What is mathematics teaching talk for? A response based on three sites of practice in mathematics education

During the last decades, the study of how learners and teachers of mathematics use the resource of language has contributed to our understanding of mathematics teaching and learning in a variety of classrooms and cultures. Developmental work with mathematics teachers on the particular resource of mathematics teaching talk is more recent. In order to explore responses related to the importance of this talk, in this paper we consider three sites of practice in mathematics education—research, professional development and teaching—and illustrations of data from or about them, including studies from the literature, and work with secondary school mathematics teachers in Catalonia-Spain and Malawi around the teaching of angles. We argue that tensions permeate these sites of practice when a focus is placed on word use, specifically the practices of naming and explaining, in mathematics teaching talk. We conclude that the importance of mathematics teaching talk is construed through tensions with other resources in language and teaching. Tensions specifically appear in the realisation of mathematics teaching talk as mediational in the work with mathematics teachers on their classroom teaching.