Implications of Complexity for Research on Learning Progressions

Hammer, David; Sikorski, Tiffany‐Rose

doi:10.1002/sce.21165

Cited by 61 publications

(38 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…As an analytic tool, the learning progression enabled us to consider the distribution of individual student performances across the levels of the learning progression and responsively design representational and conceptual contexts that supported the targeted Level 4 practices. Therefore, we conceptualize the learning progression as a range of modeling practices available to students, a valuable upper anchor for high‐level performance, and an analytic framework for examining students’ modeling beliefs and practices rather than a set of sequential levels that students move through linearly (Hammer & Sikorski, ).…”

Section: Implications and Conclusionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Therefore, we conceptualize the learning progression as a range of modeling practices available to students, a valuable upper anchor for high-level performance, and an analytic framework for examining students' modeling beliefs and practices rather than a set of sequential levels that students move through linearly (Hammer & Sikorski, 2015).…”

Section: Implications and Conclusionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Learning progressions in context: Tensions and insights from a semester‐long middle school modeling curriculum

2017

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Schwarz and colleagues have proposed and refined a learning progression for modeling that provides a valuable template for envisioning increasingly sophisticated levels of modeling practice at an aggregate level (Fortus, Shwartz, & Rosenfeld, ; Schwarz et al., ; Schwarz, Reiser, Archer, Kenyon, & Fortus, ). Thinking about learning progressions for modeling, however, involves challenges in coordinating between aggregate arcs in the curriculum and individual student learning trajectories. First, individual student performance is often dependent on students’ epistemic aims and the nature of the conceptual and representational context. Second, approaches for longitudinally supporting students in modeling is a relatively nascent endeavor, although notable exemplars have been developed (e.g., IQWST). Third, research on the highest levels of the proposed progression is often hypothetical, because few students demonstrate high‐level modeling practices in typical classrooms. In response to these challenges, we conducted a semester‐long design‐based study of eighth graders engaging in diagrammatic, physical, and computational modeling. In this paper, we explore conceptual and representational contexts designed to support sophisticated modeling practices and beliefs, analyze the nature of high‐level performances achieved through these contexts, and suggest revisions to the articulation of the Schwarz and colleagues learning progression to increase its utility and generalizability when viewed through a resource‐related lens.

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Section: Implications and Conclusionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Implications and Conclusionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Learning progressions in context: Tensions and insights from a semester‐long middle school modeling curriculum

2017

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“…In other cases, as in the present investigation, a lack of comprehension prevents students from expressing their critical potential. Given this complexity, echoing the position of Hammer and Sikorski (2015), interpreting the findings of correlation-based studies may be hazardous. It therefore seems important to better understand how students can be helped to manage their existing intellectual resources while remaining cautious about their possible limitations.…”

Section: Final Remarksmentioning

confidence: 99%

Conceptual and critical development in student teachers: first steps towards an integrated comprehension of osmosis

Viennot

Décamp

2016

International Journal of Science Education

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In a context of strong valuation of competences in physics teaching, students' critical thinking is widely advocated but there is also a risk that conceptual structuring be disregarded. For that reason, this investigation is focused on possible links between the development of critical attitude and conceptual understanding. We analyzed in detail how conceptual comprehension and critical attitude develop when a person confronts various explanations of a nonobvious topic. To this end, we conducted a fine grained analysis of five prospective teachers' critical and conceptual development during a one hour and a half interaction with an expert. This investigation completes a series of three previous studies addressing the same general research question in respect of three different physics topics. In this instance, the focus is on the topic of osmosis. A content analysis led us to identify some lines of reasoning that we expected to observe as well as conceptual targets for the interviews. In line with an integrative perspective, these conceptual goals provide some opportunities to link osmosis phenomena with a molecular approach. The transcripts were processed following two lines of analysis, one conceptual and the other focusing on critical attitude as well as metacognitive and affective affects. The findings confirm the significant occurrence of the expected lines of reasoning. They also suggest that students need to reach a threshold of comprehension, beyond logical necessity, before expressing critiques toward inaccurate texts or their previous views ("delayed critique"). Students' questions about the meanings of current phrases relating to pressure in liquids are shown to play a decisive role to activate their potential of critique as well as significant conceptual steps forward. In discussing our results, we explain how this study contributes to a holistic picture of student teachers' conceptual and critical co-development when interacting with an expert. The prevalence of "delayed critiques" aligns with our previous results. Additionally, a more specific finding of this study is the precise localization of events that are likely to trigger rapid conceptual and critical evolution. A discussion about further research and perspectives concerning the teaching of osmosis and students' formation to critique ends the paper.

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“…Moving beyond semantics, curriculum can support, or inhibit, students’ coherence seeking. We have discussed the possibility of “narrative seduction,” namely that in the midst of prescripted curriculum, students will “find the storyline so compelling that they do not check it themselves for plausibility or consistency” (Hammer & Sikorski, , p. 428). This sort of undermining of students’ coherence seeking happens quietly and could be hard to detect, a point we discuss in the next section.…”

Section: The Disciplinary Aims and Practices Argumentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Looking for coherence in science curriculum

Sikorski

Hammer

2017

Science Education

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Despite myriad attempts over the years to design curricula with logical ordering and connections, concerns persist that students view science as a body of prescribed information to memorize. In this essay, we argue that attempts to build coherence into the curriculum reflect fundamental and enduring misconceptions about the nature of coherence itself. Using examples of prominent curriculum projects over the past decade, we argue that premeditated coherence, the kind of coherence that is planned and designed for students, may inhibit students’ learning to seek coherence for themselves. We conclude with an approach to curriculum and assessment that emphasizes students’ epistemic agency in seeking coherence.

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Implications of Complexity for Research on Learning Progressions

Cited by 61 publications

References 28 publications

Learning progressions in context: Tensions and insights from a semester‐long middle school modeling curriculum

Learning progressions in context: Tensions and insights from a semester‐long middle school modeling curriculum

Conceptual and critical development in student teachers: first steps towards an integrated comprehension of osmosis

Looking for coherence in science curriculum

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