Mathematical knowledge for teaching teachers: The case of history in mathematics education

Teaching mathematics in school has been researched by many, with Ball, Thames, and Phelps (2008) and their practice-based theory of mathematical knowledge for teaching (MKT) primary among them. However, the work of teaching mathematics in teacher education has been much less researched. An emerging theory of mathematical knowledge for teaching teachers (MKTT; Zopf, 2010) is of particular interest in our current work. This paper deals with part of a Didactics of Mathematics course given to future mathematics teacher educators at the Danish School of Education, and asks the question of how to develop these future teacher educators’ MKTT in relation to history of mathematics in mathematics education. We share the key components of the theoretical constructs underlying our work and illustrate these by means of the students’ own mini-project reports, which address cases or topics ranging from analysis of the inclusion of history in mathematical textbooks, to the development of an activity for pupils – or for student teachers – which include original source materials.