RUME 25
2023
Omaha, Nebraska
What Are Instructors Doing to Initiate Refinements of Students’ Definitions?
Page: 1012
A key feature of inquiry-based instruction is to develop formal mathematics by directly building on student thinking and contributions, which often requires engaging students in refining their work. In our experiences we have noticed that it is challenging for instructors to support this refining activity and so we see a need to better understand what instructors can do in-the- moment to initiate refinements. In this study, we investigated how three instructors across four courses guided their students through the refinement of one definition. We identified three different moves that these instructors used to support the definition refinements: (1) suggest an edit with implicit mathematical reasoning, (2) suggest an edit with explicit mathematical reasoning, and (3) ask a question to create a problematic situation. The first two moves focused on the refinement itself whereas the third move focused on a problem to motivate a need for a refinement. We discuss future research directions and implications of our work.