“My noticing lens disrupts this narrative”: Preservice mathematics teachers' awareness of the self as noticer

Abstract

Teacher noticing has been identified as central to enacting responsive and equitable mathematics instruction. Mathematics teachers' noticing is shaped by institutional and sociopolitical narratives and ideologies that persistently marginalize culturally, socially, linguistically, and neuro-diverse learners. Gaining insight into how one's noticing is related to these narratives can enable a teacher to identify and reflect on how they frame, attend to, and interpret classroom activity, and how that in turn can perpetuate or disrupt inequitable mathematics instruction. We conjectured that learning to systematically analyze and reflect on their own noticing can enable preservice mathematics teachers to develop their awareness of themselves as noticers to support more responsive and equitable instructional practice. Using data from summative assignments in a course focused on learning from teaching, we investigate whether and how preservice teachers (PSTs) take up frameworks for responsive and equitable teaching to narrate their noticing, and examine what their narrations reveal about how they frame mathematics instruction. Analysis reveals PSTs problematized instruction to adopt aspirational frames for equitable practice, while also re-narrating classroom interactions from dominant perspectives. These findings have implications for PSTs' learning to notice for equity and for designing teacher education experiences for this purpose.