Paper Summary
Share...

Direct link:

Developing Pathways During Adolescence: Intersecting Identities, Interests, and Literacies

Sat, April 18, 2:45 to 4:15pm, Sheraton, Floor: Ballroom Level, Sheraton V

Abstract

There is a growing opportunity to better understand how different learners make their way through an ecology of interest-driven programs and relationships as they develop pathways toward academic and life pursuits. Over the last 3 years, our research team has been studying this issue through design-based research in an after-school program called Sci-Dentity that is run within middle school libraries in the Washington DC Public Schools (DCPS). The program engages inner-city, middle school youth in reading, watching, discussing, and creating science fiction and in the process imagining how science is relevant in our lives, the stories we tell, and the aspirations we pursue in the future. Our project began with a cohort of 6th grade students who have remained with us for 3 years (through 8th grade). We utilize case studies of focal learners to analyze a corpus of qualitative data including weekly video data of sessions, researcher observation notes, interviews with students and librarians, and artifacts of student work.

Through case studies of 4 different youth, we seek to richly describe the wide variance of pathways that these learners developed as they experienced the common learning environment of Sci-Dentity. We draw upon research about how learners develop identity (Calabrese-Barton et al., 2013; Nasir & Hand, 2008; Polman, 2006), interests (Azevedo, 2011; 2013), and new media literacies (Ito et al., 2013) to explain how these factors intertwine and interact over time to explain the different pathways our youths develop. The findings highlight how this variance can be characterized by the intricate ways in which young people position themselves and are positioned by others (identity), make decisions to pursue activities and relationships (interest), and participate in various ways (literacy). We also describe how conditions of practice—e.g., socioeconomic status, school settings, and the features of Sci-dentity as a program—enable or constrain our learners as they negotiate identity, interests, and literacy. We show how these factors interact in diverse combinations, at any given moment in time. Our longitudinal case studies also illuminate how linking these moments over time, provides a look into how to support different youth as they develop pathways of learning.

This work contributes insights to both local, teaching and learning practices and understanding ecoystems of connected learning. Our findings provide nuanced frameworks through which educators, mentors, and other stakeholders in a given learning environment may better understand their interactions with learners and pinpoint how identity, interest, and literacy play different roles in a given situation. Such nuanced thinking may better aid in guiding, mentoring, and pointing learners to experiences that continually enhance their pathways over time. At a systemic level, understanding how identity, interest, and literacy intersect for different learners can help explain the wide variance of learner outcomes over time in connected learning contexts. This understanding then attunes us to design: ecoystems of programs that can interact with a wider range of learners, mechanisms to help learners traverse this ecosystem in effective ways, and strategies that afford more diverse pathways that are valued for youth.

Author