In A. Shvarts (Ed.), Proceedings of the annual meeting of the Russian chapter of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education (PME) & Yandex (pp. 48–68). Moscow: Yandex.
ABSTRACT: Recent developments in the theory and methods of cognitive science are enabling educational researchers to evaluate empirically the historical thesis that mathematical concepts are grounded in sensorimotor activity. My presentation will survey results from several recent design-research studies that have used eye-tracking techniques to capture the moment at which a student first sees the world in a new way. For the student, this spontaneous perceptual construction serves as a handy solution for coordinating the control of an interactive system. In turn, through cultural mediation this construction evolves into a new way of reasoning that becomes a mathematical concept. I will speculate on implications for educational technology.