The Kids Over Here and the Grown-Ups Over There: Reimagining School Mathematics through Young Children's Play with Video Data

Jamie Vescio

The commodification of mathematical competence has long permitted schools to stratify minoritized and economically disadvantaged children into low ability groups with fewer opportunities to learn under the guise of "objective failure" (Cobb & Russell, 2015). Though humanizing mathematics supports students' sociopolitical consciousness and transformation of power-laden practices, empirical works have almost exclusively centered upper-elementary and secondary education students (e.g. Bartell, 2013; Gutstein, 2016). K-2 students have been historically denied the opportunity to weigh in on decisions about their learning, as adults are often reluctant to engage with children's playful, "nonsensical" sensemaking (Clark, 2011). Guided by critical childhood studies (Yoon & Templeton, 2019) and a situative theory of learning (Lave & Wenger, 1991), this participatory design study (Bang & Vossoughi, 2016; DiSalvo et al., 2017) develops a novel methodology for including young children in design processes for their own mathematical learning: "playing" with classroom video data. I partner with K-2 students who have been positioned as less mathematically competent along traditional dimensions of success, integrating student-teacher-researcher video analysis and co-design as a mechanism for reimagining mathematical participation possibilities. I draw from classroom video, interview data, and interaction analysis (Jordan & Henderson, 1995) to examine implications of play-based methodological spaces for children's recognition as mathematically competent. This study advances innovative methodologies for extending humanizing opportunities to K-2 students and for reshaping their own mathematics classrooms—contributing an understanding of how young children, particularly with multiply marginalized identities, can inform theories of learning, and transform power-laden discourses of mathematical participation and competence in schools.

About Jamie Vescio

Jamie Vescio is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Teaching & Learning at Vanderbilt University. Bridging critical childhood studies and a situative perspective of learning, her research explores the interplay between the design of mathematical learning environments and young children's opportunities for participation, learning, and recognition in schools. Employing classroom video, she considers how features of learning designs unfold in practice and through interaction to facilitate (or not) such opportunities. A cornerstone of this work is the development of methodologies for including young children in processes of interrogating and reimagining official practices in their own mathematics classrooms. Drawing from participatory design research and visual, play-based methodologies, her dissertation examines the affordances of teacher-student-researcher video analysis for transforming normative discourses of mathematical competence and for advancing child-informed theories of learning. Jamie received the Bonsal Applied Education Award to support data collection for her dissertation. Her analysis of pilot data was awarded Best Student Paper from the Advanced Technologies for Learning/Learning Sciences Special Interest Group of the American Educational Research Association, as well as Outstanding Paper at the International Conference of the Learning Sciences. Prior to her doctoral studies, Jamie was a kindergarten teacher and middle school French teacher in Kentucky. Additionally, she taught high school English in France through the Fulbright U.S. Student Program. She holds a B.A. in Anthropology and French Language & Literature from Transylvania University and a M.Ed. in Elementary Education from Vanderbilt University.