#280: Playing to Understand: Teacher Moves and Student Thinking in Nondigital Math Games

This study examines how fourth-grade students engage in mathematical thinking while playing non-digital fraction games, with and without teacher facilitation. Conducted within a four-year Research-Practice Partnership, the Games Time project embeds biweekly 30minute game sessions in 3rd- and 4th-grade classrooms to promote equitable, engaging math learning without pull-out intervention. Using video analysis from a design research framework, we compared student discourse and manipulative use across six game sessions. Findings reveal that students engage in meaningful mathematical reasoning in both conditions, though teacher presence extends structured verbal engagement and mathematical discourse, while unsupervised play encourages exploratory interaction with manipulatives. This work contributes to growing research on non-digital math games, offering low-cost, inclusive strategies for addressing unfinished learning and fostering student agency in mathematics classrooms.