Teaching to Intellectually Emancipate: Reading as Inquiry in an Elementary Science Classroom

• In Event: Roundtable Session 8
  In Roundtable Session: Teaching to Motivate and Empower Diverse Learners

Abstract

This paper addresses the correlation between science inquiry and “hands-on-activity”, an association that does not reflect the importance of learning to read and write in science for meaningful learning and for the development of science literacy in independent and autonomous thinkers. This study reconceptualizes traditional science education pedagogy in an elementary school classroom by theorizing science inquiry and science literacy using Rancière’s (1991) concept of intellectual emancipation as expressed in the Ignorant School Master. The paper explores the emancipatory possibilities afforded by inquiry through interactions with science texts and describes an intervention that adopts a dynamic view of science inquiry that focuses on the development of student’s personal growth, and the creation of their own knowledge and learning experiences.

Author

• Lorraine Otoide, York University