Abstract
In this chapter the authors discuss a development project conducted in Tanzania which became known as “hisabati ni maisha”—mathematics is living/life. The goal of the project was to build capacity for mathematics teaching and learning in rural and remote communities. The work was based on lessons learned from research conducted in Tanzania prior to the project, Canadian indigenous perspectives and complexity thinking. Of critical importance was the building and nourishing of relationships between the team and participants and among participants, and ongoing openness to emergent ideas and strategies. This openness led to constant tinkering with the design and activities of the project which we believe led to a project that had better and unexpected outcomes. We pay particular attention to some of the ways in which we tinkered with the design of the project in light of interactions among the project team and participants in the project.
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- 1.
We use of the word development in two different ways—to refer to the development project and to refer to teacher professional development. To avoid confusion, we will use the phrase GAC project to refer to the capacity building project (or “development project” funded by Global Affairs Canada. We use teacher professional development (or PD) to refer both to the professional learning activities and the concept of development for professionals.
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Simmt, E., Binde, A., Glanfield, F., Mgombelo, J. (2019). Developing Capacity for Teacher Inservice Education in Rural Tanzania: Embracing Emergent Phenomena. In: Eloff, I. (eds) Handbook of Quality of Life in African Societies. International Handbooks of Quality-of-Life. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-15367-0_17
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