About

Jen Munson is an Associate Professor in the Learning Sciences at Northwestern University, with a research focus on understanding how interactions between mathematics students, teachers, and coaches can support learning. Her work examines the discursive mechanisms that foster deep learning through inquiry, analysis, and play within elementary classroom settings. She explores how discourse can generate meaningful mathematical understanding and how to support teachers in enacting pedagogical approaches that promote such interactions. She directs the Multiplicity Lab, which supports mathematics teachers worldwide by providing brief visual activities designed to foster multiple ways of being in, knowing, and doing mathematics. Munson received a NAEd/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowship in 2020 for her work on side-by-side coaching and is the author of the book 'In the Moment: Conferring in the Elementary Math Classroom' published in 2018.

Research topics

• Pedagogy
• Psychology
• Mathematics education
• Computer Science
• Sociology
• Political Science
• Social psychology
• Developmental psychology
• Cognitive psychology
• Visual arts

Selected publications

• Revealing and refining teachers’ instructional vision: noticing strengths in video records of practice

  Journal of Mathematics Teacher Education · 2026-03-30

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Mathematics teachers’ instructional vision, or the image they hold of valued mathematics teaching and learning, is a cornerstone of instructional improvement. Prior studies of instructional vision have focused on accessing teachers’ visions through interviews in which teachers imagine a hypothetical classroom that illustrates their aspirations. How they notice such a hypothetical classroom is connected to their professional vision, or how teachers notice specific artifacts and events. In this study, we examine how teachers’ instructional vision can be accessed and developed in professional development by asking teachers to notice and name strengths in video records from one another’s classrooms. We analyzed the strengths that 23 teachers noticed in 126 video discussions across a 2-year professional development program for early career secondary mathematics teachers. We grouped the 1186 strengths described by participants into 14 strengths categories, which we argue paint a rich portrait of participants’ collective instructional vision. Further, we identified three discursive mechanisms through which teachers developed—defined and refined—their instructional vision: leveraging engagement, leveraging growth, and leveraging agreement. These findings indicate that video-based professional development can both reveal and create opportunities for teachers to refine their instructional vision by discussing strengths. Methodological implications for accessing teachers’ instructional vision are discussed.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• The intersection of teacher noticing and the language of practice

  ZDM · 2025-08-29 · 1 citations

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Growing practice in place: evidence of teacher learning from side-by-side coaching

  Journal of Mathematics Teacher Education · 2025-06-13 · 1 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Negotiating Mathematics Teachers’ Professional Vision: Noticing and Naming Strengths in Video Records of Practice

  Proceedings. · 2024-06-10

  articleOpen accessSenior author
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Side-by-side coaching: Decomposing a practice-embedded teacher learning opportunity

  Learning Culture and Social Interaction · 2024-03-14 · 3 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Developing Teachers’ Adaptive Expertise for Ambitious Instruction and Disciplinary Learning

  Proceedings. · 2024-06-10

  articleOpen access

  Since the introduction of the adaptive expertise construct many decades ago, there has been a resurgence in recent learning sciences scholarship with respect to how to support K12 teachers in adopting ambitious instruction, i.e., the discipline-specific knowledge and strategies for real-world inquiry.Such shifts require a consideration of learning theories about what teachers need to know in relation to real-world disciplinary inquiry, how this knowledge can be translated into practice, and how both kinds of knowledge engage diverse classroom communities.This symposium highlights six teams of researchers who work with in-service and prospective K12 teachers focused on understanding how best to develop their adaptive expertise for ambitious instruction.In conversation with each other and the audience, we aim to understand how adaptive expertise is conceptualized in its myriad disciplines and how it is developed through theory and practice.Of particular interest are the mechanisms that support teacher learning.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• The Micropolitical Forces That Shape Coach Access to Classrooms for Coaching (Poster 1)

  2024-01-01

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Conflict and Cooperation

  The Elementary School Journal · 2024-02-14 · 5 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  Coaches develop and use strategies to gain access to teachers’ classrooms to support teacher learning and instructional improvement. These strategies respond to the specific conditions in which coaches work, including organizational structures and interpersonal factors that can either facilitate or impede access. In this interview study of 28 content-focused coaches in one district, we used a micropolitical lens to explore the forces that influenced coaches’ access to teachers’ classrooms. Ultimately, we identified nine distinct forces that either supported or constrained coaches’ access to classrooms. These forces were bound together in a micropolitical system of interpersonal and structural forces influenced by larger macropolitical forces. Interpersonal forces emanated from three kinds of actors in the school organization: administrators, teachers, and the coaches themselves. Implications for the application of micropolitical theory to future research on the negotiations inherent to coaching and the implications for school districts seeking to establish an effective coaching program are discussed.

  PublisherDOI

• The Constant Work of Access

  The Elementary School Journal · 2024-07-15 · 1 citations

  articleSenior author

  Coaches develop and use a complex system of strategies to gain access to teachers’ classrooms for coaching. In the process, coaches confront micropolitical forces within the school organization that shape access, either enhancing or impeding coaches’ chances of being viewed as a trusted and valued partner in teacher learning. In this qualitative interview study with 28 content-focused coaches in one school district, we used a micropolitical lens to better understand how coaches coordinate micropolitical forces and strategies to gain access to teachers’ classrooms, finding that force-strategy coupling was a prevalent coaching practice. We found that coaches most frequently reported using strategies to respond to 2 micropolitical forces: (1) teacher openness to coaching and (2) structures of time and workload. Coaches responded to these forces differently depending on whether the force functioned to support or inhibit access. This research expands on the micropolitical work of coaching and coach agency.

  PublisherDOI

• The Relationship Between Appropriation and Guided Participation During Teacher Professional Learning

  Proceedings. · 2023-10-03

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  In a community of practice, such as those designed to support teachers' professional development, learning is fostered through participation in the joint enterprise of the community as teachers appropriate practice and engage in guided participation of practice.Because sociocultural activity is not sequential or isolated, this study explores the interaction between guided participation and appropriation in one environment designed to support teacher learning: side-by-side coaching.In side-by-side coaching, a teacher and coach partner to co-enact a focal pedagogical practice with the teacher's students during instruction.In our analysis, we explore the relationship between appropriation and guided participation during side-by-side coaching, finding two kinds of teacher learning opportunities at their intersection.Both theoretically and analytically, our findings indicate that appropriation is inherent to the process of teacher learning, rather than an outcome or end point.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Erin E. Baldinger

  9 shared

• Evthokia Stephanie Saclarides

  University of Cincinnati

  9 shared

• Jennifer M. Langer-Osuna

  Stanford University

  4 shared

• Gladys Krause

  William & Mary

  4 shared

• Rosa Chavez

  4 shared

• Emma Gargroetzi

  The University of Texas at Austin

  4 shared

• Sarah Larison

  3 shared

• Claudia Bertolone-Smith

  California State University, Chico

  2 shared

Education

• PhD, Graduate School of Education

  Stanford University

  2018

Awards & honors

• NAEd/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowship (2020)
• In the Moment: Conferring in the Elementary Math Classroom (…