2020 Volume 13 Pages 57-78
It is important to understand what and how mathematics teachers learn in mathematics professional development (MPD) programs. In this paper, we examined mid-career teachers’ learning in our program wherein participant teachers conducted lesson study and analyzed students’ learning by collecting and discussing multiple sources of data. We approached the issue of teacher learning from the aspect of broadening teachers’ perspectives on teaching and learning in a mathematics lesson. By examining the case of two teachers and focusing on their practical research activity in a lesson on transformations of geometrical figures, we identified four perspectives. These perspectives emerged and developed in different activities and at different periods between the planning of the lesson and the presentation of the final report. The process of growth was further examined using the construct of contextualization. An analysis of two sessions held immediately after the research lesson revealed that the teachers used the four perspectives to recontextualize or decontextualize several classroom situations and that dialogic interaction made it possible for the teachers to form novel interpretations of the behaviors and utterances of students and to reflect on their own instructional actions. This paper thus provides information on features of mid-career teacher learning in a university MPD program that emphasized practical research activity.
