Refining Mathematical Meanings Through Multimodal Revoicing Interactions: The Case of "Faster"

• In Event: 66.075 - Modes, Meanings, and Multimodality

Abstract

How do learners come to connect embodied experience with cultural-historical definitions? We compare two cases of a learner-instructor dyad negotiating the meaning of “faster” to investigate the role embodied, multimodal discourse plays in processes of collaborative semiosis within a technology enhanced discovery-based mathematics learning context (the Mathematical Imagery Trainer for Proportion). We implicate and characterize two new forms of multimodal revoicing interactions: (a) Selective gestural repetition with co-timed elaborated verbal content and (b) Elaborated gestural content with co-timed repeated verbal content. While interesting as discursive phenomena per se and setting a research agenda to map out forms of multimodal revoicing, these forms may lead to deeper understanding of how responsive teachers support embodied learning.

Authors

• Virginia J Flood, University of California - Berkeley

• Dor Abrahamson, University of California - Berkeley