Alan H. Schoenfeld - How We Think: A Theory of Goal-Oriented Decision Making and its Educational Applications

How We Think

Teachers try to help their students learn. But why do they make the particular teaching choices they do? What resources do they draw upon? What accounts for the success or failure of their efforts? In How We Think, esteemed scholar and mathematician Alan H. Schoenfeld proposes a groundbreaking theory and model for how we think and act in the classroom and beyond. Based on thirty years of research on problem solving and teaching, How We Think provides compelling evidence for a concrete approach that describes how teachers, and individuals more generally, navigate their way through in-the-moment decision making in well practiced domains. Applying his theoretical model to detailed representations and analyses of teachers at work as well as of professionals outside education, Schoenfeld argues that understanding and recognizing the goal-oriented patterns of our day-to-day decisions can help identify what makes effective or ineffective behavior in the classroom and beyond.

Alan H. Schoenfeld is the Elizabeth and Edward Conner Professor of Education and Affiliated Professor of Mathematics at the University of California, Berkeley.

Alan H. Schoenfeld, Series Editor

Artzt/Armour-Thomas/Curcio Becoming a Reflective Mathematics Teacher: A Guide for Observation and Self-Assessment, Second Edition

Baroody/Dowker (Eds.) The Development of Arithmetic Concepts and Skills: Constructing Adaptive Expertise

Boaler Experiencing School Mathematics: Traditional and Reform Approaches to Teaching and Their Impact on Student Learning

Carpenter/Fennema/Romberg (Eds.) Rational Numbers: An Integration of Research

Chazan/Callis/Lehman (Eds.) Embracing Reason: Egalitarian Ideals and the Teaching of High School Mathematics

Cobb/Bauersfeld (Eds.) The Emergence of Mathematical Meaning: Interaction in Classroom Cultures

Cohen Teachers Professional Development and the Elementary Mathematics Classroom: Bringing Understandings to Light

Clements/Sarama/DiBiase (Eds.) Engaging Young Children in Mathematics: Standards for Early Childhood Mathematics Education

English (Ed.) Mathematical and Analogical Reasoning of Young Learners

English (Ed.) Mathematical Reasoning: Analogies, Metaphors, and Images

Fennema/Nelson (Eds.) Mathematics Teachers in Transition

Fennema/Romberg (Eds.) Mathematics Classrooms That Promote Understanding

Fernandez/Yoshida Lesson Study: A Japanese Approach to Improving Mathematics Teaching and Learning

Greer/Mukhopadhyay/Powell/Nelson-Barber (Eds.) Culturally Responsive Mathematics Education

Kaput/Carraher/Blanton (Eds.) Algebra in the Early Grades

Lajoie Reflections on Statistics: Learning, Teaching, and Assessment in Grades K12

Lehrer/Chazan (Eds.) Designing Learning Environments for Developing Understanding of Geometry and Space

Ma Knowing and Teaching Elementary Mathematics: Teachers Understanding of Fundamental Mathematics in China and the United States, Anniversary Edition

Martin Mathematics Success and Failure among African-American Youth: The Roles of Sociohistorical Context, Community Forces, School Influence, and Individual Agency

Martin (Ed.) Mathematics Teaching, Learning, and Liberation in the Lives of Black Children

Petit/Laird/Marsden A Focus on Fractions: Bringing Research to the Classroom

Reed Word Problems: Research and Curriculum Reform

Romberg/Fennema/Carpenter (Eds.) Integrating Research on the Graphical Representation of Functions

Romberg/Carpenter/Dremock (Eds.) Understanding Mathematics and Science Matters

Romberg/Shafer The Impact of Reform Instruction on Mathematics Achievement: An Example of a Summative Evaluation of a Standards-Based Curriculum

Sarama/Clements Early Childhood Mathematics Education Research: Learning Trajectories for Young Children

Schliemann/Carraher/Brizuela (Eds.) Bringing Out the Algebraic Character of Arithmetic: From Childrens Ideas to Classroom Practice

Schoenfeld How We Think: A Theory of Goal-Oriented Decision Making and its Educational Applications

Schoenfeld (Ed.) Mathematical Thinking and Problem Solving

Senk/Thompson (Eds.) Standards-Based School Mathematics Curricula: What Are They? What Do Students Learn?

Solomon Mathematical Literacy: Developing Identities of Inclusion

Sophian The Origins of Mathematical Knowledge in Childhood

Sternberg/Ben-Zeev (Eds.) The Nature of Mathematical Thinking

Stylianou/Blanton/Knuth (Eds.) Teaching and Learning Proof across the Grades: A K16 Perspective

Sultan/Artzt The Mathematics That Every Secondary Math Teacher Needs to Know

Watson Statistical Literacy at School: Growth and Goals

Watson/Mason Mathematics as a Constructive Activity: Learners Generating Examples

Wilcox/Lanier (Eds.) Using Assessment to Reshape Mathematics Teaching: A Casebook for Teachers and Teacher Educators, Curriculum and Staff Development Specialists

Wood/Nelson/Warfield (Eds.) Beyond Classical Pedagogy: Teaching Elementary School Mathematics

Zaskis/Campbell (Eds.) Number Theory in Mathematics Education: Perspectives and Prospects

How We Think

A Theory of Goal-Oriented Decision Making and its Educational Applications

Alan H. Schoenfeld

NEW YORK AND LONDON

First published 2011
by Routledge
270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016

Simultaneously published in the UK
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2010.

To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledges collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.

2011 Taylor & Francis

The right of Alan H. Schoenfeld to be identified as author of this work has
been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in
any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publishers.

Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
choenfeld, Alan H.
How we think : a theory of goal-oriented decision making and its
educational applications / Alan H. Schoenfeld.
p. cm. (Studies in mathematical thinking and learning)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Interaction analysis in education. 2. Thought and thinking. 3. Problem
solvingStudy and teaching. 4. Learning, Psychology of. I. Title.