Collaborative and self-generated analogies in science education

Abstract

It has long been recognised that analogies may be a useful tool in science education. At the same time, it has been found that there are challenges to using analogies in teaching. For example, students might not identify a suitable analogy, might not recognise how the taught target domain is similar to the source domain to which it is compared, or may fail to realise where the analogy breaks down. The present study offers a review of two trends which reflect the ambition to come to terms with such challenges: self-generated analogies, making use of students own analogies in teaching, and; analogy generation in collaborative settings, such as in small group work. Empirical studies show predominately positive results with regards to students' enjoyment and learning gains, and point to opportunities for formative assessment. The specificities of language in conjunction with analogy and the role of analogies in authentic science classroom discourse are suggested as areas of study that deserve more attention going forward.

Teachers learning to apply neuroscience to classroom instruction: case of professional development in British Columbia

“…analogies the teachers used, because this aspect of their utterances emerged as a dominant feature of how they described the influence of neuroscience on their learning and pedagogical decisionmaking processes. Analogies have been reported to promote learning, where new or abstract concepts are made more concrete, accessible, and retrievable (Nashon 2004, Haglund 2013, Burdina and Sauer 2015.…”

Confronting Conceptual Challenges in Thermodynamics by Use of Self-Generated Analogies

“…More recently, the social dimension of generation and scrutiny of analogies in discourse has also received increasing attention (Haglund, 2013). For instance, Aubusson and Fogwill (2006) studied the effect of inviting secondary chemistry students to cooperate in the development of a role play as an analogy of chemical bonds, where the students acted as atoms and ions.…”

“…While most studies on analogical reasoning in science education have been carried out in the teacher generated mode (Pittman, 1999), an increasing number of studies have adopted the approach of self-generated analogies (Haglund, 2013). For instance, Wong (1993) presented eleven preservice teacher students with a piston/cylinder device and the phenomena that the force required to pull or push the piston increases the further the gas is either compressed or decompressed when the cylinder's nozzle is covered by a finger.…”

“…Bringing students to see the parallel between such phenomena by encouraging analogical reasoning may be a teaching approach worth considering (Haglund, 2013).…”

Reading Multimodal Texts for Learning – a Model for Cultivating Multimodal Literacy

“…However, the use of metaphors has also been noted to be potentially problematic, for instance if students take the analogy too far (e.g. Haglund, 2013;Danielsson, Löfgren & Pettersson, accepted). An example from chemistry classrooms is the metaphoric use of electronic "shells" when explaining the ways in which electrons move around the nucleus at a certain distance.…”