Organizing a Culture of Argumentation in Science Classrooms

• In Event: Argumentation in Scientific Meaning-Making

Abstract

Interest in argumentation as a skill to specifically develop in school has been building over the last two decades, and is now foregounded in new educational standards. In science education, argumentation is usually conceived as a particular set of cognitive skills and instructional efforts typically focus on kinds of lessons focused on the structures of “good” arguments. We view scientific argumentation as a specific cultural practice that must be explicitly organized and nurtured in classrooms. This is a view of argumentation as a discursive stance more than a particular instructional activity. We use our experience developing a culture of argumentation in elementary classrooms to describe the discursive moves teachers make to collectively organize and sustain a culture of scientific argumentation.

Authors

• William A. Sandoval, University of California - Los Angeles

• Noel D. Enyedy, University of California - Los Angeles

• Elizabeth Horst Redman, University of California - Los Angeles

• Sihan Xiao, East China Normal University

• Suna Ryu, University of California - Berkeley