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Lindenskov, L. B., & Lindhardt, B. (2020). Exploring approaches for inclusive mathematics teaching in
Danish public schools. Mathematics Education Research Journal, 32(1), 57–75.
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Title: Exploring approaches for inclusive mathematics teaching in Danish
public schools
Author(s): Lena Lindenskov & Bent Lindhardt
Journal: Mathematics Education Research Journal
DOI/Link: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13394-019-00303-z
Document version: Accepted manuscript (post-print)

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Version 2.1, September 2020
Exploring Approaches for Inclusive Mathematics Teaching in Danish
Public Schools

ABSTRACT
The Danish MINK project explored inclusive mathematics teaching in regular classes in ordinary public
schools, with a focus on teacher professional development and classroom experiments as the main elements. The
project started as a reaction to the challenges for practice arising from a political reform. The MINK project was
a design study with genuine collaboration between teacher educators and upper primary school teachers.
Participating teachers had opportunities to influence all phases of the project, including which themes to explore
in depth. The article is a result of a follow-up elaboration, with specific research questions, which goes beyond
the goals and questions in MINK. The article presents which themes emerged during the project as most
relevant to explore when focusing on inclusive mathematics teaching; and insights about the emergent themes.
In the discussion section, we relate insights from the project to the general need for professionals in mathematics
education to engage in discussions on inclusion, and we sketch a number of anticipated conclusions about
strategies and further needs for teacher education and teacher-in-service education.

KEYWORDS: inclusive mathematics teaching, students who are vulnerable in mathematics, mathematics
teachers’ professional development, professional learning community.

Inclusion - Setting the Scene

The Norwegian scholar Peder Haug reviewed European views on inclusive education (2016). He found, that
most European countries have acknowledged inclusive education as a means to secure equal educational rights
for all persons, following the Salamancha Declaration (UNESCO 1994). The declaration concerns all groups of
students in danger of facing problems in school and being in danger of segregation, which may be due to special
needs, gender, ethnicity, culture, social background, etc. Inclusion is seen as a dynamic approach of responding
positively to pupil diversity and of seeing individual differences not as problems, but as opportunities for
enriching learning (UNESCO 2005 p.12).

Haug found that the physical placement of students in local schools seems to be the most frequent criterion of
inclusive education in Europe to avoid segregation. In addition, he found that the quality of teaching and
learning processes in inclusive education has lower priority. Haug’s description fits our impression of the
Danish situation well. The Danish law has physical placement as the chosen focus. The Ministry of Education
initiated a number of national initiatives for clarifying what is inclusive teaching and for raising the quality of
teaching. However, public and professional debates highlight immense challenges for schools and teachers. See
more on the Danish situation in Räsänen, Daland, Dalvang, Engström, Korhonen et al. (2019) and Lindenskov
and Weng (2014).

According to terminology, in English and in Danish, several terms exist to describe students who may benefit
from inclusion, each with different connotations of medical and social justice perspectives (Scherer at al. 2017).
Among Danish teachers, terms such as ‘students with mathematics difficulties’ and ‘students in mathematics
difficulty’ seem to be most often used. In this article, we choose to use the term students who are vulnerable in
mathematics to cover students who are most often excluded in mathematics in the sense that they do not have
sufficient opportunities to thrive in mathematics and therefore have special rights to equitable access to quality
mathematics education (Gervasoni and Lindenskov, 2011).

One issue for school systems is to set up organizational support for inclusion and to clarify what constitutes
inclusive teaching. It may be quite another issue to clarify what constitutes inclusive subject-matter teaching.
Scherer (2019) demonstrated the needs in Germany for clarifying inclusive subject-matter-specific themes for
mathematics. In Australasian countries, inclusive practices in teaching mathematics is also an important issue.

1
Building on their MERGA research review, Vale, Atweh, Averill and Skourdoumbis (2016) suggest a holistic
view on inclusive mathematics teaching, which coordinates four levels at which mathematical learning is
organised. The first level is systems to fund and support school organisational structures, resources and cultures.
The second level is the development of purposeful partnerships between schools and their communities. The
third level is including awareness of equity, social justice and ethics issues throughout the education and
professional learning of teachers of mathematics. The fourth level is creating learning environments, with the
help of teachers that would focus on mathematical learning and knowledge building.

Faragher, Hill and Clarke (2016) add in their MERGA research review three organising themes to the ones of
Vale et al. Their first theme is access to the curriculum for all through policies and leadership practices. The
second one is diverse approaches to learning mathematics; and the third one is teaching approaches for
inclusion. Faragher et al. relate the themes to issues of gender, learning difficulties, giftedness, location, and
cultural and linguistic diversity, and they advocate a focus on mathematics learning experiences from the point
of view of the learners. They highlight issues such as the widespread use of direct teaching, and the the
proportion of out-of-field teachers who are not trained in mathematics teaching. In addition, Faragher et al.
advocate for good and adapted tasks as a core concern for enhancing inclusive instruction in practice.

In summary, inclusion in mathematics education is a complex issue, operating on multiple levels from learner to
education system. While politicians may see inclusion as increasing physical placements of students with
diverse needs in ordinary schools and regular classes, for teachers, the inclusion issue is not the physical
placement of student. For mathematics teachers and teacher educators and for researchers in mathematics
education the inclusion issue is effective mathematics teaching for all students. In addition, mathematics
teachers have to both come to to understand, and also handle the challenges which emerge in mathematics
teaching practice.

Over the past few years, general education literature underlines that exclusion and inclusion processes take place
simultaneously and encourage researchers to further the understanding of how limits between inclusion and
exclusion are drawn in practice. Hansen, Jensen, Lassen, Molbæk and Schmidt (2018, p. 17) state that
“inclusion is about constructing social practices in a school context which ensure that all students have
the same possibilities to participate and be educated (…) (Such) strategies are a matter of improving
and qualifying the handling of both inclusion and exclusion processes as part of developing inclusive
learning environments.”

The mathematics education literature introduces a similar view. Faustino, Moura, Gomes da Silva, Muzinatti
and Skovsmose (2017) hold this similar view, but consider inclusion and exclusion at macro and micro levels.
Macro-inclusion and macro-exclusion concern processes at the socio-political level. Micro-inclusion and micro-
exclusion concern processes at the levels of individuals and groups. Micro-exclusion means isolation or
silencing an individual in what intends to be an inclusive environment. Micro-exclusion may take place in
communication acts amongst a group of students. Teachers can also be involved in micro-exclusion when they
communicate, without acknowledging particular characteristics of students with special educational needs, when
they concentrate on students who perform well, and when they comment on students’ proposals and questions.
Most importantly, micro-exclusion may be subtle, covert, and unconsciously employed for all involved.

Vale et al.’s (2016) third level of equity, social justice and ethics issues become highly important when looking
into processes at micro-levels. As highlighted by Nind, Benjamin, Sheehy, Collins and Hall (2004) in
documenting exclusionary and inclusionary processes at micro-levels, you have the risk of pathologising and
objectifying children and the risk of problematising teaching and teachers.

The following section describes how the collaboration between participants in the MINK project was organized
in order to handle the methodological and ethical challenges. In addition, we describe the political background
for the project, participants and project phases. We also describe the used conceptualization of inclusion, and the
general and specific aims that guided the project and the follow-up elaboration.

2
Development, Aims and Practices of the MINK Project

The reported Danish project, Mathematics and Inclusion, had the abbreviation MINK 1 and started as a reaction
to new political regulations. Education for students with disabilities and those facing learning difficulties
changed fundamentally in 2012 with the new law in Denmark termed, ‘Inclusion of students with special needs
in ordinary teaching’. This law built upon the view that inclusive education takes place in regular classes in
ordinary schools, whenever possible. Text wording from the Danish Ministry of Education (2019) shows that
the aim is

….to retain the students in the children's community so that we do not separate children with special
needs into special education services, but let them be taught in the regular class with the necessary
support and aids. The goal of inclusion means that the students are part of the academic and social
community, that there is a professional progression and that the well-being of the students is preserved.

The idea of the reform was to minimize the number of students in special institutions and special classes, by
moving students from special institutions and special classes into ordinary schools, and by avoiding placing
more students into special institutions and special classes, whenever possible. This is in line with Haug’s review
on European views (2016). While teachers in Denmark support inclusion, they also acknowledge this presents
many challenges for teachers and students.

Six associate professors in mathematics education Beksgaard, Ejdrup, Skipper-Jørgensen, L. Lindhart, Brogård
Kristensen, and B. Lindhardt initiated and managed the MINK project in order to improve the understanding
and handling of the challenges, which emerge in inclusive settings in ordinary classroom. They all teach in pre-
service and in-service programs for mathematics teachers of Grade 1 – Grade 10 students, working at three
university college; Absalon, Northern Jutland, and South Denmark. From now on, they are termed the teacher
educators.

The MINK project evolved in collaboration with three municipalities around the country, Roskilde, Aalborg and
Varde. Altogether, twenty teachers in mathematics and special education at eleven schools joined the project as
partners in a learning community, where teachers as well as teacher educators aimed for improved
understanding and teaching strategies. The schools were publicly funded. The project ran from January 2014 to
June 2016, and Lindenskov contributed in 2013 to its preparation. The project was organized in three phases.

In the first project phase, each of the twenty teachers chose two or three students whom the teachers recognised
were vulnerable in mathematics among their fourth Grader students as a focus for the study. Some of the chosen
students had diagnoses, for instance ADHD, but the majority were without formal diagnoses. The teacher
educators observed lessons and interviewed teachers and students. On this background, teacher educators
developed a didactical tetrahedron model and guidelines for teachers’ classroom observations. The first phase
concluded with a joint seminar for teachers and teacher educators for reflection and lesson planning.

In the second project phase, neighboring teachers formed pairs and tried out planned lessons in their own
classrooms and observed each other’s lessons in several iterations. Materials were stored in a shared Dropbox.

1
Acknowledgements to:
Associate Professors Hans Beksgaard, UC South Denmark, Flemming Ejdrup, UC Northern Jutland, Anette
Skipper-Jørgensen, UC Northern Jutland, Lars Lindhart, UC Northern Jutland, Anne Brogård Kristensen, UC
South Denmark, and to the participating schools, teachers, and students.

3
The second phase concluded with a joint seminar for prepared presentation of experiences, discussion of
emergent themes, and planning of adapted and new lessons.

In the third phase, sequences of teaching lessons and lesson observations continued for the teacher pairs, with
focus on specific emerging themes. Teacher educators were in contact with the teachers by Dropbox, mail and at
regional meetings. The third phase concluded with a joint seminar on experiences and their possible general
character.

Obviously, the MINK project did not define inclusion as increasing the physical placements of students with
diverse needs in ordinary schools and regular classes. The project defined inclusion teaching as supporting
students with the right and duty to participate in the classroom community and as supporting students to
experience a certain degree of social and mathematical proficiency. That means that teachers’ abilities to
identify and observe the actions and reactions of students who were vulnerable was important. So was their
ability to make fruitful adaptations of tasks and teaching.

Concerning inclusion, the MINK project based its strict definition of what it means to be an included student in
the mathematics lessons, on Wenger’s (1998) ideas of a community of practice. That means that to be included
relies on Wenger’s three core features of mutual engagement, joint enterprise and shared repertoire. The MINK
project interpreted mutual engagement as the collaboration between students and teacher and establishment of
common mathematical norms. Interpretation of joint enterprise was that students and teachers interact and
negotiate a sense of shared understanding of school and learning. Interpretation if shared repertoire regarded
available resources, language, stories, gestures, symbols, genres, action and concepts. Inclusion does not require
that all students are alike. In principle, differences between students and between offered tasks may create a
dynamic community. In practice, creating such a dynamic, without any student who is vulnerable feel excluded
is challenging. The project used Wenger’s core concepts of participation to clarify the challenge and aims of the
project: Would adaptations of tasks and of teachers’ presentation of tasks make it possible for vulnerable
students to participate as legitimate participants? Would identical tasks and teacher presentations leave
vulnerable students as marginal participants or even as illegitimate participants without any chance to engage?

In order to handle the methodological and ethical challenges listed above (Nind et al., 2004), the organization of
the project drew on Cobb’s design project features and again on Wenger’s community of practice as a frame for
the collaboration between teacher educators and teachers. Cobb, Jackson and Dunlap (2016, p. 482) list five
features of design studies. The first feature is to address problems recognized as tough challenges in practice.
The MINK project respectfully encouraged teachers to examine what they themselves experience as tough
challenges in inclusive mathematics teaching in ordinary classrooms. This teacher quote illustrates that teachers
recognize it as a tough challenge to provide vulnerable students with the chance to succeed:
… but students, who perform at the lowest level they don't have a chance. These are the ones I can see
sitting, staring straight ahead, uninvolved and detached. (Tetler, Baltzer, Ulvseth, Langager, Andersen,
Arne-Hansen et al. 2017, p.47)

The second feature concerns developing and trying out new ideas in order to enable participants to develop
professionally. The third feature is a strong theoretical orientation concerning students’ particular involvement
in specific mathematical elements or teachers’ development of instructional practice. The fourth feature is an
ongoing testing and revising of teaching ideas, and if appropriate, abandoning ideas. The fifth feature is to aim
towards generalizability, hoping that theoretical ideas and teaching practices can be useful in other contexts.

Concerning project aims, the general aim of MINK was to provide insight about the needs arising from the
reform for mathematics teachers’ and teacher educators' practice. The main goal was
To explore viable, legitimate and effective teaching strategies to increase inclusion of students who are
vulnerable in ordinary mathematics classes.

4
 Another goal was to enhance professional discussion about inclusion between teachers, teacher educators and
researchers.

In 2018, B. Lindhardt wrote a report on the MINK project in Danish. After that, B.Lindhardt and Lindenskov
found the project organization and results so promising that they made a follow-up elaboration of the MINK
analyzes for this article in order to communicate the project outcomes to an international audience. The follow-
up elaboration focuses on three additional research questions:

1. Which themes emerged as most relevant to the MINK teachers to explore when focusing on inclusive
mathematics teaching, and how were they articulated?

For this aspect we draw on selected data from first phase’s interviews with teachers and students, teacher-pair’se
classroom observations, teacher educators’ free style memos (Glaser, 2013) and documented seminar
presentations and discussions.

2. What insights on emerging themes arose in the collaboration between teachers and teacher educators?

We draw on data from the first and second phase teaching try-outs and classroom observations, documented
seminar presentations and discussions, and teacher educators’ free style memos and mutual discussions.

3. What conclusions about strategies and further needs for teacher education and teacher-in-service education
seem plausible based on the MINK project data? How do the conclusions relate to the socalled didactical
tetrahedron?
For this, we (the authors) draw on our own free style memos and mutual discussions.

Data collection, Documentation and Analysis

In this section we focus on methodology, data generation, documentation and analyses during the MINK project
phases. We show how the project and our following elaboration use classic Grounded Theory methodology
(Glaser, 2004, 2013, 2016). This is not identical to Cobb and Jackson’s (2011) empirically grounded theory for
improving quality of mathematics teaching at scale. Grounded Theory is a methodology, which stresses that all
is data. Even literature counts as a source of data. The main methods to employ are comparing data; open coding
of data, and free style memo writing. You keep on employing the methods until patterns show up for you.

The MINK project included a range of tools for data generation and documentation. In the first project phase,
teacher educators’ collected data when visiting the schools through interviewing the chosen students about their
views on mathematics lessons, on themselves as learners and participants, and on mathematics. Teacher
educators also observed the teachers’ mathematics lessons and did interviews with each individual teacher, and
as focus groups, about their views on mathematical difficulties and students who are vulnerable. All interviews
were semi-structured. Interview guides were developed in common among teacher educators based on their
many years of experiences of collaborating with Danish mathematics teachers. Data were documented with
notetaking, video-recordeding, and free style memo writing. Data were coded by open coding methods, and the
teacher educators collaborated in their open coding. As outlined by Glaser (2016), open coding follows the rule
of constantly asking of the data, “what it is a study of?” Then you look for indications of categories and their
properties. A third question is asking of the emerging analysis what theoretical codes may apply to integrate the
emerging concepts and theorical ideas.

In this way, the teacher educators managed to find a number of emergent themes to present and discuss with the
teachers. Specifically, the teacher educators noticed an unexpected pattern in some teachers’ description of
mathematics teaching. Some teachers often confused mathematics content with teaching methods. In order to
enhance the teachers’ awareness of focusing specifically on content and specifically on methods, teacher

5
educators developed a model, which turned the didactical triangle model with content, teacher, and student into
a didactical tetrahedron model with content, teacher, student, and method. Teacher educators then developed an
observation guide based on the six edges in the tetrahedron to guide the teachers’ pairwise classroom
observations, for instance observations on the chosen students’ reactions to the methods.

The first phase of the project was concluded with a joint seminar for teacher educators and all twenty teachers.
The teacher educators presented their emerging themes to be reflected upon and discussed among the teachers.
They also explained their classroom observation guide to the teachers. As a result, the teachers decided to focus
their following project activities on further exploring the presented themes. In addition, the teachers started to
develop, in randomly composed pairs of teachers, a plan for a mathematics lesson. Teachers added these plans
to a shared Dropbox. Teacher educators documented the seminar by writing notes from all oral presentations
and discussions, and by collecting written proposals and reflections from the teachers. For instance, the
researchers noted the following teacher citations:

”… and I think, it is important that this student’s self-confidence will be raised. One of my students often says,
“I know that I cannot.””
”… and I think it is important always to talk with the students about what we shall try to achieve today. But I
don’t know how to talk with the students about the fact that not everyone shall achieve the same outcome.”

In the second project phase, teacher educators collected data when visiting the schools and following the
teachers’ input to the Dropbox. The teachers planned MINK lessons in neighboring school pairs and tried out
lessons and teaching approaches individually. They visited each other, observed lessons and documented their
observations according to the guide. They discussed their observations, without and with teacher educators, and
they wrote notes for presentation at the following seminar.

The second phase concluded with a joint seminar. Teachers presented observations for all to discuss. Everyone
engaged in discussion about structuring emergent themes. Teacher educators documented the seminar by writing
notes from all oral presentations and discussions, and by collecting written proposals and reflections from the
teachers. Teacher educators also wrote free style memos.

In the third project phase, teacher educators collected data from following the Dropbox submissions, and when
participating in some of the regional whole day teacher meetings on planning single lessons and three two-week
mathematics units. One week comprised five lessons of 45 minutes duration. Some of the plans were titled
‘Developing understanding of the Base 10 notation number system’ in the first grade, ‘Initial multiplication’ in
the second grade, ‘Angles,’ and ‘Fractions’ in the fourth grade. Teachers tried out the planned lessons and units
and observed the implementation in neighboring school pairs, focusing on one or two of the emerging themes in
detail. They documented their observations according to the guide and sometimes by video recordings. After
implementation of each unit, the teachers discussed experiences without and with teacher educators, and results
were used in planning the following unit. The teachers prepared presentations for the joint seminar.

The third phase, too, was concluded with a joint seminar with teacher presentations and discussions. All
discussed insights concerning the eight themes. This was followed by discussions on possible future uses of the
project results and their possible general character. Teacher educators documented the seminar.

In the months following the final joint seminar, the teacher educator compiled a project report. The teacher
educators had the impression that the teachers were proud to show their plans and to experiment on ways to
increase inclusion in mathematics for all. In addition, the teachers showed great interest in their pairwise
observations and discussions at project seminars. This may point to the MINK project as a successful
professional teacher development.

Emergent Themes

6
During the project phases a number of themes emerged based on teacher educators’ Grounded Theory analyses.
The themes were discussed and validated at the project seminars.

A teacher educator’s free style memo describes the emergence of the themes as follows:

“I do not consider the themes generally valid, but related to the ten teachers, their pupils and the present
teaching framework in Denmark. Thus, it is an attempt from our group of teacher educators to summarise the
teachers' own reflections and thereby point at opportunities to increase the academic inclusion of the students
who are vulnerable. The themes are based on suggestions, which surfaced during the project for how to improve
inclusive mathematics teaching in order for it be to become more effective, realizable, and legitimate”.

The project analyses identified nine emergent themes, as follows:

Theme 1: The communication between students and teacher on mathematics and mathematics learning

The teachers emphasized observations of students who lose concentration early in the lessons, when the teacher
presents goals and tasks. Notably, the students who were vulnerable did not concentrate for the longer time. The
teachers also emphasized that the longer teachers spoke, the more this grew in complexity. Finally, teachers
noticed many examples of low-level questions, such as ‘guess what the teacher thinks’ questions.

Theme 2: The teacher’s feedback to students

The teachers were aware of the importance of the quality of the teacher’s feedback to the students, but were
confused about how to best practise this. The lesson observations confirmed their need to improve the quality of
their feedback.

Theme 3: Clarifying goals, differentiating between which goals should be met and which goals could be met

The teachers remarked that their own articulated lesson goals and the goals articulated to the students by their
teacher-partners often were very complex. Besides, the teachers remarked that too many learning goals were
identified compared to the amount of time allowed for students to meet these goals. Teachers realised that this
situation confused most students, including the students who were vulnerable. Some students gave up and didn’t
participate.

Theme 4: Focus on quality of students’ work rather than quantity

As a tendency, teachers believed at the beginning of the project that the students who are vulnerable in learning
mathematics needed training and repetition of tasks much more than other children. However, the teachers
emphasized that they observed the low motivation of students who are vulnerable partly due to the monotonous
and tedious tasks they were offered. The teachers wondered how to establish work processes that could support
curiosity, deep thinking and understanding without scaring students with complexity.

Theme 5: Structures that support students’ awareness and concentration on tasks

The teachers observed that students who are vulnerable did not manage to hold awareness and concentration on
tasks as needed. The teachers wondered which classroom management structures might give the students
opportunities to find calmness, and time for learning, without being distracted.

Theme 6: Students’ mathematical self-concept

In teacher educators’ interviews with teachers in the first project phase, a typical statement was that most
students who were vulnerable had a low academic self-concept. Some teachers underlined that the low self-
concept caused marginalization and exclusion of the student from the class community. A teacher said:

7
 No students deliberately exclude their classmates. However, a student who is vulnerable, as a
tendency, might withdraw and stop participating when the student does not feel able to engage in the
common topic. Due to the the low self-concept, the student might not perform as well as their pre-
requisite knowledge would suggest.

Theme 7: Use of aids and tools

The teacher interviews uncovered experiences of the use of concrete aids as helpful for students who are
vulnerable. For instance, that early use of calculators may prevent students’ low calculating skills to slow down
processes towards conceptual understanding.

Theme 8: Teaching materials and student tasks

The teacher interviews and teachers’ observations strongly point to the lack of textbook materials and
worksheets that corresponds to the students’ varied needs. The need for the students who are vulnerable to get
mathematically genuine and sufficiently accessible materials emerged as the most obvious emerging theme.

Insights on Emergent Themes

In the following section we present some insights to be drawn from the emerging themes. The data come from
the the documented discussions on the project joint seminars and regional meetings. The data also come from
teacher educators’ memos, and mutual discussions during our own follow-up elaboration on MINK. In addition,
we draw on specific literature.

Theme 1: The communication between students and teacher on mathematics and mathematics learning

Teachers’ observations in each others’ classrooms had confirmed that the students who are vulnerable could not
concentrate for the longer time, and that the longer teacher’s spoke, the more this explanation grew in
complexity. Especially initial teacher talk at the beginning of a lesson was critical. Therefore, the teachers
planned to cut down the initial teacher talk to 10 minutes as a maximum. The teachers dedicated the saved time
to students who needed elaboration. The teachers reported this was helpful for the students who are vulnerable.

Some teachers tended to use gestures more and use drawinsg more often. When this occurred, teachers observed
better focusing, more motivated students, and that more students understood more. All teachers recognised the
importance of language, and that the use of formal mathematics language was important for students who are
vulnerable, although difficult. At the end of the project, some teachers noticed greater student eagerness and
willingness to explain their solutions and thinking orally than at the beginning of the project.

Theme 2: Teacher’s feedback to students

Feedback for students was often a focus in the designed lessons. Teachers viewed feedback for students as
important, and they viewed students’ involvement in the feedback processes as important, too.

Some teachers also used short pre- and post-tests in some of the lessons as part of their feedback in order to
show the students that they actually progressed and to specify what they did learn. According to the teachers,
most students who were vulnerable noticed more correct answers in post-tests than in pre-tests, and it made
them happy. Still, many teachers were concerned about the risk that testing could promote experiences of
mathematics learning as participation in a competition. It could weaken a view of mathematics learning as an in-
depth problem-solving activity, as it is easier to construct simple skills and facts-test questions than problem
solving tasks. Nevertheless, several teachers argued that pre- and post-testing simple skills and facts to ensure
good test results improved the self-concept and motivation of students who are vulnerable.

8
Some of the teachers aimed to strengthen students’ own involvement in feedback. These teachers made big
thermometers with the scale 1 – 10. The teacher asked students to mark their success in relation to the
articulated learning goal onto the thermometer at the end of the lesson. This seemed to motivate several
students, and they were eager to work hard and to perform. Nevertheless, the thermometers did not motivate all
students, - and often not the students who are vulnerable. In addition, the teachers worried about some students
making their relatively low performance levels public. On this basis, the teachers decided to change the
thermometer to measure the student’s effort, instead of success in approaching the learning goals. According to
the neighboring teachers’ observations, this motivated the students who are vulnerable. We have no data to
show how the other students reacted.

Additionally, teachers gave feedback to the students who are vulnerable at certain moments during a lesson,
when teachers organised a summary and reflection for them. The teachers noticed positive effects.

Theme 3: Clarifying goals and differentiating between which goals should be met and which goals could be met
As mentioned, the teachers’ articulation of the lesson goals seemed to be too long and too complex at the
beginning of the MINK Project. In addition, too many goals were articulated. Some students just gave up. After
reflecting on this outcome, some teachers decided to start differentiating between skills and knowledge goals
that were essential to learn, and those that were ‘nice to know’. We do not have data on the effect of this
strategy.

In general, the teachers felt that when they clarified the learning goals and had fewer learning goals, they
provided students with less stress and a stronger sense of security. Students became more relaxed and more
ready to participate in the mathematics learning. The impression is that all teachers became better in clarifying
the goals for the students across the course of the project.

Theme 4: Focus on the quality of students’ work rather than quantity

The theme of quality of students’ work focused on the activities appropriate for students who are vulnerable.
Most teachers in the MINK project emphasised in the first phase interviews that the students needed repetition
tasks and training in basic mathematical processes. According to the teachers, students who are vulnerable might
be scared by complex problems for which they do not have ready-made algorithms and solutions.

Research in mathematics learning has this dimension as a core issue. It is argued that mathematics tasks of low
cognitive demand may stand in the way of tasks that have the potential of building more understanding. Boaler
(2011) has published results from streamed lower secondary classes that later became de-streamed. Results
showed that all students benefitted from de-streaming, whether achieving at low, middle, or high levels.
Analyses showed that the background for the benefits was the fact that teaching of all students included high-
level work with rich tasks, formative assessment and high expectations of students. In addition, research on
streamed education reports disadvantages for students who are vunerable. Forgasz (2010) investigated streaming
for mathematics in years 7-10 in Victoria, Australia. She found benefits for students who achieve at a high level,
but disadvantages for students who are vulnerable. This was probably because the streamed instruction allowed
high achievers to engage with genuine mathematical challenges. Streamed instruction offered “drill and
practice” approaches and more basic mathematics topics for students who were vulnerable, which may narrow
down their possibilities to learn.

The teacher pair observations in classroom had some impact on the dominant teacher view of “drill and
practice” approaches and more basic mathematics topics as the most appropriate for students who are
vulnerable. The observations showed that repetitive and tedious tasks might cause increased student passivity
and low motivation, contrary to the teachers’ view. The teachers realized that such tasks also might stand in the
way of tasks that have the potential for building more understanding. Therefore, the teachers became eager to
establish work processes that could support students’ curiosity, deep thinking and understanding. The teachers
became more and more aware of the didactical challenge of balancing genuine, complex mathematics and

9
students’ legitimate need to be able to engage with the mathematics. Throughout all lessons and courses the
teachers kept exploring which elements the students find scary, demotivating, and motivating.

As an example, the teachers planned the ‘initial multiplication’ unit in second grade to include a game-based
and student-centred approach. The teachers made cards with symbolic multiplications, symbolic repeated
additions, drawings of everyday materials, or were blank. Everyday materials included, for instance, an egg
carton with two rows of six in each. Together, the teachers prepared seven packs of cards with diverse
complexity. Each pack had ten pairs. The teachers distributed the games one by one to each student group at the
time the teachers found it appropriate. The students worked in pairs combining and comparing cards, writing
and drawing on blank cards, and telling stories. The student pairs used a range of approaches. For instance,
counting 15 drawn eggs one by one, followed by repeated addition of three using the fingers to keep track. For
instance, describing the number of drawn eggs as five – ten – fifteen, followed by symbolic multiplication.

The observations of the course showed a fine activity flow. No students were disengaged. All students seemed
to participate and master the activity. All students presented their approach in classroom. All students succeeded
in explaining their card combinations. It seemed that all students experienced they were able to contribute to the
class’ negotiations on common knowledge of initial multiplication. Some students explained how to turn the
drawing in order to change 3×5 into 5×3. The teachers concluded that the game’s inclusive qualities consisted of
a low entry threshold, a short time required, and that it gave every student a chance to win. In addition, the game
gave all students the possibility to experience genuine mathematics.

In addition, we find it worth remarking that most students who are vulnerable participated to a high degree in
the unit of “Angles”, and to a lower degree in the following unit on “Fractions”. It may have played a role, that
Angles was a new topic for all the students, while students who were performing at higher levels already had
considerable knowledge of fractions.

Theme 5: Structures that support students’ awareness and concentration on tasks

We find it worth noticing that in teacher educators’ interviews in the first project phase with students who are
vunerabele, several students expressed that they experienced too much turmoil. On the contrary, in teacher
educators’ interviews with teachers, no teachers remarked on turmoil as a particular problem for students who
are vulnerable, although the teachers found that some students were easily distracted.
The teacher observations showed that the longer time the teacher used to present the lesson’s goals and tasks,
the more students who are vulnerable lost their concentration. Consequently, the teachers planned lessons with
more concise teacher presentations as the start with a maximum duration of 10 minutes. In return, new
possibilities arose for individual and group elaboration. Classroom observations of these lessons showed that the
new organization benefitted the students who are vulnerable.

Theme 6: Students’ mathematical self-concept

Teacher educators’ interviews with teachers showed that typically the teachers thought students who are
vulnerable have a low academic self-concept, which makes the students withdraw. The teachers expressed that it
is difficult for them to re-engage students as participants. It seemed to us that the teachers felt that students who
are vulnerable might exclude themselves. All the teachers fully agreed that the goal is to raise learning for all
students. However, all the teachers were also unsure about whether this is possible for all. Teachers, mostly in
the interviews, expressed views of students who are vulnerable as having fixed problems inherent in themselves
or problems due to their family background. One of the teachers put it this way: ‘there are so many home and
social problems that they cannot learn.’

These viewpoints encouraged us to look into mathematics research literature on identifying where mathematics
difficulties are situated. Scherer, Beswick, DeBlois, Healy and Opitz (2017) discuss whether to consider the
difficulties as deriving from failures inside the individual or to consider the difficulties as failures of the
education system or other societal features. They argue that medical models may result in deficit views, such as

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those expressed in the first phase interviews in MINK. Scherer et al. argue that more relational views on
mathematics difficulties may better be able to see all students as having potentials and motivation for
mathematics learning. Faragher, Brady, Clarke and Gervasoni (2008) and Faragher (2014) indicate possibilities
for all to learn mathematics in showing possibilities for students with Down syndrome.

It is worth noticing that very new insights emerged during the MINK project on the emergent theme of students’
mathematical self-concept. Teachers reported they have experienced positive effects for several students’
mathematical self-concept, and that this may be due to just a few changes in the relation between teacher and the
student in a mathematical activity. A teacher reported that he experienced that just few minutes of direct contact
with a student who is vulnerable could have a distinct and positive influence on the student’s motivation and
self-concept. Several teachers reported that their own increased recognition of a student’s learning progress
increased the student’s effort and self-concept. They realized that even small progress in a specific mathematical
concept or process could be felt as a victory for the student and affect the student’s engagement with other
mathematical and personal areas positively. Some teachers described this phenomenon in physical terms, like
‘the student grew’ and ‘the student got some steel in his spine.’

This is in line with other research in mathematics education reporting improvements in students’ self-concept.
Faragher, Beswick, Cuskelly and Nankervis (2019) report the affective impact of inclusive secondary
mathematics for learners with Down syndrome. They highlight that good affective impact is in itself positive,
that it might transfer to other academic subjects and as a tendency, it strengthens performance.

It is urgent for us to add, that student interviews revealed that the students themselves shared an individualistic
view. Students reported that their own lack of knowledge is the reason for their low participation in classroom
and group discussions. The students did not express any suggestions for how the teachers might change
communication structure, mathematical content, and teaching methods. For instance, a student said “When I
learn how to multiply, I will participate”.

However, despite the teachers’ view that most students who are vulnerable have low academic self-confidence
in mathematics, almost all students who are vulnerable expressed very positive attitudes towards mathematics
and mathematics classes. As an example, a student who was asked to rate mathematics classes on a scale of 1 -
10 replied: "I would like to say 8 but since I am having a hard time, I should rather say 5." Some teacher
educators remarked in their free style memo writings that seemingly the students experience themselves as part
of a community in the classroom and that the students see their relationship with the mathematics teacher as
very positive. It seems to us that the teachers perceive low-level achievement as more stressful than students feel
this themselves.

Theme 7: Use of aids and tools

The teacher interviews showed that teachers trusted positive effects of calculator use, especially for students
who are vulnerable. Several of the teachers declared that early use of calculators may prevent students’ low
calculating skills to slow down processes towards conceptual understanding.

The teachers planned that students should use ICT in their communication with each other and with the teacher.
The teachers observed that in some lessons with ICT, the students who are vulnerable seemed to be more active
than the other students.

In the unit on ‘Angles’ in fourth Grade, the teachers explored the use of concrete materials. The students
constructed themselves concrete protractors and measured angles for a range of physical items at the school. The
teachers anticipated that the activity would benefit all students. Nevertheless. the teacher educators observed a
negative effect for some of the students who are vulnerable. Some of the students stopped being engaged. They
seem to disappear mentally without anyone noticing. The teacher educators noticed that some teachers seem to

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be aware of this, but most teachers seemed not to be aware. We wonder if the teachers’ belief in the benefits of
using concrete materials are too positive.

Theme 8: Teaching materials and student tasks

The teacher interviews, teachers’ observations, and reflections on all joint project seminars througout the whole
project, strongly point to the lack of textbook materials and worksheets that corresponds to the students’ diverse
needs. The need for the students who are vulnerable to receive mathematically genuine and sufficiently
accessible materials emerged as one of the most obvious themes. One of the teachers expressed it like this, “It is
not fun for a fourth Grader to work with materials addressed to a first Grader". The teachers’ ongoing search for
more problem-oriented tasks continued througout the whole project and just confirmed that published tasks
prescribed for students who are vulnerable are primarily closed tasks and focused on skill-training.

In their lesson planning processes, the teachers aimed to develop and adapt tasks and activities with appropriate
complexity. The teachers looked for open tasks in order to encourage students’ curiosity, thinking and
understanding, while at the same time, preventing the scaring of students by setting the learning bar too high.
As an example, some MINK lessons included tasks requiring the students to estimate results. Observations
showed that this was complicated, especially for students who were struggling. It seemed to the teachers that the
estimating tasks confused the students, probably because they contradicted students’ beliefs in mathematics
problems requiring exact answers.

Discussion

The local drivers behind the MINK project are in line with the international issues described in the ‘Inclusion -
Setting the scene section. As stated by Scherer (2019) there is an urgent need for clarifying what does inclusive
teaching in mathematics mean, and how to raise its quality. Much needs to be done. Because inclusive teaching
in mathematics is still quite an uncultivated area of mathematics education in Denmark, we found Grounded
Theory approaches appropriate to use in the project in order to activate practice knowledge.

First, we wish to highlight the teachers’ engagement in the project. To our knowledge, teachers in Denmark
support the humanistic principles of inclusive instruction. Their intention is to assure all students’ participation
and learning to the highest possible degree. At the same time, teachers in Denmark experience the law of
inclusion as a big challenge putting pressure on their practice in local schools. The MINK project provided an
excellent opportunity to work on these challenges.

The project influenced the teachers’ thinking and enlarged their repertoire of teaching strategies. They
communicated more nuanced thinking about the motivation and learning of the students who are vulnerable,
thereby minimizing the ethical risk of pathologising and objectifying children (Nind et al., 2004). In addition,
the teachers’ reflections on teaching strategies for students who are vulnerable reached a higher quality during
the project, and the teachers came to use a broader range of teaching strategies and student activities, as hoped
for by (Faragher et al. (2016). The teachers came to believe more and more in the idea that low performing
children also should be invited into active-discovery constructive learning or co-learning with others involving
collective argumentation. At the same time, teachers were aware of the challenges and continued to give high
priority to providing questions that they thought students were able to answer.

We see the MINK project is an example of a partnership, where teachers’ experiences in the classroom are the
main drivers. In our view, the combination of the diverse elements in the MINK project might have given the
opportunities for the MINK teachers to explore and develop their views on teaching and learning mathematics
and on students who are vulnerable. We conclude from the MINK project that successful development of
inclusive practices requires a focus on the challenges that teachers experience themselves. Most importantly,
teachers’ actions and reflections influenced all phases of the project, as teachers’ own observations in
neighboring teachers’ classroom were desicive for the emergence of themes to explore, and as all teachers were

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encouraged to freely reflect and discuss their experiences and the teacher educators’ input at project seminars.
These features assured a respectful handling of the ethical challenges of risking to problematise teaching and
teachers.

However, we wonder if the MINK project, that focused on professional development of teachers for inclusive
teaching, may highlight a bigger issue about teachers’ development for more effective mathematics instruction.
We wonder if it may be easier and more legitimate for teachers to admit what they do not master concerning
inclusive instruction, so that teachers are motivated to improve. In addition, not many opportunities exist for
professional development in mathematics education. When one turns up as a reaction to a political decision,
teachers take advantage of the opportunity. Finally, the humanistic values that underpin professional discussions
on inclusion may also motivate and inspire teachers to do their best, more than the utilitarian and economic
values that may underpin public discussions on education.

The importance of affective issues that are often less exposed in mathematics education research probably could
have been more in focus in MINK. For instance, a teacher described one of the MINK students who progressed,
but wanted to hide his progress from his classmates. Therefore, it remained a secret between the teacher and
student. Maybe fear and insecurity follow the possibility of taking on a new role as a successful mathematics
learner. Research in mathematics education research owes the teachers to investigate and provide advice for this
connection between mathematics learning and mathematics identity, where both teachers’ and learners’
identities may be at stake. As an example, one teacher among the many teachers emotionally affected by project
incidents, almost jumped with joy when he told about a student showing much more motivation and potential to
learn than the teacher had ever imagined possible. In addition, the teacher felt pride in his teacher identity, and
he remarked, “It meant a lot to me, that I saw this student grow.”

The MINK project provides an insight into the complexity of the teachers’ everyday school practices and into
how teachers can participate in exploring inclusive mathematics instruction in ways that teachers may find
usable. We wish to challenge the idea from ICME 13 that
Perhaps the question is not how we can assist students with mathematical learning difficulties, but how
we can learn to build a mathematics education system that no longer disables so many mathematics
students. (Scherer, Beswick, DeBlois, Healy and Opitz 2017, p. 259)

We feel sympathy for the thought, but it is inadequate in relation to the obligation to improve the teaching of
current students, and of current pre-service and in-service teachers. The current students and teachers cannot
wait for an improved mathematics education system. In addition, we think that genuine analyses of practice are
necessary for designing new systems with improved inclusion approaches and teaching methods. We hope that
the MINK project and similar endeavors in mathematics education will support the development of teaching
approaches and curricula that enable mathematics learning for all children in inclusive settings. Unfortunately,
for the moment, no decisions are taken to continue the MINK project.

When in the future school mathematics teachers and teaching educators continue to explore the type of issues
considered during the MINK project, we anticipate, as a stepping-stone, that the following six teaching practices
have potential to further the discussions and to improve inclusive mathematics education for all students:

• Teachers’ whole-class presentation of a lesson’s activities and learning goals are short and clear.
Teachers provide time to elaborate for students who are vulnerable and to sum-up meetings during the
lesson.
• A balance is found between genuine, complex mathematics and students’ legitimate need to be able to
engage with the mathematics. Teachers are aware of the risk that repetitive and tedious tasks may cause
student passivity and low motivation.
• Using activities, which have low entry threshold, require only a short time, and give every student a
chance to experience genuine mathematics. A game may be an example of such an activity, as long as
all students have a chance to win.

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 • Teachers recognize and give feedback to individual students about their learning progress.
• The individual students are involved in feedback processes. Students report on their own effort as well
as on their success in approaching learning goals. Now and then, short pre- and post-test simple skills
and facts may be used to convince the students that they improved.
• Teachers keep exploring which teaching practices their individual students find demotivating and
motivating.

To our best judgement, these practices have potential to improve inclusive education for all students, and
especially for those who have special rights for mathematics education. We recommend that further research
considers the impact of these practices, and works to further elaborate advice for teachers and policy makers.

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