University of New Hampshire University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository Doctoral Dissertations Student Scholarship Winter 2006 Exploring lesson study as a form of professional development for enriching teacher knowledge and classroom practices Melissa K. Mitcheltree University of New Hampshire, Durham Follow this and additional works at: https://scholars.edu/dissertation Recommended Citation Mitcheltree, Melissa K., "Exploring lesson study as a form of professional development for enriching teacher knowledge and classroom practices" (2006).edu/dissertation/356 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Scholarship at University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized administrator of University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository. For more information, please contact Scholarly.
Exploring Lesson Study as a Form of Professional Development for Enriching Teacher Knowledge and Classroom Practices BY Melissa K. University of New Hampshire (2004) DISSERTATION Submitted to the University of New Hampshire in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Mathematics Education December 2006 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. UMI Number: 3241647 INFORMATION TO USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted.
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Further reproduction prohibited without permission. This dissertation has been examined and approved. Dissertation Director, Dr. Sonia Hristovitch Assistant Professor of Mathematics Dr.
Wansart Associate Professor of Education J. Graham Professor of Mathematics Dr. Edward Hinson Associate Professor of Mathematics Dr. William Geeslin Associate Professor of Mathematics Date Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner.
Further reproduction prohibited without permission. DEDICATION This work is dedicated with all my love to my daughter Katherine Rose Mitcheltree. May she use this as an inspiration to always persevere to achieve her lifetime goals! iii Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First, I would like to thank my husband Thomas Mitcheltree for all of his understanding and support throughout this long process. I am blessed with a husband that always offers encouragement. For his love and support, I am grateful. Next, I would like to thank my parents - Bonnie Wardenga and the late Joseph Napoleon.
They instilled in me the dedication and motivation to succeed. To Sonia Hristovich, my thesis advisor I will be forever grateful. I appreciate her time and patience. Thank you to Bill Wansart for working as my minor advisor.
I enjoyed all of our discussions of Barbara Rogoffs work. A big thank you to my other committee members: Karen Graham, Bill Geeslin, and Ed Hinson. I appreciate your time and dedication to graduate students. Lastly I would like to thank my friends and neighbors.
Your words of encouragement and inquiries about my progress helped to keep me going. In particular, Anna Titova and Anne Collins, I cherish our friendship, and I thank you both for all of your help. iv Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
TABLE OF CONTENTS DEDICATION. iv LIST OF TABLES.1 Why Lesson Study and Teacher Knowledge?. 10 Mathematics Content Knowledge. 10 Pedagogical Content Knowledge.34 Forms o f Teacher Knowledge.
34 Lesson Planning and Reflection. 37 Lesson Study for Improving Teacher Knowledge. 46 Data Coding and Analysis. LESSON BY LESSON RESULTS.
56 Goal Setting Meeting. 60 Mathematics Content Knowledge.61 Meaning and Connections to Prior Knowledge. 62 Choosing Example Problems. 73 Anticipating Possible Student Misconceptions.80 Assessing Student Understanding During the Lesson.
91 Mathematics Content Knowledge.91 Prior Knowledge Connections.97 Choosing Example Problems. 98 Anticipating Possible Student Misconceptions. 108 Assessing Student Understanding During the Lesson. 112 Creating Meaning and Prior Knowledge Connections.112 vi Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner.
Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Choosing Example Problems. 114 Assessing Student Understanding During the Lesson. RESULTS BY STAGES ACROSS LESSONS.
TEACHER BY TEACHER RESULTS. DISCUSSION AND IMPLICATIONS.175 Interaction Between Mathematics Content Knowledge and Pedagogical Content Knowledge. 205 APPENDIX A LESSON STUDY MATERIALS.206 Timeline o f Data Collection. 206 Lesson Study Tool for Planning and Describing Study Lessons.
209 Lesson Plan for Lesson # 1. 215 Lesson Plan for Lesson # 2. 219 Lesson Plan for Lesson # 3. 222 APPENDIX B IRB AND CONSENT FORMS.
226 Teacher Consent Form.226 Student Consent Form. 230 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. LIST OF TABLES 1.1 Contrasting Views of Professional Development .1 Initial Interview Questions .2 Common Final Interview Questions.47 viii Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner.
Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ABSTRACT Exploring Lesson Study as a Form of Professional Development for Enriching Teacher Knowledge and Classroom Practices by Melissa K. Mitcheltree University of New Hampshire, December, 2006 This study tracked the development of teacher knowledge through a professional development experience called lesson study. Lesson study is a Japanese professional development process in which a group of teachers develop a series of lessons using the following stages: planning lessons, teaching/observing the lessons, reflecting on lessons taught as well as sharing and discussing the lessons with their colleagues (Lewis, 2002).
The aim of this study was to explore how the lesson study process influenced teacher knowledge of mathematics content and pedagogical content. Study participants were four secondary mathematics teachers from a rural high school in the Northeast. All participants were certified in teaching secondary mathematics and varied in their educational background and teaching experience. These four teachers and the researcher created a Mathematics Lesson Study Group at the high school level.
Throughout the 2004-2005 school year, this group met to plan three different mathematics lessons. After planning ix Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. each lesson, one teacher from the group taught the lesson to his/her class of students while the other teachers observed.
Following the teaching/observing stage of the lesson development, the teachers had a debriefing meeting to reflect on how the lesson went and to propose possible revisions. Each stage of the lesson study process- planning, teaching/observing, and debriefing was examined carefully in order to determine how the various aspects of that stage contributed to the development of the teachers’ mathematics content and pedagogical content knowledge. This information was gathered from videotapes and teachers’ notes taken at all meetings, journal reflections following the meetings, initial and final interviews, and classroom observations. All data was analyzed qualitatively.
Results indicate that the teachers’ mathematics content knowledge in the form of substantive and syntactic knowledge was influenced throughout all stages of the lesson study process. In addition, during each of the stages of lesson study the teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge evolved in the areas of prior knowledge connections, anticipating student misconceptions, questioning, choosing example problems, assessing student understanding during the lesson, and curriculum knowledge. Lastly, the results support how important the components of planning and reflection, within the lesson study model, are to the enrichment of teachers’ knowledge and classroom practices. IX Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner.
Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION Purpose This research is a study of teacher knowledge development in the context of in-service professional development experience for mathematics teachers. The purpose of this research was to understand how mathematics teachers’ knowledge progresses as they participate in lesson study as a professional development experience. Lesson study is a Japanese professional development method in which teachers systematically examine their classroom practice in order to improve instruction (Fernandez & Chokshi, 2002).
Lewis (2002) reports the following four stages of the Japanese model of the Lesson Study Cycle: Goal-Setting and Planning, Research Lesson, Lesson Discussion, and Consolidation of Learning. In the first stage of lesson study, a group of teachers work together to establish a goal or a set of goals that they want to accomplish with their students and teachers meet regularly to plan a lesson. Once the group of teachers plans the lesson in the second stage of lesson study, 1 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
at least one of the teachers conducts the lesson while the other teachers observe how the lesson is carried out in the classroom. In the third stage of lesson study after the lesson is taught, the group of teachers meet s again to debrief or reflect on the success of the group’s lesson. In the fourth stage, if desired the teachers re-teach a refined lesson and study it again. In this study, stage one is referred to as the planning stage, stage two is referred to as the teaching/observing stage, stage three is referred to as the debriefing stage, and the fourth stage was not carried out.
As the teachers work together to plan, teach/observe, and debrief the lesson, there are many opportunities for the teachers to share instructional strategies and learn from one another. During this type of professional development experience teachers are given the opportunity to enhance their knowledge of mathematics content and pedagogy. The purpose of this study was to examine and clearly document the elements of the lesson study experience that aid in the development of teacher knowledge. The results of this study add to the limited amount of research on lesson study in the United States and provide an examination of lesson study and its effect on teacher knowledge.
Why Lesson Study and Teacher Knowledge? As we focus on teacher knowledge, we must consider the complex nature of this knowledge. Teacher knowledge will be examined in two forms - mathematics content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge. Mathematics content knowledge also referred to by others as subject matter 2 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
Pedagogical knowledge consists of the components of the teaching process that could be applied to any content area such as lesson planning, classroom management, and assessment. Kauchak and Eggen (1993) state “pedagogical knowledge is the information we gather about the process of teaching itself from research and the experience of expert teachers that helps us understand connections between teaching and learning” (p. Pedagogical content knowledge is the content knowledge that is necessary for teaching (Shulman, 1986). Ball and Bass (2000) use the term pedagogical content knowledge to describe a “unique subject-specific body of pedagogical knowledge that highlights the close interweaving of subject matter and pedagogy in teaching” (p.
Pedagogical content knowledge is a subset of content knowledge that is necessary for planning and executing lessons. In teaching mathematics, pedagogical content knowledge may include useful representations; unifying concepts; clarifying examples and counter examples; helpful analogies; and important relationships and connections among concepts (Grouws & Schultz, 1996). My experience as a secondary mathematics teacher has sparked my interest in the professional development of in-service teachers. The professional development activities initiated by the school system, where I was once an employee, consisted of small amounts of information about diverse topics, rather than setting out to reach long-term goals for the school or individual teachers.
3 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Many professional development workshops or activities have teachers consider how the instructional strategy or “best practice” can be used in the classroom, but may not have the teacher actively plan an activity or lesson that can be directly applied to their own classroom. This type of professional development activity does not contribute as well to my knowledge growth.