Noticing Student Mathematical Thinking in the Complexity of Classroom Instruction

Noticing students' mathematical thinking is recognized as a key element of effective instruction, but novice teachers do not naturally attend to and make sense of student thinking. We describe a design experiment in which prospective teachers were engaged in analysis of minimally edited classroom video in order to support their ability to notice important student mathematical thinking within the complexity of classroom instruction. We discuss evidence of prospective teachers' learning in five iterations of the intervention, including the extent to which they developed a focus on students' mathematics, changes in the ways they discussed that mathematics, and the extent to which they focused on instances of student mathematics that had potential to be capitalized on to support student learning. Aspects of the intervention that seemed to support teachers' noticing are discussed, as well as future directions for the work. [For the complete proceedings, see ED583989.]