Forms of Student Knowledge Creation in a Design and Making Environment: A Funds of Knowledge Approach

• In Event: 34.033 - Student Learning and Thinking Processes in the Design of Learning Environments

Abstract

Despite increased attention to design and making environments, students’ knowledge creation is still an unexplored issue in these novel learning spaces. To address this research gap, we investigate forms of knowledge creation that emerge in students’ social activity during design and making activity. Drawing on sociocultural and cultural-historical theorizing, we ask; How do the students’ funds of knowledge mediate their knowledge creation activity? Our findings indicate three forms of knowledge creation: “horizontal knowledge creation”, “vertical knowledge creation”, and “extended knowledge creation”. The findings show how students bring their funds of knowledge into the making activity and how in this creative process, the students’ personal funds of knowledge become hybridized with the sociomaterial context of the learning.

Authors

• Anu Kajamaa, University of Helsinki

• Kristiina P. Kumpulainen, University of Helsinki