Abstract:

Due to Covid-19 and with instruction turning remote, beginning mathematics teachers who were part of a graduate program in childhood mathematics education in NYC had to move their assessment of student’s mathematical thinking with the Clinical Interview into the virtual space.

The Clinical Interview is an assessment method in the form of a conversation between the teacher or interviewer and a student. The conversation centers around a mathematical problem or task chosen to give the subject every opportunity to display behavior from which to conclude which mental processes are used in thinking about that task or solving that problem.

In the face-to-face interview protocol teachers are trained to consider the subject’s verbal and non-verbal behaviors and to look closely at student’s work in order to decide the follow up questions and subsequent steps. By moving the interviewing practice online, teachers needed to adjust, modify and supplement many of their in person interviewing moves.

In this study, we explore what teachers modified in order to adjust to the virtual medium, we then compare the type of questions that teachers used in both spaces. We analyze last how teachers perceived both the challenges and strengths of the online math interview. Based on the results, we propose a continuum of hybrid math interviewing and present guidelines for mathematics teacher educators to help teachers become ready and flexible when assessing children’s mathematical thinking in various spaces and under different conditions.

Keywords:

Clinical Interview, Assessment, RemoteTeaching, Mathematics Learning, Covid-19, Elementary Mathematics Education.