Abstract

Mathematics teachers develop in tandem via the professional competence known as noticing. In this study, “noticing” is defined as mathematics teachers’ identification and interpretation of communicative orchestration. Researchers have not yet fully investigated how the actions performed by a facilitator can influence noticing of communicative orchestration; therefore, the objective of this study is to characterize the facilitation strategies used by the facilitator during a professional development program (PDP) designed to support mathematics teachers’ noticing of communicative orchestration. Building on a prior study that indicated that teacher noticing of communicative orchestration improves when discussing it within a group, we analyzed the facilitation strategies of a group discussion facilitator to determine how these actors could help five teachers to improve their noticing competence. We selected and adapted facilitation strategies (van Es, 2009) through actions that we analyzed in sessions in which a facilitator guided whole group discussions. Our results revealed the predominance of the “prompter” facilitation strategy, related to the identification of communicative orchestration, and the “proposer” facilitation strategy, related to its interpretation. The “builder” and “critic” facilitation strategies, which involve using evidence and challenging participant interpretative positions about communicative orchestration, were less frequent. These results are examined considering the levels of identification and interpretation attained by the teachers. Finally, the limitations of the study are described.