“People Can See How Other People’s Minds Work”: Students’ Perspectives on Work-Sharing Across Two Classrooms

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Friday 7:45 am - Gold 3
  In Roundtable Session: Illuminating Student Perspectives of Mathematics Classrooms

Abstract

“Work-sharing practices,” in which students share their mathematical work with the class, are a widely recommended and implemented instructional strategy. Yet these practices can be enacted in many ways, such that students may experience work-sharing as a high-stakes activity that reinforces hierarchies of mathematical ability and/or they may experience it as an opportunity to be positioned with authority, both of which can impact learning and engagement. Accordingly, I examine 12 focal students’ perceptions of work-sharing across two sixth grade mathematics classrooms. Through qualitative analysis of student interviews, I found that students in the two classrooms conceptualized work-sharing practices and the positions these practices made available to them remarkably differently. Findings highlight the need to consider students’ perspectives on this practice.

Author

• Miriam Simone Leshin, University of Virginia