What is Conscious Construction

Facilitating meaningful mathematical discourse in an online setting can be a challenge for instructors. The purpose of this chapter is to analyze an instructor's discourse interventions to encourage mathematical discourse in online asynchronous discussions in an analysis course for secondary mathematics teachers (SMTs). The SMTs were required to participate in the discussions and encouraged to ask/answer questions, share/compare their ideas, and explain their thinking/answers. Instructor responses were analyzed using both Mazzolini and Maddison's four categories of response the respect to instructor intervention—(1) question, (2) answer, (3) mix of answer and question, and (4) other—and Simonsen and Banfield's five recurring categories—(1) resolve, (2) validate, (3) redirect, (4) expand, and (5) withhold. With respect to instructor intervention, the author suggests mainly withholding from responding and to use expand, redirect, question, or mix if necessary to encourage mathematical discourse.