Details of the Noticing & Rehearsal Workshops

The learning opportunities we provided in the workshops align with the first two quadrants of the learning cycle for professionals proposed by McDonald, Kazemi and Kavanagh (2013). Specifically, the workshops involved the following: (1) introducing the PSTs to the core practice of eliciting, interpreting and using student thinking using classroom video clips and (2) approximating the core practice in a sheltered environment with input by coaches.

Overview of the activities in the workshops

Workshops

Major activities

1

Viewing, discussing and analysing the published videos

Viewing and analysing a series of authentic classroom video clips showing teachers enacting the focal core practice to different extents

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2

First rehearsals

Performing first rehearsals with student actors
Watching peers from another subject discipline in the first rehearsal
Reflection on the first rehearsal experience

3

Viewing and analysing
videos

Viewing and analysing an exemplary video taken from an authentic classroom
Watching a rehearsal video of a peer from the same discipline
Watching and reflecting on one’s own rehearsal video (CIB)

4

Viewing and analysing POV footage

Sharing of video-viewing experience with peers
Sharing and discussing metaphors representing video-viewing experience
Watching and reflecting on one’s own POV video footage
Watching and reflecting on student perspective POV video footage

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Performing a rehearsal for the second time
Watching peers teach the same topic in the second rehearsal
Reflection on the second rehearsal experience

5

Second rehearsals

6

Summary

Sharing of rehearsal experiences with peers
Collective reflection on rehearsal experiences

We first engaged PSTs in analysing videos showing teachers using the focal core practice to different agrees. Afterwards, the PSTs approximated the core practice in rehearsals (Lampert et al., 2013) for which the PSTs planned a 15-minute teaching segment in which they practise the core practice. We asked the PSTs to practise ‘talk moves’, which are verbal prompts (simple statements or questions) for revealing student thinking and for orchestrating classroom dialogue (Resnick, Michaels, & O’Connor, 2010’ Michaels & O’Connor, 2012). To simulate the complex classroom interaction inherent in responsive classrooms, we asked some student actors whom the rehearsing PSTs were not familiar with to role-play different student roles. For example, some student actors would verbalise their partial scientific understanding during the rehearsals in order to elicit the rehearsing PSTs’ in-the-moment teaching decisions. Immediately after the rehearsals, the coaches led rehearsal debrief discussions by inviting the rehearsing PSTs to share their immediate reflection on the rehearsal. They then invited the non-rehearsing PSTs to provide comments on the rehearsals. The coaches also asked questions and provided feedback whenever necessary.

The rehearsals were captured by three cameras at different positions of the classroom (i.e., teacher point-of-view (T-POV) camera goggles, student point-of-view (S-POV) camera goggles and an observer camera in the back (O-CIB)). See the figure and table below:

Figure 5: Video camera positions and design of the rehearsal activity

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Table 1: Video camera types, positions and functions

The following video clips give you a sense of what the three types of footage look like. The videos feature the first several minutes of the rehearsal by a PST who asked students to work in groups and then used talk moves to orchestrate whole-class discussion. To access the videos, please fill in the following form. Please follow the ethical guidelines concerning the use of videos. You can find the transcript of this video here. Remember to follow the ethical guidelines concerning the use of videos.

Observer Camera-in-the-back view footage

(O-CIB footage)

Teacher point-of-view footage

(T-POV footage)

Student point-of-view footage

(S-POV footage)

Composite footage

The PSTs were then asked to watch their peers’ videos and their own videos (T-POV, S-POV, O-CIB). We hoped this activity would foster their reflection on their own practices from multiple vantage points. We also asked them to view their peers’ videos to promote their learning.

Collectively, our workshop has three unique elements that make it distinct from prior efforts to promote PSTs’ responsiveness:

1

Opportunities to watch and analyse different teachers’ enactments of the focal core practice. The PSTs were able to see how the same core practice was interpreted and enacted differently by different teachers. Different types of video (own, peer, published) were used in the workshop (Zhang, Lundeberg, Koehler, & Eberhardt, 2011). The published videos presented the focal core practices and the use of talk moves by different teachers for the PSTs’ analysis, the PSTs’ own videos served as a mirror to stimulate PSTs’ reflection on their own enactment of core practices, and the peer videos provided a window into other novice PSTs’ enactments of core practices in the same topic.

2

Involvement of student actors. We recruited student actors to role-play different roles (Figure 1), including target students (Tobin & Gallagher, 1987), silent students (Jones & Gerig, 1994), and students with disruptive behaviour. We purposely created student roles that expressed partial science understandings and/or misconceptions to stimulate PSTs’ in-the-moment teaching decisions and reactions in response to emergent/unexpected student thinking.

3

Examining the rehearsal experience from multiple vantage points captured in videos. The PSTs had opportunities to examine three types of footage of their own rehearsals: O-CIB, T-POV and S-POV footage. We believe POV footage offers unique physical access to the participants’ interactions with student actors that are central to responsive teaching. PSTs also watched footage from student perspectives because they rarely have a chance to see their own teaching through a student’s eyes. These video clips collectively captured the complexity of classroom interactions from multiple perspectives, allowing the PSTs to witness how responsive teaching practices and interactions were enacted from both the teachers’ and students’ perspectives.