Details for publication #3:
2011 - Journal paper
Teachers telling tales: the narrative mediation of professional identity
This paper draws on the biographical narratives of two mathematics teachers who describe themselves as 'traditional' and 'connectionist' teachers respectively. Holland et al.'s amalgam of Bourdieu, Vygotsky and Bakhtin, including 'figured worlds', 'positionality', 'self-authoring', and 'world-making' is used to examine these narratives. Differences between the two narratives include (i) their histories of compliant or oppositional identities as learners, and subsequently as teachers; (ii) their different experiences of 'understanding' and 'tricks', and (iii) their different use of figures as role models or anti-heroes in their self-authoring as teachers. It is argued that these narratives might 'make worlds' and provide future teachers in turn with figures for their own professional identity work.
Williams, J. (2011) Teachers telling tales: the narrative mediation of professional identity. Research in Mathematics Education 13:2, pages 131-142.
The Transmaths website has been developed as part of the project:
Promoting participation and engagement in post-compulsory mathematics education for STEM
ESRC Award: RES-189-25-0235