The impact of teacher privileging on learning differentiation with technology

Abstract

This study examines how two teachers taught differentiation using a hand held computer algebra system, which made numerical, graphical and symbolic representations of the derivative readily available. The teachers planned the lessons together but taught their Year 11 classes in very different ways. They had fundamentally different conceptions of mathematics with associated teaching practices, innate 'privileging' of representations, and of technology use. This study links these instructional differences to the different differentiation competencies that the classes acquired. Students of the teacher who privileged conceptual understanding and student construction of meaning were more able to ..