Young Children as Scientists: Promoting Scientific Practices and Knowledge Creation Through Idea-Friend Maps

• In Event: Technology Environments and Aids for Teacher and Peer Support and Relationships

Abstract

We examined a knowledge-building environment, mediated by a learning analytics tool “Idea-Friend Maps”, to scaffold scientific practices. Fifty-two Grade Five students learning Human Input & Output were enrolled. Results showed the improvement in socio-cognitive dynamics of knowledge building across time. Furthermore, students’ social interaction predicted their contribution to collective knowledge advancement, which further promoted individual conceptual understanding. Moreover, how students pursued relative ideas from other research groups, identified current state and future direction of the community knowledge and created new knowledge by crossing knowledge boundaries with the support of Idea-Friend Maps was explored by qualitative analysis. This study sheds light on the use of opportunistic groups and learning analytics to scaffold young children to work like scientists in scientific practices.

Authors

• Xueqi FENG, Southern University of Science and Technology

• Jan van Aalst, The University of Hong Kong

• Carol K. Chan, University of Hong Kong

• Yuqin Yang, Central China Normal University