Source: Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education, Volume 44, Issue 5, 2016, Pages 486-503.
This article examines how coaching using questions could assist novice teachers to promote mathematical thinking and discussions within time-constrained programmes.
Videos of rehearsals, reflective debriefs, and student teacher surveys were collected across a range of courses over 4 years.
Findings included that student teacher roles in rehearsals were enhanced through coaching with questions and co-construction was enabled. Coaching questions exposed effective practice, particularly in relation to orchestrating mathematical discussion, enabling student teachers to reflect, discuss, make decisions, and immediately trial teaching strategies. Questions appeared to lengthen rehearsals but improved their effectiveness through enhancing participation and enabling co-construction of meaning. Findings indicate that questions used in coaching of rehearsals inform and empower novice teachers, essential factors within initial teacher education for equitable and ambitious mathematics teaching.