Consequential Research on Learning and Development: Diverse Pathways for Learning and Integration Across Domains of Development

Session Type: Invited Speaker Session

Abstract

While attention to biological processes has historically been used to warrant systems of
oppression, this evolving expansive conception of human learning and development is
rooted in very different principles – namely that because human malleability and diversity
of pathways of development are rooted in our evolution as a species, we ignore such
malleability and diversity at our peril. To address powerful truths of human possibilities,
we need a science of human learning and development that does not ignore diversity, but
embraces it and theorizes it.
In this Presidential Symposium, we argue that continuing to build on these foundational ideas introduces powerful new opportunities for education and learning:
• Designing robust learning environments (formal and informal) that integrate social- emotional well-being with deep cognitive learning
• Expanding our conceptions of the breadth of repertoires of everyday practices (content and conceptual knowledge, linguistic, epistemological, ontological) to recruit these practices to support robust intellectual and civic development in and across academic disciplines
• Expanding methodologies and designing research that seeks to account for and promote human learning and development
• Expanding how we think about preparing both practitioners and researchers to study and impact opportunity to learn.

Sub Unit

• AERA Presidential Session

Chair

• Maxine McKinney de Royston, University of Wisconsin - Madison

Papers

• Opportunities of a New Frontier: Science(s) of Human Learning and Development - Carol D. Lee, Northwestern University

• Nurturing Nature: Researching Developmental Processes and Contextual Affordances in Both Education and Neuroscience - Mary Helen Immordino-Yang, University of Southern California

• Taking the Science of Learning and Development Seriously in Our Research and Designs for Learning - Na'ilah Suad Nasir, Spencer Foundation