Lesson Study: knowledge and professional development of mathematics' teachers

Abstract

This research project is embedded in the FAPESP call "Public Education line" and it pursuits two main goals. From one side it intends to contribute with opportunities for mathematics teachers', working on public school in the region of Campinas, professional development through the development of a collaborative work involving agents from the school and university. In an associated manner, on the other hand, the project has an investigative aim linked with obtaining a broader understanding on how mathematics teachers' professional development occurs, focusing on the mathematics teachers' specialized knowledge. These goals, perceived in an intertwined manner, intend to contribute ultimately to improve students mathematical learning and knowledge. The project will be developed in the context of the Grupo de Sábado (GdS) - a group meeting at UNICAMP since 1999 - considering three subgroups will be considered: primary (first five years of schooling); lower secondary (from year six to year 9) and upper secondary (from year 10 to year 12). Pursuing the designed aims, a Lesson Study will be developed. Considering the Brazilian context and the goals of this proposal, the Lesson Study will be developed in six steps: 1) identification of problematic issues (or requests) from the participants; 2) discussion of the problematics brought by the GdS elements; 3) collective planning of intervention classes; 4) classroom observation with audio and video record (of tasks implementation); 5) collective reflection and analysis of tasks implemented previously; 6) systematization of the lived experiences and learning from previous stages. As one result it is expected the improvement of teachers' practices and students mathematics learning by the improvement of teachers' mathematics specialized knowledge - grounded on teachers professional development. (AU)