Formation of Math Teachers’Community in Saitama in 1970’ : From the viewpoints of On the Job Training and Editing Training Manuals

[出版社版]This paper is about the formation process of Mathematics Teachers’ Community in Saitama, when they had new mathematics movement in 1970’s. Because of so called “Sputnik crisis” in 1957, the modernization of mathematics education became one of the important issues in Japanese society. New mathematics concepts, such as set theory, function, probability, and so on, were strongly focused on by mathematics teachers. However, since such concepts were new to most of the teachers, Prefectural Board of Education had had hard time to train them to be familiar with such new mathematics topics. One of the strategies they used was “On the Job Training” for school teachers. Some capable math teachers were selected to have one-year sabbatical leave for university, and they have become regional leaders for teacher training or seminar. The major method they used was “Lesson Study”, and many teachers even tried to teach in other schools from where they were working. One of the best ways to do was having lessons on Saturday. Schools had regular classes in the morning, and additional lessons for Lesson Study were scheduled in the afternoon. Lesson Study had become widely implemented in all of schools in Saitama, and teachers’ community for Lesson Study implementation had been formed. In order to make Lesson Study in proper, they also tried to make teachers’ manuals about new math contents. Some capable teachers, who were selected for one year sabbatical leave and had training at university, tried to edit teachers’ manuals to show how to teach new mathematics concepts. Such manuals have been published every year for both elementary and lower secondary teachers. Teachers’ manuals have played important role to make school teachers to be familiar with new mathematics topics, and make them able to teach in proper. Mathematics teachers’ community played as not only editors of teachers’ manuals but also instructors at Lesson Study. They even had recruited capable younger teachers to be editorial members for teachers’ manuals, as well as to be recommended as future regional leader for having one year sabbatical leave and had training at university