Using the Material Semiotics of Actor Network Theory to Support Diversity and Equity in Next Generation Science Standards

• In Event: 68.017 - Equity-Focused Implementation of Next Generation Science Standards: Exploring Models of Hope and Possibility

Abstract

Purpose
The Next Generation Science Standards raise the bar for all students in multiple ways, including linguistically. Nowhere is this truer than in the focus on science and engineering practices. While the goal that all students engage in the NGSS practices is laudable, mastery of these practices requires that new linguistic skills be acquired and applied through material tasks. As part of a three-year study of science teaching and learning with middle school English learners, we came to consider material tasks in new ways to scaffold the language necessary for all students to participate in and communicate about the NGSS science and engineering practices.
Theoretical framework
Law (2004) has referred to Actor Network Theory (ANT) as the semiotics of materiality, by which he means that ANT takes the insights of the semiotic turn – how meaning is produced relationally through language – and applies these insights to all materials, rather than just to language. We use material semiotic insights to explore the evolution of our project as we worked with teachers, students, and families to promote more equitable and rigorous science learning. Following Latour (2005), we consider how ANT insights helped us to shift the focus of our project’s design work from primarily discursive to primarily material through the collaborative development and testing of science investigation kits.
Methods
Using Latour’s (2005) distinction between intermediaries (that transport meaning without transforming it) and mediators (that both transport and transform meaning) we analyze the interactions between human and material actants in the context of science investigations. Rather than asking what allows teachers and students to be successful in using these kits, we explore these material relationships from the kits’ perspective, asking what allows an investigation kit to successfully make use of students and teachers to translate actions locally and then circulate more broadly.
Data Sources
We use video data, photographs, structured field notes, and students’ science notebooks from lessons taught using our project-developed investigation kits in two distinct settings. One setting was a 6th grade Earth science classroom in a local middle school with a growing number of English learners. The second was an 8th grade class in a summer science enrichment academy for English learners that was part of our research project.
Results
We compare what might be expected in our data if we viewed our kits as intermediaries that should be used to implement project practices with fidelity with what we found by considering the kits to be actants that work as mediators that transform meanings (such as the meaning of the academic language or of science investigation practices) while also leaving traces of the intentions of other actors (human and material), such as curriculum developers and lab probeware.
Scholarly Significance
We juxtapose both productive and reproductive implications of this work as we explore the intentionalities and performances of human and non-human actors. Among other implications, we believe that this work provides new ways of thinking about dissemination and sustainability – two critical areas of interest for STEM education.

Authors

• Cory A. Buxton, University of Georgia - Athens

• Susan Harper, University of Georgia - Athens

• Yolanda Denise Payne, University of Georgia - Athens

• Yainitza Hernandez-Rodriguez, University of Georgia - Athens

• Martha A. Allexsaht-Snider, University of Georgia