Realization tree assessment 2.0 – Ett analytiskt verktyg för att undersöka elevers möjligheter till begreppsutveckling i matematiklektioner

For both research and teacher education purposes, it is important to be able to describe the extent to which teaching gives learners the opportunity to learn concepts—to develop a discourse about mathematical objects. This study describes the analysis tool RTA-2, which focuses on classroom discourse about mathematical objects. It was tested on 25 lessons taught by five new teachers in upper secondary school. This constitutes the chapter’s two contributions – one empirical and one methodological. The new teachers—to a lesser extent than that which teacher education encourages—invite the learners to participate. Certain teacher actions can make a big difference to learner participation; for instance, giving learners time and opportunity to work on tasks before classroom discussion, or the teacher consciously involving several students. The methodological contribution is that the framework can only be used in lessons with whole-class discussion, where it can help to map students’ opportunities to develop their discourse about mathematical objects. However, the effect of central teacher actions is not captured by the tool, and since the empirical results point to the necessity of these, it is recommended that teacher actions be included with RTA-2, not least if the analysis tool is intended to be used for teacher education purposes.