ABSTRACT
In the Professional Teaching Standards, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM, 1991) called for a shift in authority in mathematics classrooms – away from the teacher and textbook as the primary determinants of mathematically correct answers and toward students’ own mathematical reasoning. The ways in which this shift in authority might take place in a mathematics classroom, however, are not clear or straightforward. For example, merely telling teachers “not to tell” is not helpful (Chazan & Ball, 1999). Furthermore, once a textbook is added to the teacher-student interaction, there are additional complexities. As Thom (1973) pointed out: “As soon as one uses a textbook, one establishes a didacticism, an academicism, even if the book be so written as to promote individual research” (p. 196). Given Thom’s assertion, it is interesting to note that, although the NCTM document suggested a shift away from the textbook as authority, one policy response was to fund curriculum materials that could support teachers in helping students learn mathematics in deeper and more meaningful ways. The juxtaposition of NCTM’s position on textbooks and the subsequent policy response compels us to think about how teachers might manage a shift in authority with the use of “new” (Standardsbased) textbooks.
