How Did Students Solve Mathematics Tasks Collaboratively? An Investigation of Chinese Students’ Participation in Groups

In this chapter, we report findings from a study of five groups’ interactions and task completion process to examine how students solve a mathematical task collaboratively through group work. Five groups in one class were recruited. The video recording and transcripts of students involved with collaborative mathematics tasks were analysed. We first determine each group’s negotiative event chain to portray the task completion process. On this basis, group dynamics in terms of group discussed topics, students’ utterances, and group status, for example, collaborative or not, during the discussion were analysed. The results showed that even though negotiative event chains vary between different groups, most groups concentrate on mathematics and task-related events rather than social aspects. The study lays a foundation for understanding how Chinese students work together to solve a mathematical problem and raises certain questions about group dynamics in such contexts. For example, whether students’ gender differences in composition influence the group’s control over the problem-solving process, and so on.