| A major focus of mathematics reform at the secondary level has been directed at the teaching and learning of algebra, driven by the belief that mathematics instruction—and algebra instruction, in particular—must effectively reach all students. It is widely agreed upon in mathematics reform literature that algebra is a gatekeeping course whereby students who do not succeed are denied access to equal participation in a technologically oriented society; moreover, algebra is accessible to all students only when it can be understood conceptually, explored within contexts that are meaningful to students.;In this study, the author explores the learning experiences—focusing on the algebra and functions content strand—of six students, each of whom had previously experienced non-success in school mathematics, in the first part of the first course of Core-Plus, a reform high-school mathematics curriculum. Through an analysis of classroom observations and in-depth interviews conducted at three different moments in time of the course, the author investigates the nature of the students' previous non-successes, their experiences of the Core-Plus curriculum, and their understandings of algebra and functions as presented in Core-Plus Course 1A. After developing individual portraits of each student, the author reads across all six participants for common features and patterns of their school-mathematics histories, their experiences of the Core-Plus curriculum, and their understandings of algebra and functions.;The findings coalesce around issues attendant to representations of mathematical phenomena, the role of contextualized situations in providing access to abstract mathematics, and a construct called “mathematics community membership” that captures a number of qualities that the author claims to be closely associated with navigating a reform curriculum successfully. The implications call for both high school mathematics teachers and mathematics teacher educators to devote serious attention to students' alienation from the subject and to explicitly socialize them into expressly mathematical modes of thinking, speaking, and behaving. |
