How students interact when working with mathematics in an ICT context

Abstract

There is a common assumption that computers will change the conditions for teaching mathematics. This paper discusses expectations regarding changes in working methods and, specifically, adolescents’ interaction in the computer-aided teaching of mathematics in middle school. The empirical material was collected through interviews with eighteen teachers in grades 7-9. The author also participated in all of the computer-aided lessons given by two teachers during one year, which means access to 700 lessons where teachers and students could use computers. During this year they used computers in only 18 lessons. This particular study reports from a closer analysis of seven observed lessons and 18 teacher interviews.
In sum, using the computer when solving mathematical problems with peers is not always a successful learning method. The empirical data indicate that the linguistic interaction consists mostly of one student posing a question and another giving an answer. There was a lot of communication in the classroom but very little could be signified as dialogic. The different forms of interaction observed also tell us that students are not involved in communication about scientific concepts. Their communicative ability is therefore not developing to any large extent. When students collaborate in order to solve math problems they oscillate between disjunctive and complementary tasks. It means that different students practice different skills, some that are important for their mathematical ability and some that are not.