Mathematics education, language and superdiversity

Abstract

There is a growing awareness in the social sciences that globalisation has changed the nature of ‘diversity’. The old certainties of distinct ethnic groups, with distinct cultures, speaking distinct languages and living in distinct communities in specific locations are increasingly untenable. This shift is as applicable in mathematics classrooms as anywhere else and is particularly relevant to research on the teaching and learning of mathematics in multilingual classrooms (Clarkson, 2009a).