Analysis of Mozambican Elementary Mathematics Textbooks Compared with Japanese Textbooks Focusing on Tasks and Exercises Related to the Real World

Abstract

The importance of sociocultural perspective in curriculum emphasized in the context of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Textbook has a strong relation of all three types, intended, implemented and attained curriculum. Therefore, analyzing sociocultural features of the textbooks leads to improving quality of education in the context of SDGs. This study aims to clarify the pertinent characteristics of Mozambican elementary mathematics textbooks from a sociocultural perspective (in comparison to Japanese ones) by focusing on how they treat ‘real-world’ mathematics. The following four perspectives are discussed: (1) Proportion of the tasks related to the real world via the introduction of new learning content (2) Proportion of exercises related to the real world (3) Categorization of the situation of the tasks and exercises related to the real world. As a result, we found that there are few problems which are related directly to the real world in the Mozambican elementary mathematics textbooks. The content of the problems related to the real world are about the tax system and salaries, which means students are given opportunities to view and think mathematically about their social system right from the elementary school age. In addition, various exercises related to social science topics are contained to help students to understand and hand down Mozambican culture.