Outdoor photography: a resource teacher training

Abstract

Several researchers refer the importance of outdoor photography for the understanding of math contents. However, we do not have enough knowledge about how preservice teachers pose problems in real life contexts. This paper describes a study where elementary preservice teachers capture photographs in their environment that allow task design. In particular, we want to identify what features of the environment were privileged and to understand what are their main difficulties and reactions when designing mathematical tasks. Results suggest that participants favoured elements related to buildings and expressed difficulties in the design of high- level cognitive tasks. This experience had a positive impact on them, providing a “closer look” at everyday objects, developing their “mathematical eye”.