Pedagogies of Practice for Responsive Facilitation: Combining and Unpacking Representations and Approximations

• In Event: Reimagining Professional Learning Structures: Supporting Teacher Educators to Lead Ambitious and Equitable Mathematics Teacher Learning

Abstract

Research has identified key tasks in facilitating mathematics teacher professional development (TPD) but offers little guidance on designing learning activities to prepare prospective facilitators to facilitate such tasks. This proposal presents the Learning to Facilitate Framework (LTFF)–to support facilitator educators in designing, analyzing, and improving facilitator preparation activities. Below, we describe the LTFF and use it to analyze a facilitator professional development (FPD) activity focused on fostering responsive facilitation.
We draw on situative learning (Putnam & Borko, 2000), arguing that facilitators, like teachers, learn best by engaging with the activities and artifacts of their practice (e.g., Tekkumru-Kisa & Stein, 2017). The LTFF consists of the pedagogies depicted in Figure 1. In developing this framework, we incorporated Grossman et al.’s (2009) pedagogies of practice, then adapted them in key ways: 1) adding a fourth pedagogy—selecting a facilitation task; 2) replacing the “decomposition” pedagogy with “unpacking” to highlight observable facilitation practices together with the decisions underlying them; and 3) introducing an unpacking pedagogy after approximation.
The LTFF resulted from a collaboration of three projects that address both TPD and FPD. The focal TPD in this proposal aims at fostering teacher reflection through viewing videotaped lessons of unfamiliar teachers. We analyze one activity from the program's facilitator preparation course, to illustrate how the LTFF helps surface insights that facilitator educators may consult in improving and designing facilitator preparation. Using video recordings, planning materials, and facilitator educators’ reflections, we highlight how different pedagogies are combined to enhance facilitator learning.
The selected task (Figure 2) addressed how to respond to teacher frustration—a common challenge in video-based discussions. The FPD activity centered on a video (representation) in which a teacher expressed frustration about lacking time to implement lessons with multiple solution strategies. Prospective facilitators first watched, then unpacked the video and discussed balancing empathy with pedagogical guidance and avoiding patronizing responses. Next, participants approximated a real-time discussion, with one role-playing a facilitator and the facilitator educator acting as a frustrated teacher.
This role-play was followed by reflective unpacking, where participants surfaced a tension to facilitating TPD between stepping back and stepping in to “solve teachers’ problems”, as one participant said. Their reflections were deepened by shifting perspectives—first experiencing the scenario as “teachers”, then unpacking it as prospective facilitators—which enhanced their attunement to teachers’ needs.
This analysis highlights how combining (and unpacking) representations and approximations supports facilitator learning: the pre-selected TPD video allowed the foregrounding of a key facilitation challenge that may not emerge in live scenarios. Combining this video with a live approximation enabled participants to both recognize and rehearse responsive moves.
This analysis also demonstrates how the LTFF can support the design of FPD activities by providing guidance regarding the selection of key tasks, representations, approximations, and unpacking. While many facilitator preparation programs include representations, fewer explicitly engage participants in approximating and unpacking facilitation. The LTFF can support the incorporation of these latter pedagogies and the analysis of FPD activities, as well as the design of learning structures for facilitators, coaches, and teacher educators.

Authors

• Gil Schwarts, Weizmann Institute of Sciecne

• Michael Jarry-Shore, North Carolina State University

• Hilda Borko, Stanford University