Providing a video-case-based professional development environment for prospective mathematics teachers to notice students' misconceptions in measurement

Abstract

This qualitative study examined how prospective mathematics teachers attend to, interpret, and respond to student misconceptions through providing them a video-case-based professional development environment. A sample of 30 prospective teachers attending an elective course was asked to watch video cases about student misconceptions related to the concept of measurement. Then, class discussions were held on the misconceptions, reasons, and suggestions to remedy the misconceptions. Thereafter they individually wrote down their response to an open-ended question asking them how to remedy the misconceptions. Data obtained from the discussions and individual reports were analyzed using the content analysis technique with the framework of professional noticing of children's mathematical thinking. Findings indicated that the professional development environment provided prospective teachers with an opportunity to attend to, interpret, and then decide how to respond to student misconceptions. We found that while prospective teachers generally understand how students think and why misconceptions arise, they mostly provided partial evidence for interpreting. Moreover, their suggestions for addressing mathematical misconceptions were generally based on conceptual understanding. Our findings suggested that in order to acquire skills in noticing student thinking, it is important that prospective teachers have sufficient opportunity to reflect on likely misconceptions in a professional context.