CAREER: Sparking "Number Talks" to Strengthen Mathematical Identities

This five-year participatory research project follows students from transitional kindergarten to third grade to understand whether and how Number Talks (i.e., ten-to-fifteen-minute math discussions where students mentally solve mathematics problems and then come together as a class to share their mathematical reasoning) can empower students to develop productive mathematical identities while strengthening their number sense. First, this study aims to identify the strengths (e.g., knowledge, skills, and resources that individuals create through their interactions with others and their environment) each student brings with them to mathematics class. Second, by leveraging these strengths, educators will intentionally design, enact, and revise number talks in ways that support productive mathematical identity development. Third, this project aims to determine the design principles of number talks that positively impact productive mathematical identity development while understanding how mathematical identity evolves over time. In sum, this project has the potential to improve transitional kindergarten to third grade mathematics education for students by intentionally leveraging (and confirming) resources for productive mathematical identity development. Further, this project will also equip educators to design number talks building upon students’ strengths and to also support their efforts to positively develop students’ mathematical identities.

This project focuses on using participatory research methodologies. Participatory research methodologies emphasize direct engagement of local priorities and perspectives and are co-constructed in partnership with students, caregivers, teachers, and community partners. In this project, I recruit students and caregivers to engage in participatory photography to document how mathematics is used in everyday, out-of-school activities. Then, teachers will engage in participatory research via Math Labs to use the photos taken by students and caregivers to iteratively plan, enact, reflect, and revise Number Talks connected to students’ strengths. Together, we will seek to understand how the mathematical objects contained in the Number Talk photos mediate learning and identity development. Here, we use qualitative analysis to understand the alignments/contradictions between interactions (people and tools), norms and practices (positioning within the learning community), frames (strengths lens), and narratives (resources for recognition) that afford/constrain mathematical identity development. Further, we will identify design principles of number talks (i.e., norms and practices) that support or hinder the development of productive mathematical identities. Findings of this project will help us to understand how the integration of learning, knowing, and doing that are familiar to students can be leveraged to build positive mathematical identities.