Séance Séminaire

Séminaire de Recherche en Didactique et Epistémologie des Mathématiques

The Social Essentials of Learning: Speaking in and about Mathematics Classrooms

Many of the processes by which educational phenomena are experienced and by which the products of the learning process are enacted are essentially social. This presentation will report the key findings from three complementary projects: ? the optimisation of student learning when engaged in individual, pair and collaborative group work (The Social Unit of Learning Project), ? the role of teacher selective attention in facilitating teacher professional learning (The Learning from Lessons Project) and ? the identification and promotion of the professional language by which teachers in Australia and eight other countries interact with and reflect upon the events of the mathematics classroom (The International Lexicon Project). In combination, the three projects provide different perspectives on the mathematics classroom and an empirical base from which to discuss the ways that ?the social? can shape and even constitute the learning of students and teachers. It is hoped that the projects' findings will inform the optimal functioning of the classroom as a site for student and teacher learning.