Grade 10–12 Mathematics curriculum reform in South Africa: A textual analysis of new national curriculum Statements

Abstract

Radical curriculum change in South African schooling over the past decade has been driven by a need for social, economic and political transformation. In this paper, I examine aspects of the bias and focus of new curriculum documents for Grades 10–12 school mathematics within this reform context. The curriculum statements are analysed in three ways. Firstly, drawing on Graven (2002), orientations to mathematical knowledge evident within the curriculum statements are investigated. Secondly, using Bernstein (1996), the organization of knowledge in the curriculum and the type of integration between its proposed contents are examined. Finally, drawing on Dowling (1998), domains of mathematical practices implied by the statements are identified, and therefore how access to mathematical knowledge could be structured is revealed. Using these theoretical frameworks, I show that the new mathematics curriculum, as defined through the official curriculum documents for Grades 10–12, is a hybrid combining a general rhetoric of the social logic of competence which dominates the introductory rationale with aspects of a performance based curriculum, specifically a focus on progression in the discipline and access to structured knowledge and esoteric mathematical practices. At the same time, there are significant changes in orientation to mathematical knowledge and pedagogy implied by the new curriculum. The statements demand more democratic mathematics classroom practices and the development of a mathematical gaze incorporating a broad and deep knowledge of mathematics as a discipline, a practice and a tool.