ABSTRACT
In my thesis (Hamann, 2018), I looked into the implementation of ideas connected to the New Math movement in primary mathematics education in the Federal Republic of Germany. The reform (nowadays still best known as “Mengenlehre”/“set theory”) had a massive impact on elementary education from 1972 on, especially regarding the curricular contents and classroom methods, but already saw its end around 1984. An account of this part of the history of the so-called New or Modern Mathematics serves as a further puzzle piece augmenting the picture of New Math (as for further such pieces see De Bock, 2023) and complements the work by Weiss (2023) who puts emphasis on secondary education.
In the thesis, a framework model has been developed, made up of four layers of institutions where the protagonists who contributed to the reform can be located and between which reinterpretations of underlying ideas took place (Hamann, 2019). Within this framework, the development from initial impulses up to implementation into classroom is traced, based on three exemplary textbooks.
The ICHME8 contribution will present some key results of the work and will aim to bring these in line with developments in other countries. The comparison seeks to focus on the reform process particularly regarding the conditions and types of practices: Who were the protagonists? What were the main influences and driving forces? And what circumstances can be identified as crucially framing the process?
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
De Bock, D. (Ed.) (2023). Modern Mathematics: An international movement?. Springer.
Hamann, T. (2018). Die “Mengenlehre” im Anfangsunterricht: historische Darstellung einer gescheiterten Unterrichtsreform in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland. urn:nbn:de:hbz:467-13870
Hamann, T. (2019). New Math at primary schools in West Germany – a theoretical framework for the description of educational reforms. In U. T. Jankvist, M. van den Heuvel-Panhuizen & M. Veldhuis (Eds.), Proceedings of the Eleventh Congress of the European Society for Research in Mathematics Education. Freudenthal Group & Freudenthal Institute, Utrecht University and ERME. https://hal.science/hal-02421852
Weiss, Y. (2023). West German Neue Mathematik and some of its protagonists. In D. De Bock (Ed.), Modern Mathematics: An international movement? (pp. 103–125). Springer.