Elena Ausejo

Mathematics Education in Spain and Portugal

Spain Elena Ausejo This section offers a brief overview of Spanish mathematics education over the last two centuries, in the context of the educational system as a whole, which in turn depended to a very large extent on the country’s political and economic circumstances. Although political instability delayed the regulation of secondary education in Spain until 1836, the syllabi of 1845 and 1857 set up the basic structure throughout the nineteenth century. The country developed a system for preparing mathematics teachers that was relatively demanding – above all with respect to mathematical knowledge – and absorbed international experience through translations of textbooks. Later, Spain took part in the principal international movements in mathematics education, becoming involved in the ICMI and the reform movements of the 1950s–1970s.

New Perspectives on Commercial Arithmetic in Renaissance Spain

Commercial arithmetics in Spain date back to the fourteenth century, though they were first printed only in the following century (See the following recent studies: [Caunedo / Cordoba 2000], [Caunedo 2007], [Docampo Rey 2004], [Docampo Rey 2009].). Actually, the first printed book on mathematics in Spain was probably the second on the subject to appear in the entire Western world: Francesc Santcliment’s Summa de l’art d’Aritmetica, first published in Catalan (Barcelona, 1482), and later in Spanish (Zaragoza, ca. 1487) [Malet 1998].