Discursive Practice and Knowledge Construction in Mathematics Classrooms in Widely Different Cultural Settings

Session Submission Type: Symposium

Abstract

The four papers in this symposium employ different analytical approaches to the study of classroom discourse and knowledge construction in particular Asian and Western mathematics classrooms. Comparison across such culturally disparate sites poses powerful questions regarding the nature of classroom social interaction and the social processes whereby knowledge is constructed and discursively performed. The symposium combines a focus on classroom patterns of participation with fine-grained analyses of associated patterns of communicative exchange and negotiation of meaning. It is our intention to raise questions relating to the development of mathematically sanctioned forms of discursive practice as the goal of mathematics instruction.

Sub Unit

• SIG-Research in Mathematics Education

Chair

• Minoru Ohtani, Kanazawa University

Papers

• Dialogic Voices in a Japanese Fourth-Grade Mathematics Classroom: A Bakhtinian Perspective - Minoru Ohtani, Kanazawa University

• Embodied Epistemic Claims in Educational Settings - Fritjof Sahlstrom, University of Helsinki; Helen Melander, Uppsala University

• Metadiscursive Rules in Three “East Asian Classrooms”: Case Studies of Mathematics Classroom Discourse From Shanghai, Seoul, and Tokyo - Li Hua Xu, The University of Melbourne; David J. Clarke, University of Melbourne

• Student-Student Classroom Discourse: Practices and Consequences for Mathematics Classrooms in Different Countries - Robert Hunting, La Trobe University; David J. Clarke, University of Melbourne; Li Hua Xu, The University of Melbourne; May Ee Vivien Wan, University of Melbourne

Discussant

• Anna Sfard, University of Haifa