Facilitating Formative Feedback: Using Simulations to Impact the Capability of Novice Mathematics Teachers

在他们最初的教师准备经验中，职前教师需要有意义的形成性评估，以支持他们作为新的数学教师发展他们的技能和实践。虽然实地实习提供了一些这样的机会，但职前教师往往无法看到、体验和制定全方位的基于研究的有效数学教学实践。这项为期四年的二级评估设计与开发研究探索了如何通过精心设计的模拟为职前教师提供形成性评估机会，作为实地实习背景反馈的补充或替代。将设计一组模拟，重点是激发和解释学生的思维。这些模拟将用于三个不同规模和人口统计的小学教师准备项目的职前教师。通过分析模拟中的表现、对职前教师的访谈以及教师教育工作者的反馈，我们将收集数据，以了解参与模拟的反馈如何增强职前教师引出和解释学生思维的能力。一项相关研究将确定模拟作为评估工具的可靠性和有效性。模拟将分三个周期开发和测试，每个周期之间进行迭代改进。第一个周期将有10名职前教师参与一个试点研究，与参加课程分开，在这个研究中，职前教师参与一个模拟，接受形成性反馈，并参与第二个类似的模拟。这个周期将评估反馈对后续绩效的影响程度。在第二个周期中，该项目将与三名不同背景下的教师合作，在所有职前教师的基础数学方法课程的一个部分中进行模拟。在最后一个周期中，模拟的使用将从扮演学生角色的研究团队演员转变为由三所院校的教师教育工作者招募的现场演员。为了验证这些工具，将进行研究者可靠性和教师教育者可靠性研究，以评估四种不同的模拟评估在多大程度上为目标教学实践提供一致的反馈，以及评估评分的可靠性。将进行一项G研究（概括性研究），以评估教师参与者是差异的主要来源的程度，与学生参与者或管理评估的评分者的差异相比。结果将在各种数学教育环境中传播，模拟材料将提供给从业人员，并适应混合现实模拟平台的额外使用。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

During their initial teacher preparation experiences, preservice teachers need meaningful formative assessment that can support them in developing their skills and practices as new teachers of mathematics. While field placements offer some such opportunities, too often preservice teachers are not able to see, experience, and enact a full range of research-based effective mathematics teaching practices. This Level II four-year Design and Development Study in the Assessment strand explores the ways in which thoughtfully designed simulations can provide preservice teachers with formative assessment opportunities that serve as a complement to, or alternative to as needed, feedback derived from field placement contexts. A set of simulations will be designed with a focus on eliciting and interpreting student thinking. These simulations will be used with preservice teachers in three elementary teacher preparation programs of varying size and demographics. Data will be collected to understand the ways in which the feedback from engaging in the simulations serves to strengthen preservice teachers' abilities to elicit and interpret student thinking through an analysis of performance in the simulations, interviews with preservice teachers, and feedback from teacher educators. An associated study will establish the reliability and validity of the simulations as assessment tools.Simulations will be developed and tested in three cycles, with iterative improvements made between each cycle. The first cycle will involve 10 preservice teachers in a pilot study separate from participation in a course, in which preservice teachers engage in a simulation, receive formative feedback, and engage in a second similar simulation. This cycle will evaluate the extent to which feedback appears to influence subsequent performance. In the second cycle, the project will work with three teacher educators in diverse contexts to enact the simulations with all preservice teachers in one section of their elementary mathematics methods courses. In the final cycle, the use of the simulations will shift from a research team actor playing the role of the student to a site-based actor recruited by the teacher educators at each of the three institutions. To validate the tools, researcher reliability and teacher educator reliability studies will be conducted to asses the extent to which the four different simulation assessments provide consistent feedback on the targeted teaching practices and the extent to which the scoring of the assessments are reliable. A G study (generalizability study) will be conducted to evaluate the extent to which the teacher participant is the primary source of variation as compared to variations from student actors or the rater administering the assessment. Results will be disseminated in a variety of mathematics education settings and the simulation materials will be made available to practitioners and adapted for additional use in mixed-reality simulation platforms.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.