Practice-Based Pedagogy in Mathematics and Science Teaching Methods: Challenges and Adaptations in Context

Abstract

Practice-based pedagogy in mathematics and science teaching methods: Challenges and adaptations in contextJust over five years ago, conversations between mathematics and science teacher educators in our faculty led to considerations of how to develop a more consistent pedagogical approach to teacher education across subject areas and programs. The conversations included a discussion of Cycles of Enactment and Investigation (Kazemi, Franke, & Lampert, 2009), an approach to teacher education which had already shown promise in terms of supporting novice teachers in understanding the complexities of teaching (Lampert et al., 2013). In what follows, we describe our own practices as mathematics and science teacher educators, and our collaborative efforts to develop novice teachers' pedagogies of practice in three complex and varied teacher education programs via Cycles of Enactment and Investigation. More specifically, we present some of the challenges we have encountered with respect to implementing Cycles in our own academic context, along with how we have adapted the Cycle to support novice teachers within the context of our own programs. We offer this work as an introduction to Cycles of Enactment and Investigation in a Canadian setting, as well as an example of how programs developed elsewhere might be adapted to more local contexts.Research indicates that novice teachers frequently leave teacher education programs with a great deal of theoretical knowledge about effective mathematics or science teaching, but scant opportunities to practice these pedagogies in context (Grossman, Hammerness, & McDonald, 2009;Windschitl, 2006).The result in the field is that novice teachers enact a mixed bag of pedagogical approaches (Windschitl, 2006). These can range from inquiry-based methods, to rote methods formulated through the "apprenticeship of observation" -the lengthy process of enculturation into beliefs about teaching that novices have engaged in throughout their lives as students (Lortie, 1975). Over the past five years we have been developing a program of mathematics and science teaching that requires novice teachers to enact core practices (McDonald et al., 2014) that elicit and respond to students' thinking. To develop This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in 'Canadian Journal of Science, Mathematics and Technology Education'.

Contrast, Commonality, and a Call for Clarity: A Review of the Use of Core Practices in Teacher Education

“…As the description of choral counting above demonstrated, some flexibility can exist across grade spans, but the enactment remains relatively constrained. Similar dilemmas were evident in the Campbell and Elliott (2015) article described above (see also Jao et al, 2018).…”

“…Both groups of teacher educators supported TCs in practicing the facilitation of a whole group discussion; however, we are claiming that these experiences are substantially different for the TC and the teacher educator. Because teacher educators must wrestle with these choices (e.g., Jao, Wiseman, Kobiela, Gonsalves, & Savard, 2018;Peercy & Troyan, 2017), we discuss potential affordances and limitations in the "Discussion" section and below. First, however, we highlight two unique cases in which teacher educators chose to switch between the two approaches we described above.…”

“…When the teacher educator chooses a teaching practice to focus on, multiple representations can be offered and decomposition can include significant variation, in the sense that the target teaching practice is not inherently situated in a single routine nor bound to a single scenario. Although the representation and decomposition of the practice typically occur according to a specific model(s), the TC must find a way to incorporate the practice in their field placement (e.g., Ghousseini & Herbst, 2016;Jao et al, 2018).…”

“…A significant constraint in the open-design enactment approach is that the teacher educator must manage considerable complexity as TCs plan to enact the target practice across many grade levels, types of classes (e.g., history as compared to geography), and classroom contexts. The teacher educator must be able to provide an array of supports as TCs essentially create individualized versions for the enactments (e.g., Jao et al, 2018;Thompson et al, 2013;Troyan et al, 2013). Whether teacher educators are equipped to meet such high demands depends on a range of situated factors.…”

Public health crises compounded: A high school equivalency context in the time of a pandemic

“…Zack first entered our NGO in 2015 following a two-year residency on a doctoral programme in Educational Studies in Canada. There, he apprenticed in educational research and trained in high leverage, inclusive K-12 maths and science teaching methods (Jao et al 2018(Jao et al , 2020. Zack describes his entrance into the HSE programme as follows: (Math, Science, Social Studies, and RLA), in two of which I had no training.…”