Exploring Conceptions of ‘Number Sense’ Evident in Pre-service Programmes for Primary School Teachers: A Review of Texts Used Across 11 University Programmes

Abstract

This paper examines the conceptions of ‘number sense’ as promoted in pre-service primary mathematics education courses at 11 South African Higher Education Institutions through the texts used by academics or prescribed for students. While all the participating institutions agree that the development of primary school learners’ ‘number sense’ is central to their mathematics methodology courses and that there is an overwhelming amount of research and literature on ‘number sense’ nationally and internationally, their conceptualisations of the nature of ‘number sense’ vary. Teacher educators, who develop pre-service teacher education courses, were asked to provide the texts, used to underpin the 11 universities’ mathematics education modules in the Bachelor of Education (Foundation and Intermediate Phases) and Post Graduate Certificate in Education (Foundation and Intermediate Phases) programmes. These texts were analysed drawing on Whitacre et al.’s emphasis on three ‘number sense constructs’ identified as Innate Number Sense, Early Number Sense and Mature Number Sense. The results show that there is no common language of description for ‘number sense’ across the 11 universities. This research implies that there is a need to develop a consistent understanding of ‘number sense’ and how it is developed across institutions.

Keywords:

• Primary pre-service teacher education
• conceptions of ‘number sense’
• innate number sense
• early number sense
• mature number sense

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Acknowledgement

We acknowledge Edward Domboka, Karin Hackmack, Mapula Ngoepe, Manono Poo and Marinda van Zyl for their participation in the writing retreat which provided the impetus for this article. The research is supported by the Department of Higher Education and Training in South Africa and funded by the European Union project ‘Teaching and Learning Capacity Improvement Project’.