Multiplicative reasoning task design in teacher education with student teachers in Scottish schools: valuing diversity, developing flexibility and making connections

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article considers the development of synthetic landscapes of multiplicative reasoning constructed by student teachers (pre-service teachers). It explores the implications of working in a way that integrates literature from Maths Recovery, Cognitively Guided Instruction and Realistic Mathematics Education approaches. The aim is to better understand how working in this way affects student teacher interactions with learners, the questions they ask, the tasks they design; their capacity to value diversity in literature and develop their flexibility in practice. The findings indicate that this embodied approach to task design within teacher education led to all student teachers engaging in a participatory view of learning mathematics, discussing a range of strategies and models used by the children. Although many student teachers experimented with different pedagogical approaches and were beginning to design their own tasks, very few understood the underlying relational structures between a series of connected tasks within number strings or investigations.