PERC 2024 Abstract Detail Page
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| Abstract Title: | Non Sensemaking: A commognitive analysis of teachers' discussions about measurement uncertainty |
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| Abstract Type: | Symposium Talk |
| Abstract: | We focus on the collaborative sensemaking of physics teachers when engaged with a professional development task focused on measurement uncertainty in the context of a professional learning community. Our aim is to demonstrate the fruitfulness of the theory of commognition to shed light on the challenges and opportunities involved in collaborative sensemaking in this context. To this end, we analyze the discursive interactions between the peer teachers and between them and the community leader, while exploring solution to the task. The task design intends to lead participants to acknowledge the limitations of the prevalent discourse of physics teachers regarding measurement uncertainty, as a precursor to a process in which they internalize the canonical discourse of the scientific community. Commognition, developed in the context of mathematics education research, perceives learning as becoming a participant in the specific discourse of a particular professional community. It provides tools to analyze sense-making by mapping different facets of the discourse - keywords, visual mediators, narratives and routines, as well as the meta-rules that govern them. Appropriating a new discourse involves reconciling the commognitive conflicts between the different discourses. The design of the professional development tasks required a characterization of the prevalent and canonical discourses, as discussed in central policy papers, that call for change in the instruction of experimental practices, particularly measurement uncertainty. We will present this characterization, demonstrate how it inspired the design of the professional development task, and apply it to analyze commognitive conflicts. We show how different discursive meta-rules held by teachers lead to unacknowledged commognitive conflicts and hinder sensemaking, and highlight unrealized opportunities in the discussion. |
| Parallel Session: | Learners' engagement in sensemaking |
Author/Organizer Information | |
| Primary Contact: |
Ofek Sivan Department of Science Teaching, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel |
| Co-Author(s) and Co-Presenter(s) |
David Perl-Nussbaum, Department of Science Teaching, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel Edit Yerushalmi, Department of Science Teaching, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel |
