Abstract: Despite widespread agreement that proof should be central toall students' mathematical experiences, many students demonstrate poor
ability with it. The curriculum can play an important role in enhancing
students' proof capabilities: teachers' decisions about what to implement
in their classrooms, and how to implement it, are mediated through the
curriculum materials they use. Yet, little research has focused on how
proof is promoted in mathematics curriculum materials and, more
specifically, on the guidance that curriculum materials offer to teachers
to enact the proof opportunities designed in the curriculum. This paper
presents an analytic approach that can be used in the examination of the
guidance curriculum materials offer to teachers to implement in their
classrooms the proof opportunities designed in the curriculum. Also, it
presents findings obtained from application of this approach to an
analysis of a popular US reform-based mathematics curriculum. Implications
for curriculum design and research are discussed.