While the mathematics education community encourages teachers to support students in developing a more meaningful contextual understanding of algebraic symbols, very little is known about teachers' quantitative understandings of algebraic symbols themselves. The goal of this study was to fill this gap and examine secondary teachers' ability to contextualize algebraic symbols, in particular notation that results from algebraic generalization. The results led to the identification of various conceptual hurdles that teachers encountered as they endeavored to articulate the underlying quantities as well as various conceptualizations they invoked, both productive and unproductive, in their attempt to overcome these challenges. [For complete proceedings, see ED581294.]