Implementing Emergent Design to Foster Student Epistemic Agency in a Grade 5 Science Community

• In Event: Advances in Research on Learning Science Through Engaging in Practices

Abstract

The development of student epistemic agency is a vitally important goal for science education across all grade levels. This descriptive study aims to provide a detailed account of the implementation of student agency-driven science practices over a whole school year with an emergent design approach. Qualitative analyses of teacher-researcher co-design meetings, classroom observation notes, and student-created artifacts elaborated the dynamic processes of how student agency-driven science practices were planned, initiated, and reorganized in the classroom over time. Qualitative and content analysis of the teacher’s weekly reflection journals characterized the teacher’s roles in facilitating student-directed science inquiry. These results shed light on an emergent design approach to foster student agency and sustain agency-driven science practices in science classrooms.

Authors

• Dan Tao, Beijing Normal University

• Jianwei Zhang, University at Albany - SUNY