Embodied collaboration to foster instrumental genesis in mathematics

Abstract

As cognitive science reports joint action requiring tight intercorporeal coordination between two partners, we aim to evaluate the role of this coordination in computer-supported instrumental genesis for mathematics. In our dual eye-tracking design study we developed an embodied activity that potentially contributes to technologically extended problem solving in trigonometry. We tested three versions of the design: (a) individual sensorimotor enactment only, (b) individual and then collaborative enactments, and (c) individual enactment and then collaborative description followed by enactment. As our first case showed, the required sensorimotor coordination was developed but never used in the following problem solving when a student worked alone. In contrast, in both collaborative cases the relevant sensorimotor coordination became a part of instrumented action scheme. Future research is needed to investigate if intercorporeal coordination with the other is crucial for the transfer of sensorimotor coordination from their original source to instrumental activity in mathematics.