"Give me one reason why this is true": A multimodal investigation of the strategies used by university teachers of mathematics to elicit responses from students

This study aims to broaden the current understanding of undergraduate university mathematics teaching by conducting a multimodal analysis of video-recorded segments of classroom teaching by an experienced professor and a less experienced Teaching Assistant. The study focuses on the participants’ use of discursive strategies and multimodal features as they are used to elicit responses from students. The analysis is conducted through the qualitative multimodal thematic coding of video-recorded segments, and audio transcripts, and with the quantitization of the participants’ strategies used to elicit student responses. Findings show that despite variance in the teaching location, educational backgrounds, and levels of experience of the participants, the discursive and multimodal strategies that they use during teaching are remarkably similar; in other words, the participants use the same genre of teaching undergraduate mathematics. Conclusions present undergraduate mathematics teaching as a complex, multimodal, and wholly interactive genre of teaching.