Collaborative Research: Connecting Formative Assessment Simulations of Mathematics Teaching to Classroom Teaching Practices

The project will engage in the STEM discipline of mathematics and will involve undergraduates preparing to teach grades K-5 as well as teacher educators. Building on our prior work to design and study the use of teaching simulations focused on the teaching practices of eliciting and interpreting student thinking, this project will enhance the validity argument for the use of simulations as formative assessments to improve teacher preparation. A central issue to investigate is the set of connections among (1) the teaching practice the simulation is designed to emulate, (2) observed performances of the practice in the simulation setting, (3) the presentation and reception of structured feedback aimed at enhancing the knowledge, skills, and dispositions making up performance of the practice, (4) the influence of the experience and feedback for improving subsequent performance in simulations, and (5) transfer of the learned knowledge, skills, and dispositions to increasingly authentic contexts of practice. Studying these connections via a validity framework creates opportunities to understand whether and how users perceive, engage in, and make sense of the simulations and the diagnostic information they yield, and the influence of resulting feedback.