Aki Murata

How Should Research Contribute to Instructional Improvement? The Case of Lesson Study

Lesson study, a Japanese form of professional development that centers on collaborative study of live classroom lessons, has spread rapidly in the United States since 1999. Drawing on examples of Japanese and U.S. lesson study, we propose that three types of research are needed if lesson study is to avoid the fate of so many other once-promising reforms that were discarded before being fully understood or well implemented. The proposed research includes development of a descriptive knowledge base; explication of the innovation’s mechanism; and iterative cycles of improvement research. We identify six changes in the structure and norms of educational research that would enhance the field’s capacity to study emerging innovations such as lesson study. These changes include rethinking the routes from educational research to educational improvement and recognizing a “local proof route”; building research methods and norms that will better enable us to learn from innovation practitioners; and increasing our capacity to learn across cultural boundaries.

Introduction: Conceptual Overview of Lesson Study

Lesson study is a collaboration-based teacher professional development approach that originated in Japan (Fernandez and Yoshida 2004; Lewis and Tsuchida 1998; Stigler and Hiebert 1999). Lesson study attracted the attention of an international audience in the past decade, and in 2002 it was one of the foci for the Ninth Conference of the International Congress on Mathematics Education (ICME). It subsequently spread to many other countries and more than a dozen international conferences and workshops were held around the world in which people shared their experiences and progress with lesson study as they adopted this new form of professional development in their unique cultural contexts (e.g., Conference on Learning Study 2006; Fujita et al. 2004; Lo 2003; National College for Educational Leadership 2004; Shimizu et al. 2005).

Mathematics Teaching and Learning as a Mediating Process: The Case of Tape Diagrams

This article examines how visual representations may mediate the teaching and learning of mathematics over time in Japanese elementary classrooms. Using the Zone of Proximal Development Mathematical Learning Model (Murata & Fuson, 2006; Fuson & Murata, 2007), the process of mediation is explicated. The tape diagram, a central visual representation used in Japanese mathematics curriculum, is explored for its roles and the student learning that is intended to be mediated over time, illuminating aspects of the process. The study argues that the consistent and coherent use of one representation can bridge student understanding over time, focusing on mathematical relationships and problem-solving processes. The study also suggests different instructional approaches between U.S. and Japanese curricula that are reflected in the uses of representations.

Lesson Study in Preservice Elementary Mathematics Methods Courses: Connecting Emerging Practice and Understanding

Teacher education programs have long struggled to find the best way to prepare quality teachers, and research has shown that teacher educators face several challenges. Lortie (1975) uses the term “apprenticeship of observation” in explaining how teachers’ own schooling experiences shape their beliefs about teaching, and ultimately how they interact with students in their classrooms. Brouwer and Korthagen (2005) stipulate that teachers become socialized into the profession, adopting more traditional models of teaching that are consistent with the culture at most schools, despite the kind of experiences they have had in teacher education programs. We must question how much influence the teacher education programs can have on teachers given that such socialization is a strong factor impacting practice.

Diversity and High Academic Expectations Without Tracking: Inclusively Responsive Instruction

This article presents an instructional model (inclusively responsive instruction) that takes advantage of student diversity in order to differentiate student learning while maintaining high expectations. In the history of U.S. education, diversity and academic rigor were often considered at odds, and educators tried to emphasize one at the expense of the other. This article uses a detailed set of examples from Japanese mathematics education to illustrate how diverse ideas, as important resources, can drive classroom instruction. Teaching and learning supports are described that are essential to helping all teachers balance group and individual learning in classrooms. Current U.S. instructional approaches and the model of inclusively responsive instruction are compared in terms of balancing diversity and academic expectations.

Teacher Learning with Lesson Study

Lesson study is a form of teacher professional development that originated in Japan. This article gives an overview of lesson study with its structure, variation, and history and reviews emerging lesson study research literature to explicate models of teacher learning with lesson study as well as to identify future research agendas. Teachers learn with lesson study by developing knowledge for teaching, establishing professional communities, and producing teaching resources. The challenges teachers face with lesson study in new cultures should be considered as learning opportunities by which teachers develop necessary inquiry skills, and that will help us understand teacher learning and existing teaching systems better.