher perceived competence with respect to mathematics thanfor traditional arts subjects such as history, geography and art is contrary to thecommon perception of primary teachers as being uneasy with mathematics and itsteaching. This leads us to suspect that it is not attitudes to the subject itself whichare leading to the competence levels found.

There is additional support for our view that it is not attitudes to the subject per sethat is contributing to these self-perceived 'competence* levels from an examinationof the attitudes of the males and females surveyed. Females are known to have lesspositive attitudes to mathematics than males [8]. However a breakdown of the'competence' levels by sex, as shown in Table 3, shows a significant difference in self-perceived competence between males and females towards teaching mathematics inthe national curriculum4. Yet there are gender differences with regard to the teachingof a number of other subjects, notably art, music and religious education (femalesmore confident), design and technology, and science (males more confident).

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Attitudes to the national curriculum (in mathematics) 69

Another factor is the differences in teachers* self-perceived competence inteaching the core subjects of the national curriculum according to the length of theirteaching experience as teachers. This is shown in Table 4.

In mathematics and English the more experienced teachers see themselves asmore competent to teach the national curriculum. In mathematics the teachers'perceived competence increases from 52% for teachers with less than 6 yearsexperience to 78% for teachers with more than 25 years experience. There are similarincreases for English starting from a higher level. These results are in markedcontrast to the science perceptions where the self-perceived competence level dropsfrom 37% for teachers with less than 6 years experience to 27% for the mostexperienced teachers. This suggests that teachers know from experience that theycan teach most of the English and mathematics statements listed in the quest-ionnaire, presumably because they already teach most of them. However there is avery different situation in science, where new demands are being made of teacherswhich are more difficult for more experienced teachers than for the more recentlytrained, younger teachers.

The evidence suggests to us that the mathematics national curriculum inmathematics is perceived by teachers as being relatively straightforward toimplement simply because it contains much the same sort of mathematics thatteachers are currently teaching. Hence attitudes to the subject, initial trainingspecialisms and gender are relatively unimportant variables. However teachingexperience does make a difference because older teachers are, in general, moreconfident in teaching the existing curriculum and this is transferred to the nationalcurriculum to the extent that it is little different from current practice.

To explore this interpretation further we have sought other evidence on thenovelty of the national curriculum in mathematics.

3. How different is the national curriculum in mathematics?We have sought some additional evidence on how the detailed syllabus

incorporated in the national curriculum might appear to teachers. In particular wewanted to know if the syllabus was familiar, and hence fairly unproblematic, ornovel, and hence providing difficulties for teachers. We have looked for thisinformation in two different ways. Firstly we have looked to the explicit, publicreactions of teachers to the national curriculum either individually or through theirprofessional organizations and secondly we have compared the actual content of thenational curriculum with the content of a fairly standard mathematics teachingreference book.

Subject

EnglishMathematicsScience

1-5

715237

6-10

796231

Years of teaching

11-15

837133

16-20

777034

experience

21-25

917130

26-30

917830

30 +

927827

Table 4. Percentage of teachers self-assessed as competent according to length of teachingexperience.

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70 R. Stoessiger and P. Ernest

3.1. Teacher reactionsTeacher reactions to the content aspects of the mathematics national curriculum

have been surprisingly muted. A survey of recent issues of the two main journals forteachers of mathematics, Mathematics Teaching and Mathematics in School, revealedonly five articles devoted principally to aspects of the national curriculum. None ofthese discussed the actual curriculum topics. There were several editorials inMathematics in School and 'Reports of Progress' in Mathematics Teaching but againthese had little to say about the curriculum material itself.

Articles in the national press show a general if tacit acceptance of the contentas specified in the attainment targets. For example the Chair of the Associationof Teachers of Mathematics wrote in the Times Educational Supplement(16 September, 1988)

Many teachers will discover as they examine the document that they arealready doing in their classrooms many of the things that are required of them,even that some current work is not required, and that their energy can bereleased for other matters (p. 29).

and... all teachers have a role to play in offering evidence as to theappropriateness of specific targets, and in suggesting modifications as the needfor them is demonstrated. Nevertheless the working group is to be con-gratulated for a brave and considered first draft (p. 29).

Similarly a head teacher and office holder of the Mathematical Association wrote inthe same publication:

We shall all have our own opinions of the attainment targets. It is possible tonitpick, but teachers will find themselves nodding in agreement more timesthan not. They are progressive and they allow good practice to continue (p. 28).

There were discussions in the newspapers about whether the 'Using and ApplyingMathematics' section should be a separate profile, about the wisdom of specifying anational curriculum, about the removal of references to multicultural aspects ofmathematics and a great deal of concern about how the assessment aspects of theproposals would be implemented. These seemed to be matters of interest rather thanthe details of the curriculum content itself, especially at the lower levels relevant toprimary schools.

However, it should be said that the development of the mathematics curriculumis only a small part of an overall reform of education of byzantine complexity. Eventhe mathematics curriculum has progressed through five or six published phases(interim report, final report, consultation report, parliamentary orders, statutorydocument, non-statutory guidance). Therefore it is not surprising that teachers andeducationists have not offered detailed criticisms, let alone come to grips with thedetailed implications of the new proposals.

3.2. Direct comparisonsWe have compared the national curriculum for mathematics with the content

covered by a popular reference book for primary teachers, Primary MathematicsToday (PMT) [9]. We hoped to find out how the national curriculum mightcompare with the recommendations concerning what should be taught in schools, in

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Attitudes to the national curriculum (in mathematics) 71

a standard reference text for teachers. We chose this text because it has been widelyused in the preparation of primary teachers in mathematics throughout the 1970sand 1980s in numerous editions. It incorporated most of the features of the NuffieldProject of the 1960s, and is perhaps the next most representative of the primarymathematics curriculum of the past two decades.

This comparison exercise presented some problems, particularly with attain-ment targets 1 and 9. These two targets are entitled 'Using and ApplyingMathematics' and are the sections of the national curriculum which most take up theprocess-oriented proposals of the Cockcroft report [1]. The particular attainmenttargets of this section are not discussed explicitly in PMT, but the multitude ofexamples in the book are much in the spirit of these targets and illustrate howmathematics can be used in practical and exploratory situations. Therefore if severalillustrative examples could be found this was accepted as evidence of the coverage ofthat attainment target by PMT.

These difficulties aside, there is a high degree of similarity between themathematics required by the national curriculum and that presented in PMT. Forthe 14 attainment targets we have examined levels 1-5 which represent themathematics that most students will encounter in the primary years (level 4 isintended to be the level of an average 11 year old). Of the relevant 157 statements inthe national curriculum only 21 are not covered by PMT. Several of these are not atall novel but have simply not found space in PMT. For example the treatment of oddand even numbers is not covered in PMT but is, of course, taught in all primaryschools.

The major difference is the inclusion of computer topics such as LOGO,databases and spreadsheets in the national curriculum, for there is only a limited anddated section on the use of computers in PMT. In addition, although PMT has achapter on statistics and probability it is not as detailed as are the probabilityrequirements of the national curriculum. While some teachers may not usecalculators to the degree required by the national curriculum this topic is actuallyvery well covered in the current edition of PMT.

So while there are important differences between the national curriculum andPMT it is the overwhelming similarity which is most striking and which suggeststhat the national curriculum is not new to teachers. If anything, the nationalcurriculum represents a consolidation of the 'new maths' curriculum introduced inthe 1960s, but without the excesses of formalism, set theory and other structuraltopics, that were initially involved.

We conclude that the national curriculum is not a new curriculum. Ourconclusion from the discussions.above is that the national curriculum in mathema-tics is fundamentally very similar to what is currently being taught in primaryschools, or at least widely recommended to be so taught. Its implementation willrequire some changes in increased emphasis on probability and computer work, butthese are relatively small changes.

If this is so, then it is not very surprising that teacher attitudes to the mathematicsparts of the teacher survey were generally very positive. If it is the sort ofmathematics that most teachers are already teaching then there is little reason to callfor in-service support. The areas where teachers might require help would beexpected to be in new topics such as computer related areas. This is confirmed byteacher perceptions of the 12 statements of attainment in mathematics, presented tothe teachers in the questionnaire and listed in Table 5.

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72 R. Stoessiger and P. Ernest

Rank

123456

7

89

101112

Statement of attainment

Use addition and subtractionRecognise squares etc.Interpret bar chartUse metric unitsExplain number patternsDivision 3 digit no. by

2 digit no.Calculate fractions and

percentagesUnderstand scale in mapsRecognise rotational symmetryGeneralize patternsUse index notationEnter and access database

Difficulty index5

1-031-041111171-181-18

1-23

1-251-271-451-48213

% of teachersfeeling competent

989693858586

82

8178666833

Table 5. Rank order of teachers' self-perceived competence with mathematics statementsof attainment, (see [7] for details).

Wi th one exception, teachers clearly regard themselves as being very competentin teaching these at tainment statements. T h e three highest ranking mathematicsstatements are the highest ranking in the whole survey, all being perceived as lessproblematic than the first of the language statements which has a 'difficulty index'o f l - 1 3 . 5

T h e only statement presenting difficulties is the one involving use of computers ,and only a third of teachers feel competent with this statement without additionalhelp. Th i s is very much in line with the other information-technology statementsincluded on the questionnaire which had difficulty indices ranging from 2-20 to 2 -98.

A comparison of the mathematics and science attainment targets is quiterevealing. T h e science results are given in Tab le 6.

T h e second most problematic mathematics statement had a difficulty index of1 -48 which would have placed it in fifth position on the science scale ahead of 13 otheritems. As mentioned above this cannot be due to the initial subject specialism of theteachers as very similar proport ions had specialized in the two subjects(Table 2). T h e obvious explanation of the differences between mathematics andscience is that teachers were very familiar with the mathematics statements and feelthat they are already teaching them competently but are unfamiliar with the sciencestatements and feel in need of considerable support . Th i s is confirmed by thetendency for teachers with more years experience to feel increasingly competent withthe teaching of mathematics, bu t less competent in science (Table 4).

4. Implications for mathematics educationThe results presented here do not make us very optimistic about the national

curriculum having benefits for mathematics education in England and Wales. Firstlyit seems that the 'new' curriculum will be largely business as usual. There will besome changes. The emphasis on using and applying mathematics is hardly new, butwill support the approaches to the subject emphasized by the Cockcroft Report [I].6

The use of computers in mathematics will be a change for some teachers and theprobability and statistics sections are given more emphasis than many teachers mayhave previously been used to.

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Attitudes to the national curriculum (in mathematics) 73

Rank

123456789

10111213

14151617

Statement of attainment

Look after living thingsExplain water cycleUnderstand reproductionExplain night occurringKnow about wasteGroup materialsKnow about soundsCarry out investigationUnderstand forcesKnow about genesExplain shadowsConstruct simple circuitCritically examine their

investigationIdentify variablesUse power sourcesSuggest questions for testingUse micro-electronic kits

Difficulty index

1-331-351-461-471-531-541-651-751-801-831-871-922-00

2-022-032-112-63

% of teachersfeeling competent

74766568606162514545464439

40363418

Table 6. Rank order of teachers' self-perceived competence with science statements ofattainment, difficulty index and percentage of teachers feeling competent with existingknowledge.

But overall the changes are relatively minor. In particular, the modifications aremuch less than for science where the changes are very extensive and are clearlypresenting difficulties for teachers [10]. I t could be argued that mathematics will getless emphasis from teachers as they struggle to update their own scientific knowledgeand to find sensible ways of presenting the national curriculum science topics toprimary aged children.

If the national curr iculum has merely codified the mathematics content thatteachers are currently teaching what then is its likely impact on mathematicseducation? W e would suggest that there will be very few worthwhile effects. If it wasa concern of government that teachers were teaching some strange mathematics oflittle relevance to current times then they are bound to be disappointed as theydiscover teachers go on teaching much the same material, in much the same way, inthe next few years. If the proponents of the 'back to the basics' exponents felt that the'new' curriculum would return schools to some better past when the basics formedthe curriculum then they too will be disappointed. T h e basics will be represented inthis 'new' curriculum much as they have been in what it replaces. Little will change.

T w o possible negative outcomes can be anticipated. First of all, because of thehierarchical nature of the curr iculum model (attainment targets at 10 levels), lowattaining children may be kept working at the lowest levels until they pass theassessments. Th i s could mean a further restriction of the mathematical curriculumfor low attainers to a diet of 'basics ' . Secondly, as other commentators haveremarked, when the testing programme is in place, there is likely to be a tendency to'teach to the test ' . Th i s may emphasize recall and computation, at the expense of theproblem-solving, discussion and investigation proposed by Cockcroft [1]. Th i swould be a shame as the positive impact of the Cockcroft Report [1] is already beingreported both in the observations of experienced observers such as H M I [3] and in

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74 Attitudes to the national curriculum (in mathematics)

results of testing programmes [11]. It is a pity that the resources of the nationalcurriculum are not being applied to furthering the teaching and learning proposals ofCockcroft [1] rather than, at best, canonizing the status quo in a national curriculum.

Notes1. This research is part of the Leverhulme Primary Project, directed by Professor S. N.

Bennett and Professor E. C. Wragg and co-ordinated by Clive Carre, at the University ofExeter School of Education. We are grateful to Clive Carre for constructive criticism of anearlier draft of this paper.

2. Rex Stoessiger gratefully acknowledges a travelling scholarship from the EducationDepartment of Tasmania and facilities provided by the School of Education, ExeterUniversity.

3. This paper considers the introduction of the national curriculum in mathematics from atechnical and non-controversial perspective, as merely another curriculum innovation.While we are aware that powerful radical critiques are possible, and indeed, exist (and [12and 13]), we abstain from taking any ideologically critical or controversial position here.

4. We are aware that the relationship between attitudes to mathematics and gender is acomplex and much misunderstood area. See, for example [14].

5. The 'difficulty index' of a statement of attainment is the mean of the values attributed to itby the teachers from 1 = Yes, I feel I am competent..., to 4 = No, I feel I would not becompetent without substantial inservice support. See 'Key to responses, subsection 2.2.

6. However this emphasis is far less than that recommended by the Mathematics WorkingGroup [15], which was drastically reduced despite the support of almost 80% ofrespondents in the consultation process [16].

References[1] COCKCROFT, W. H., 1982, Mathematics Counts (London: Her Majesty's Stationary

Office).[2] DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE, 1989 b, Mathematics in the National

Curriculum (London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office).[3] DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE, 1989 a, The Teaching and Learning of

Mathematics (London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office).[4] DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE, 1985, Mathematics from 5 to 16 (London: Her

Majesty's Stationery Office).[5] ERNEST, P. (Ed.), 1989, Mathematics Teaching: The State of the Art (London: Falmer).[6] DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE, 1987, National Curriculum Mathematics

Working Group; Interim Report (London: D.E.S.).[7] WRAGG, E. C., BENNETT, S. N., and CARRE, C. G., 1989, Research Papers in Education, 4

(3), 17.[8] ASSESSMENT OF PERFORMANCE UNIT, 1988, Attitudes and Gender Differences (Windsor:

NFER-Nelson).[9] WILLIAMS, E., and SHUARD, H., 1982, Primary Mathematics Today, third edition

(Harlow: Longmans).[10] CARRE, C , and CARTER, D. (in press) Primary Teachers' Self Perceptions Concerning

Implementation of the National Curriculum in Science. Int. J. Sci. Educ.[11] ASSESSMENT OF PERFORMANCE UNIT, 1985, A Review of Monitoring in Mathematics 1978

to 1982 (London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office).[12] ERNEST, P., 1991, The Philosophy of Mathematics Education (London: Falmer).[13] DOWLING, P., and Noss, R. (Eds) 1990, Mathematics Teaching Versus the National

Curriculum (London: Falmer).[14] WALKERDINE, V., and the GIRLS and MATHEMATICS UNIT, 1989, Counting Girls Out

(London: Virago).[15] DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE, 1988, Mathematics for Ages 5 to 16 (London:

D.E.S.).[16] NATIONAL CURRICULUM COUNCIL, 1988, N.C.C. Consultation Report: Mathematics

(York: N.C.C).

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