La reforma de la Educación Matemática en en Costa Rica. Perspectiva de la praxis

Abstract

In May 21, 2012, the Consejo Superior de Educación de Costa Rica (highest Na-tional Board for Education) approved new Math programs, which changed essen-tially programs developed in 1995-96, which had suffered some minor changes in 2001 and 2005. The new programs started to be installed in 2013 in a gradual process that will take four to five years. In this way, between 2016 and 2017 all pre-university education in Costa Rica will be following this curriculum. Since 2011 the country has invested in training processes and creating resources to support the installation. More than a curriculum design and its implementation this process should be considered as a major reform of the teaching of Mathematics in Costa Rica. This paper:

• after a brief introduction to the Costa Rican System of Education, it summarizes some of the main problems of Mathematics Education in this country,
• analyzes the previous Math school curriculum,
• synthesizes the history of the adoption of the new curriculum,
• describes the main features of the new curriculum,
• discusses the new curriculum within the international Mathematics Education theorethical debates (constructivism, problem solving, mathematical modeling, lesson study, competency-based approach),
• describes the project “ Mathematics Education Reform in Costa Rica” that has been the crucial factor in the reform strategy followed by this country,
• studies the reform from the more general perspective (a “meta–reform” analysis which provides diverse lessons to the educational community),
• reviews the difficulties and challenges of this reform.

The focus of this paper is Mathematics Education reforms in the context of a developing peripheral country and the proposal of one strategy for curriculum and educational change with a practical vision that is called: the Praxis Perspective in Math Education