Alderton, J., Ineson, G., Donaldson, G., Rowland, T., Voutsina, C. & Wilson, K. (2022). “You see things that you wouldn’t have seen otherwise”: enabling elementary preservice teachers to share different ways of seeing mathematics. Mathematics Education Research Journal. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13394-022-00423-z

Preservice teachers on 1-year postgraduate programmes engaged in shared mathematics enquiry, with a focus on visual growing patterns. We analysed interview data from 15 preservice teachers alongside their subsequent lesson plans and lesson evaluations. We explored the awarenesses that emerged through deliberate retrospective analysis of sharing what others were seeing and how this influenced prospective thinking about teaching. Not all the preservice teachers we worked with found it easy to learn from sharing what they see. However, engaging in their deliberate retrospective reflections allowed us to trace and interpret the way in which they make sense of their collective mathematical experiences in university-based sessions, and draw on them in their prospective anticipation of their teaching. Our preservice teacher participants began to develop a disposition to see mathematics as a learner does. Enabling preservice teachers to see mathematics as others see it and to become aware of the challenges associated with understanding the way in which others may see mathematics is essential for the development of educators who, in their own classrooms, will be able to anticipate their students’ solutions and underlying reasoning and thus be proactive in their planning for appropriate pedagogical actions.