Mathematical and Cultural Practices of Redesigning a Board Game: A New Immigrant Student's Multimodal Interactions

• In Event: 34.033 - Student Learning and Thinking Processes in the Design of Learning Environments

Abstract

Designing games engages learners in understanding and creating a complex set of meanings. In this paper, we discuss our investigation on how board game design engages learners with mathematical and cultural practices in their learning process in a Western Canadian elementary school. We analysed the multimodal interactions in redesigning a game by Jian, who recently immigrated to Canada from China and made a unique contribution to this task. In redesigning the game, Inversé, his group adopted the rules of the ancient game, Go, while engaging in mathematical thinking of area, multiplication and estimation. Jian’s work demonstrates how the learning activities involved in redesigning games encourage learners to bring in their cultural/personal resources while engaging in mathematical thinking.

Authors

• Beaumie Kim, University of Calgary

• Reyhaneh Bastani, University of Calgary