Pre-service teachers’ development of digital resource design capacity

Abstract

AbstractIn the current digital age, (mathematics) teachers are provided with a profusion of digital resources. Consequently, research in mathematics education has focused on teachers’ interactions with resources as the heart of their professional activity. The term Pedagogical Design Capacity (PDC) was introduced to designate teacher’s ability to perceive affordances of resources and to make decisions about how to use them efficiently. PDC has been further conceptualized to define teacher design capacity (TDC) as including a goal or points of reference for the design, a set of design principles, and reflection-in-action. This definition is illustrated with case studies involving teachers’ design of digital resources, yet it does not seem to consider the specificities of the latter. We therefore aim to further refine the concept of TDC by considering crucial components that designing technology-based tasks and their enactment in the classroom entail. We ask: What are the unique components of TDC specific to digital technology and resources? We elaborate a framework to suggest dimensions and components of mathematics teacher Digital Resource Design Capacity (DRDC) to emphasize the focus on design of digital resources. This framework is built on previous studies and on the concept of instrumental orchestration, and is refined taking into account findings from two case studies in France and Israel.