Effect of an Animated Classroom Story Embedded in Online Discussion on Helping Mathematics Teachers Learn to Notice

Abstract

Rich-media representations of teaching using animated cartoons can be effective to stimulate teachers’ discussion about practice, and hence help them learn productively from each other about their profession. Our research aims to design web-based interactive rich-media virtual settings for teachers to learn to do the practice of teaching. For that purpose, we seek a set of operational design principles that could be used to optimally exploit web-based interactive rich-media technologies. By operational design principles, we mean guidelines that facilitate decision-making in the creation of learning conditions. In this paper, we report on a study of the effect of embedded animated clips of instructional practice in online interactive forum/chat to support teachers in learning to notice and interpret critical events of classroom interactions. The study shows that both novice and experienced teachers actively participated in discussion and effectively noticed important events of teaching practice. The main findings include: (a) embedding animated representations of teaching in forum/chat, by serving as a common point of reference, helps both novice and experienced teachers effectively notice and discuss noteworthy events in teaching practice; (b) forum suits novice teachers better than chat, and (c) both forum and chat suit experienced teachers in different ways. This study is a critical step in a design-based research agenda toward the building of more complex virtual settings for teacher education.