Open Access

The world is facing severe global challenges such as climate change, food security, rising migration, social justice, or the current corona crisis. In these times, citizenship education seems more important than ever. How can this citizenship education relate to mathematics and science learning? The research project MaSDiV (Supporting mathematics and science teachers in addressing diversity and promoting fundamental values) connected mathematics and science with citizenship education by modeling real-life problems relevant to society. In this paper, we present the foundational design features of the PD course as well the results from the accompanying evaluation of this PD course, which was implemented by partners in six countries to support teachers in connecting mathematics and science education with citizenship education. More specifically, we investigate how participating teachers experienced the PD program; how their self-efficacy beliefs, learning-related beliefs, as well as teaching practices change; and which factors contributed to that change. In order to investigate the outcome of the PD program, we surveyed N = 311 mathematics and science teachers’ pre- and post-participation of the PD in six different European countries. Among others, our results show that in general, most participating teachers reported a high overall satisfaction with the course across all six participating countries. They also indicate that teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs about using relevant contexts, their learning-related beliefs about the benefits of using contexts, as well as their own teaching practice changed significantly after participating in the MaSDiV PD course.

In this paper, we discuss the theoretical background of mathematical modelling and its connection to citizenship education. Citizenship education in this context means that young people are equipped with competencies to respond as responsible citizens in situations relevant for society. To outline the connection between mathematical modelling and citizenship education in theory, we discuss the aims of mathematical modelling, modelling competences and the connection between numeracy and modelling. Based on these reflections we present an extended modelling cycle that specifically highlights modelling steps relevant to citizenship education. To show how the theoretical connection between mathematical modelling and citizenship education can be used in teaching practice, we describe three different examples of modelling tasks and analyse them with the help of the extended modelling cycle. We argue that the three tasks support different learning aims in relation to citizenship education and require modellers to carry out different steps of the extended modelling cycle. As an example of context, we used the pandemic caused by COVID-19, as it affected the quality of human life greatly, as all students in the Western world experienced.