Using Mathematical Learning Goals to Analyze Teacher Noticing

Abstract

Teacher noticing of student mathematical thinking is increasingly seen as an important construct, but challenges remain in operationalizing and assessing teachers’ analyses of their classrooms. In this chapter, we present a methodology for analyzing teachers’ professional noticing of student mathematical thinking based on its alignment to mathematical learning goals. This process entails first deconstructing a mathematical learning goal into its conceptually important pieces (known as subgoals). Then, researchers can look for references to these subgoals in teachers’ attending, interpreting, and deciding (the three skills of noticing). When teachers reference conceptual subgoals of a learning goal in their noticing, it indicates their attention to students’ reasoning about the important mathematical ideas of a lesson. This method of data analysis can be used across a variety of contexts and allows for greater precision in understanding teacher noticing by focusing on its mathematical content and attention to relevant student thinking. In this theoretical chapter, we describe this research methodology (and the process of deconstructing learning goals and using subgoals), justify its appropriateness as a measure of teacher noticing, and provide examples from our own and others’ work to illuminate its use.