Teachers' Opportunities to Learn Through Collaborative Storytelling and Visualization

• In Event: 54.045 - Innovative Professional Development From Around the Globe: Storytelling, Networks, and Blended Learning

Abstract

In this paper, we report on the potential of StoryCircles, a process of collaboratively representing a lesson using a storyboarding tool, for engaging teachers in substantive discussions about teaching mathematics. The analysis focuses on the interactions amongst a group of inservice teachers during which they wrestled with several dilemmas of practice. We describe how engagement in the StoryCircles process allowed opportunities for teachers to discuss dilemmas of practice, possible solutions and their alternatives, as well as weigh alternatives according to their professional obligations for teaching mathematics. In reflection, the participating teachers suggested the construction of a collective storyboard as critical for enabling them to listen to and learn from one another in spite of differing perspectives.

Authors

• Amanda Marie Milewski, University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

• Patricio G. Herbst, University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

• Umut Gursel, University of Michigan - Ann Arbor