The use of dialogue and tools to develop students’ mathematical language and meta‐cognition

Abstract

This paper presents the analysis of two representative lessons drawn from a cross case study of K–12 classrooms in which students and their teachers engaged in a collaborative dialogic inquiry process (data‐driven dialogue) to co‐construct meaning from assessment results. The representative lessons illustrate a significant shift from teacher‐centered uses of assessment results – determining student mastery of content, contributing to a course grade, sorting students into remediation groups, etc. Rather, in these lessons, the first use of formal classroom assessment results is to engage students in explaining their results and in identifying what actions they will take. The purpose of this analysis is to better understand student participation in a dialogic process of making meaning of assessment results, to document interaction among the teacher and her students, and to investigate the use and role of mediating artifacts in this emergent practice. The study suggests shifts in the roles of the teacher and learner in production of learning; students demonstrating agency in their learning process; peer‐to‐peer interaction and collaboration focused on learning; student use of mathematical language in describing the meaning of their assessment results; and, student use of meta‐cognitive strategies including student self‐evaluation, self‐monitoring and goal setting.

Keywords:

• data‐driven dialogue
• formative assessment
• meta‐cognition
• mathematical language
• socio‐cultural historical theory