Kindergarten and pre-school educators researching and reflecting about their own practice in mathematics

Abstract

This research was carried out by a group of 23 kindergarten and pre-school
teachers involved in a project on continuous formation in an academic
environment. Their question for investigation was: which dynamics
experienced by a group of undergraduate kindergarten and pre-school teachers
allowed the professional learning of mathematics? The aims of the research
were (1) to identify the types of theoretical interpretations and working
dynamics for the integration of theory and practice that produce meanings
for the reflections on the teaching practice, and (2) to analyze the formation
contexts in which the teacher becomes an investigator of his/her own practice. It
is a qualitative approach whose documentation includes a starting questionnaire
(personal characteristics), reflective registers on the importance of games
and the dynamics experienced by the formation group, and an investigation
work developed in classrooms. Among all the dynamics that revealed signs
of professional learning, we point out at (I) the child’s register, which makes
it possible to have an investigation of his/her own practice; (II) the theoretical
interpretations that give the teaching practice sense; (III) the kindergarten games
and plays allowing a curricular dimension for mathematics in kindergarten; and
(IV) the appropriation and (re)signification of “letting speak” by the teachers
who worked with the dynamics.