In M. Martinez & A. Castro Superfine (Eds.),“Broadening Perspectives on Mathematics Thinking and Learning”—Proceedings of the 35th Annual Meeting of the North-American Chapter of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education (PME-NA 35) (Chap. 10: “Technology,” p. 1205). Chicago, IL: University of Illinois at Chicago.
Reflecting on a pilot design-based research intervention with high school participants that implemented a computer-based artifact, we frame our empirical data as a case study of what may occur when digital devices are introduced into a milieu without anticipating preexisting cultural practices surrounding the medium. Three 9th grade students participated in a 25 minutes task-based collaborative clinical interview designed to investigate their mathematical learning via engaging in a tablet-based guided activity for proportion. A tutorial interview protocol we had previously used successfully for a Wii-mote version of the design became undone as the eager students commandeered the tablet’s interface features that set the activity’s interaction mode and numerical items. Whereas our design rationale was thus undermined, we inferred alternative task framings that would respect students’ tablet practices but still support learning.