In this paper we discuss findings of a study that investigated the resources and language that teachers in Malawi use to teach the concept of zero. In Malawi primary schools, textual resources available to teachers are mainly the curriculum materials in the form of syllabus, teacher guides and learner textbooks. The syllabus and teacher guides are in English while the learner textbooks are in Chichewa as teaching is in Chichewa or other local language in the first 4 years of primary school. We used the Mediating Primary Mathematics framework (Venkat and Askew in Educ Stud Math 97:71–92, 2018) and a qualitative case study of two teachers to explore the resources used, how the teachers interacted with the resources and how they moved between the two languages. Our findings include that the language and resources that the teachers used provided affordances as well as constraints for learning the concept of zero. We identified two types of challenges for the teachers; that of naming and that of representing the concept of zero. We discuss what the Malawi context illuminates about teaching zero in post-colonial multilingual settings.

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Background: Learners in many countries in sub-Saharan Africa are underperforming in important subjects such as mathematics, and research in these contexts tends to focus on the lack of resources, insufficient teacher knowledge or poor quality in teaching as explanatory factors. This study has taken a different approach.Aim: The study aimed at exploring how analysis of dilemmas that teachers encounter in the work of teaching mathematics may provide a productive approach to studying mathematics teaching in the African context.Setting: The study was conducted in a rural Malawian Grade 1 classroom, where a teacher was teaching arithmetical notation to young learners.Methods: A case study approach was applied, and data were gathered through video observations and interviews. Inductive analysis of observation data was applied to identify and unpack dilemmas of mathematics teaching.Results: Two inherent dilemmas of the complex work of teaching mathematics have been identified and discussed. One dilemma was to decide when and how to present arithmetical notations in different modalities without losing the mathematical meaning. A second dilemma was to decide how to deal with unexpected learner errors while maintaining the planned focus of the lesson.Conclusion: Considering dilemmas of teaching shifts the emphasis from evaluating the teacher to understanding and developing shared understanding of teaching as professional practice.Contribution: The suggested shift in focus acknowledges the challenges of the local context without reverting to deficit views, and it contributes to developing a shared professional language.