The different lenses we look through: Examining the role(s) of language and communication in science education research

Scientific Conference (2022, January 29)

Inquiry-based pedagogies as an inclusive practice: Approaches for in-service teacher education

in Andersen, Katja Natalie; Ferreira da Silva, Brigida Ticiane; Silva de Moraes Novais, Valéria (Eds.) Educação, Cultura e Inclusão: Contextos internacionais e locais (2022)

Multimodal Interaction Analysis: a Powerful Tool for Examining Plurilingual Students’ Engagement in Science Practices Proposed Contribution to

in Research in Science Education (2021)

Science teaching and learning are discursive practices, yet analysis of these practices has frequently been grounded in theorizations that place language at the forefront of interaction and meaning-making ... [more ▼]

Science teaching and learning are discursive practices, yet analysis of these practices has frequently been grounded in theorizations that place language at the forefront of interaction and meaning-making. Such language-centric analytic approaches risk overlooking key embodied, enacted aspects of students’ engagement in science practices. This manuscript presents a case of a plurilingual student’s participation in science inquiry to demonstrate how multimodal interaction analysis can be used to examine the highly diverse array of communicative resources that she draws upon while participating in science, including gestures, facial expressions, vocal intonations, and languages. Grounded in dialogic theorizations of language, we first detail the multimodal interaction approach, and second, we show how multimodal interaction analysis beginning first with her embodied engagement, then coupled with her subsequent written and spoken engagement, reveals robust views of her engagement in science practices. Key to this methodological approach is multilayered analysis that backgrounds verbal or spoken communication to allow for an identification of embodied interaction resources employed. We emphasize how this analytical method allows us to conceptualize science as a practice that unfolds through and in interaction, as compared to a static body of concepts to be learned. [less ▲]

Interaction rituals, emotions, and early childhood science: digital microscopes and collective joy in a multilingual classroom

in Cultural Studies of Science Education (2021), 16

In her original article, “Identity, Agency and the Internal Conversations of Science and Math Teachers Implementing instructional reforms in High-Need Urban Schools”, Stacy Olitsky (2021) takes us on an ... [more ▼]

In her original article, “Identity, Agency and the Internal Conversations of Science and Math Teachers Implementing instructional reforms in High-Need Urban Schools”, Stacy Olitsky (2021) takes us on an exploration of the identity development and agencies exerted by two teachers working to implement science instructional reforms in high-need urban schools. Olitsky (2021) utilizes Interaction Ritual Theory as a lens to examine a seldom viewed and even intimate aspect of teacher’s worlds, namely teachers’ self-talk. In this forum article I embrace the invitation extended by Olitsky, through an exploration of the interaction rituals that took place among students and a teacher working with digital microscopes in an early childhood classroom. I draw upon the theoretical lens of communitas to illuminate the power of collective joy that formed. Specifically, I will share two vignettes from a multilingual early childhood classroom to illustrate how teacher-guided and studentguided spaces afforded interactions that lead to the development of collective joy. I show how collective work with the microscopes allowed for joy and surprise to occur within a classroom of plurilingual students who are participating in their first schooled experiences of science. I conclude with a discussion of the power of student-driven instructional spaces as places for students working to learn science, and the language of instruction, to collectively experience joy as they explore. [less ▲]

Science notebooks as interactional spaces in amultilingual classroom: Not just ideas on paper

in Journal of Research in Science Teaching (2020)

Past studies have explored the role of student science notebooks in supporting students' developing science understandings. Yet scant research has investigated science notebook use with students who are ... [more ▼]

Past studies have explored the role of student science notebooks in supporting students' developing science understandings. Yet scant research has investigated science notebook use with students who are learning science in a language they are working to master. To explore how student science notebook use is co-constructed in interaction among students and teachers, this study examined plurilingual students' interactions with open-ended science notebooks during an inquiry science unit on condensation and evaporation. Grounded in theoretical views of the notebook as a semiotic social space, multimodal interaction analysis facilitated examination of the ways students drew upon the space afforded by the notebook as they constructed explanations of their under-standings. Cross-group comparison of three focal group sled to multiple assertions regarding the use of science notebooks with plurilingual students. First, the notebook supported student-determined paths of resemiotization as students employed multiple communicative resources to express science understandings. Second, notebooks provided spaces for students to draw upon diverse language resources and as a bridge in time across multiple inquiry sessions. Third, representations in notebooks were leveraged by both students and teachers to access and deepen conceptual conversations. Lastly, students' interactions over time revealed multiple epistemological orientations in students' use of the notebook space. These findings point to the benefits of open-ended science notebooks use with plurilingual students, and a consideration of the ways they are used in interaction in science instruction. [less ▲]

Working toward equitable research practices: the value of highlighting complexity and respecting context

in Cultural Studies of Science Education (2020)

In this response paper, we reflect upon the contributions of Gallard Martínez, Pitts, Brkich, and Ramos de Robles (this issue) in their manuscript “How does one recognize contextual mitigating factors ... [more ▼]

In this response paper, we reflect upon the contributions of Gallard Martínez, Pitts, Brkich, and Ramos de Robles (this issue) in their manuscript “How does one recognize contextual mitigating factors (CMFs) as a basis to understand and arrive at better approaches to research designs” and elaborate the ways in which we work toward highlighting the contextual complexities within our own research. Our research focuses on working toward equitable practices for culturally and linguistically diverse children in science education, in order to draw on the many cultural and communicative resources they bring to primary school science investigations. We draw upon our previous and current research projects in this forum contribution to tease-apart CMFs related to issues of equity in teaching science with culturally and linguistically diverse primary school children in our national context in Luxembourg. We conclude with a consideration of how the process of unpacking a diverse array of CMFs relative to our work with students helps us select and employ theoretical lenses and research methodologies that position us to gather rich understandings of the complexities within our research contexts and in our work with children and teachers [less ▲]

The role of critical reflexivity in the professional development of professional developers: A co-autoethnographic exploration

in Interfaces Científicas (2018), 7(1), 13-24

This manuscript shares findings from a collaborative autoethnography project during which two classroom teachers worked together with university researchers to develop and facilitate science education ... [more ▼]

This manuscript shares findings from a collaborative autoethnography project during which two classroom teachers worked together with university researchers to develop and facilitate science education professional development workshops for elementary teachers in Luxembourg. Grounded in critical theoretical perspectives, we undertook a process of collaborative autoethnography grounded in dialogue and reflection, to examine our own professional development in the process of facilitating the professional development of our colleagues. First, we elaborate the cultural and historical importance of this project in the context of teacher professional development in Luxembourg, an education system that operates from a national primary school curriculum, but in which instructional decisions are made by teachers. Next, we describe how critical methodologies allowed us to examine working within this system from each of our unique perspectives, while critically analyzing the process of engaging in professional development with teachers. We then elaborate the two main claims that emerged from our collective processes of reflection, dialogue, and action, namely that undergoing this critical process in parallel with supporting teacher professional development facilitated changes in our perspectives and our positions towards the national curricula, and that our multiple roles coupled with the process of reflection-dialogue-action mediated taking agency and the adaptation of primary science curricula. [less ▲]

Critical reflexivity in the professional development of professional devlopers: A co-autoethnographic exploration

Poster (2018, January)

„Doing Science“: Erwerb von Kompetenzen im naturwissenschaftlichen Unterricht der École fondamentale

in Luxembourg Centre for Educational Testing (LUCET), Universität Luxemburg; Service de Coordination de la Recherche et de l’Innovation pédagogiques et technologiques (SCRIPT) (Eds.) Nationaler Bildungsbericht Luxemburg 2018 (2018)

Reconstructing science education within the language I science relationship

in Tobin, Kenneth; Bryan, Lynn (Eds.) 13 Questions: Reframing Education's Conversation: Science (2018)

Our research is embedded in the multilingual national context of Luxembourg, a small diverse country in Western Europe, and as such our research participants are culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD ... [more ▼]

Our research is embedded in the multilingual national context of Luxembourg, a small diverse country in Western Europe, and as such our research participants are culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD). Luxembourg’s public schools reflect the diversity of the country, with 44% of students identifying as a nationality other than Luxembourgish, and 55% speaking a first language other than Luxembourgish (Ministère de l’éducation nationale, de l’Enfance et de la Jeunesse [MENJE], 2015). Certainly, students draw on a wide variety of resources as they make meaning in science, and a key resource in this process of meaning making is language, which serves to mediate learning as well as position participants in the learning process. However, for students with proficiencies in languages other than the ones used for instruction in schools (such as the students we work with), the nuances of how language(s) can serve as resource(s) for learning are crucial for researchers and teachers to consider and understand. Science, language, and learning are interwoven, connected, and we believe, inseparable, to the processes of science education. In this chapter we use a critical lens to deconstruct the use of language(s) in science education as we address the overarching question posted by the title of this section, “In what ways does language affect (and is affected by) the science educational process?” Throughout this process of deconstruction, we address several critical questions that arise from our research and lived experiences connected to Reconstructing Science Education within the Language | Science Relationship Reflections from Multilingual Contexts sara e. d. wilmes, christina siry, roberto gómez fernández, and anna maria gorges c h a p t e r n i n e t e e n 254 | sara e. d. wilmes et al. the relationship between science education and language. Specifically, we address the following interrelated questions: • Who decides which languages are used in classrooms? • How can we create classroom spaces that value diverse student resources? • What is the relationship between language used in science education, power, and agency? [less ▲]