A NARRATIVE EXPLORATION OF CONTEXTUAL TEACHING PRACTICES OF SCHOOL MATHEMATICS TEACHERS

Abstract

According to Curriculum Development Center [CDC] (2014), the school level Mathematics primary objective is to develop the problem solver of practical problems and acquire competencies on Mathematics for life long and for higher education. But I hardly find it as per above statement. The school level Mathematics has different definition; Mathematics is a subject to score higher numbers and good students. It is the subject with lots of problems in the exercise that requires rigorous practice and learning Mathematics strategies seems memorizing all the formulae and includes continuous practice of problems until and unless they get imprinted in students’ mind. The student’s critical thinking and the creativity, making sense, developing and realizing the usefulness of the mathematics are overshadowed. To address it, I intended to explore the possible causes and their solution through this research project. This research project is the result of the narrative exploration of teachers’ experiences in contextual Mathematics teaching practices guided by theories of ii constructivism and transformative learning theory. I used the paradigm of interpretivism which helped me in interpreting/explaining the contextual teaching practices of mathematics teachers. The Contextual Teaching Learning (CTL) approach (Selvianires & Prabawanto, 2017) involves active students in the learning process to find the concepts learned by linking the material with the knowledge possessed and experienced in daily life. I have interviewed with two school level teachers to explore their contextual teaching learning practices from Kathmandu and Lalitpur districts. I have tried to make meaning from the experiences shared by the research participants. Moreover, the finding shows that Contextual Mathematics teaching practices are helpful to develop conceptual understanding of students, engagement and involvement of students to learn mathematics and developing creativity and critical thinking.