2021 年 14 巻 p. 17-36
Over the last few decades mathematics education in China (refers to the Chinese mainland throughout this paper) has made important progress, along with its rapid economic and social development, and attracted increasing attention internationally. At the same time, mathematics education research in China has also experienced a noteworthy growth in a variety of aspects. To examine how mathematics education research in China has developed and hence explore what are possible and needed directions, we conducted a focused survey of research as mainly published since the early 1990s in the Journal of Mathematics Education, the sole national research journal and primary publication avenue in China particularly devoted to mathematics education research. With a focus on first research methods in terms of the general dichotomy of non-empirical methods and empirical methods and then research issues in terms of different areas in mathematics education, the results revealed that over the three decades, empirical studies have turned to be the mainstream of mathematics education research in China, while issues about mathematics teaching and learning have received the dominant attention. Issues about curriculum and textbooks have also attracted fast growing attention, particularly when the issues are related to curriculum reforms. Other topics that have received noticeable increasing attention include issues about mathematics teacher education and professional development, and issues concerning culture and history in mathematics education. Possible and needed directions of the development of mathematics education research in China are discussed at the end of this article.
