Beliefs About the Nature of Mathematics in the Bridging of Everyday and School Mathematical Practices

Evidence from two research projects, one with high school students and the other with graduate students in an Ethnomathematics course, is presented to suggest that the beliefs students hold about the nature of mathematics both enables and constrains their ability to construct conceptual bridges between familiar everyday practices and mathematical concepts taught in school or university. Using a semiotic theoretical framework, graduate students learned to construct chains of signifiers linking a cultural practice that was personally meaningful to them, with abstract and general mathematical ideas. In the process, a majority of students broadened their conceptions, both of the nature of mathematics and of its relationship with cultural practices.