Co-creation of classroom language: Supporting learners to develop expressions of uncertainty and statistical concepts

This qualitative study explored how Grade 4 students and the researcher co-created language to express statistical concepts in a multilingual Indian classroom during a week-long instructional sequence. The analysis draws on a situated socio-cultural perspective on language in mathematics. Students’ language progressed from simple claims to more refined and sophisticated expressions, enabling them to discuss central tendencies and distributions while acknowledging uncertainty. Co-created phrases such as āsapās reshā (the nearby line) not only supported communication but also deepened reasoning. The article also discusses what role scaffolding played in refining these informal resources.