Helping children feel seen, heard, and understood: preservice teachers' strategies to support diverse learners in math lessons

All children can develop high levels of math proficiency when they are given rigorous instructional tasks with appropriate teacher support. Preservice teachers (PSTs) must develop various instructional strategies tailored to the diverse learners in their classroom, including multilingual students. M...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of early childhood teacher education 2023-10, Vol.44 (4), p.874-896
Main Authors: Beisly, Amber H., Lake, Vickie E., Ross, Rae, Lim, Boo-Young
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Children
Early Childhood Education
Educational Strategies
Individualized Instruction
Lesson Plans
Mathematics Education
Multilingualism
Preservice Teachers
Qualitative research
Student Diversity
Students
Teaching Methods
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Summary:All children can develop high levels of math proficiency when they are given rigorous instructional tasks with appropriate teacher support. Preservice teachers (PSTs) must develop various instructional strategies tailored to the diverse learners in their classroom, including multilingual students. More research is needed on how PSTs can support students of different math abilities with strategies for multilingual learners in early childhood classrooms. This qualitative research study explored instructional strategies found in 20 PSTs' math lesson plans and lesson plan reflections to understand how they taught equitably to diverse learners across their kindergarten-3 rd grade field placement settings. Strategies emerging from the codes were analyzed to determine how different instructional strategies supported multilingual learners, offered differentiation, or were culturally responsive. Most strategies supported multilingual students and students who may need additional support in math; examples include gesturing and pointing, allowing students to respond non-verbally, and modeling the activity. Some areas of the framework were not addressed in the lesson plans, and potential reasons and solutions for this are also addressed.
ISSN:1090-1027
1745-5642
DOI:10.1080/10901027.2023.2165983