Abstract

Researchers have generally agreed that textbooks as a major conveyor of the curriculum play a dominant role in modern education scenes across different school subjects. The study analyzed a set of four learners’ textbooks and their corresponding teachers’ guides which are used as set books for teaching mathematics at Grade 9 level in South Africa. These textbooks were produced in response to the demands of the Grade R-9 National Curriculum Statement (NCS) policy document. A qualitative content analysis on how the recommendations in the policy document were further recontenxtualised in the pedagogic recontextualising field (PRF) by textbook authors into curriculum materials is presented. A vertical analysis approach was used, attending to the ways in which textbooks treat the idea of indigenous mathematical knowledge. Thus, it checks on the provided affordances for connecting culture and mathematics. Indications of affordances for connecting culture and mathematics are awash in the analyzed textbooks. However, authors had few examples from the learners’ indigenous cultures but rich implementation ideas using foreign cultures. There is need for further research on where and how this indigenous mathematical knowledge can be extracted so as to be part of the textbooks’ content.

Key words: Indigenous knowledge, culture, affordances, school textbooks.