Aesthetic Development and K–12 Science

• In Event: 58.024 - Constructionism, Modeling, and Games: Synergies Through the Lens of Next Generation Science Standards and the Common Core

Abstract

Playful and consequential learning through building public objects and experiences are key tenets of constructionism (Papert, 1980; Resnick, Berg Eisenberg, 2000). However, the relationship of constructionism to work, in particular, physical work (Rose, 2005) and professional practice (e.g., Latour, 1990) has rarely been explored beyond momentary mentions. This is particularly relevant given the emphasis of NGSS on adopting a “science as practice” perspective (Pickering, 1992; Lehrer, 2009). In this image, learning science involves a progressive deepening of the learner’s participation in authentic scientific work, which involves a complex relationship between ideas, representational infrastructure, materiality, and community. In this paper, my goal is to present an argument that a pragmatist interpretation of constructionism, grounded in Dewey’s notion of aesthetic development (Dewey, 1934), can lead to a richer image of learners’ development of disciplinary practices and identities, that can potentially serve as a theoretical anchor for a constructionist approach to NGSS-based learning.
Dewey establishes “aesthetic experiences” as supra-ontological or pre-categorical i.e., experiences that bring together or underlie multiple domains of knowledge, and involve the transformation of a material into an expressive medium. However, grounded in the pragmatist perspective (Dewey, 1929; Rose, 2005), we further argue that without imagining and designing pedagogies to support continuities between play, physical work, and professional practice, especially in the context of educational computing, we may risk hiding the instrumental characteristic of knowledge in professional practice from the learners, thereby renewing technical rationality (Schon, 2002) in K16 education.
How can the lens of aesthetic development help us address this issue? To answer this question, we will present illustrative cases from long-term developmental studies of children and teachers (primary data), and secondary analyses of undergraduate art students’ works from year-long courses at the Rhode Island School of Design (Maeda, 2013). Physical work, in both these cases, was inextricably tied to play, and at the same time, also meaningfully shaped symbolic and representational work, in ways that were resonant with professional practice.
We will present qualitative, thematic analyses that highlight two different contexts for aesthetic development: a) the long-term integration of embodied and imaginary play in children’s design of computational media for consequential use in science and math; and b) the consequential integration of scientific representational practices as instrumental devices for “critical making” in art. Our analysis will identify two essential characteristics of aesthetic development that are common across these cases: what students develop is a form of experience that a) brings together multiple domains that remain separate in traditional classrooms, and b) deepens students’ design thinking through engaging them in authentic contexts where designed artifacts are “put to use”. We will conclude with theoretical and methodological implications for researchers of educational technologies who typically tend to focus on much shorter time scales, which makes such complex forms of human development hard to imagine and foster through curricular experiences, even when the practices targeted by NGSS can be better supported and studied through such longer-term and complex pedagogies that go beyond a single domain and a single intervention.

Authors

• Pratim Sengupta, Vanderbilt University

• Amy Voss Farris, Vanderbilt University, Peabody College, Department of Teaching and Learning

• Amanda Catherine Dickes, Harvard University

• Kara Krinks, Vanderbilt University