ABSTRACT
Teacher educators in mathematics education face inherent dilemmas, tensions, and challenges in preparing teachers for life in classrooms as they are now and in preparing teachers for life in classrooms as they might be. Prospective teachers themselves are successful graduates of schools as they are now with mathematics classrooms that more often than not tend to focus on the learning and application of routine procedural skills. Visions for how mathematics classrooms might be, depicted in the various reform documents (National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM), 1989, 1991), portray teachers developing learning environments and activities which encourage their students’ mathematical inquiry, understanding, and sense-making. Balancing the worlds of what is and what might be in teaching education is an activity fraught with difficulties and challenges.
