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Fostering scientific understanding and epistemic beliefs through judgments of promisingness

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Abstract

The evaluation of promisingness is central to knowledge building and knowledge creation but remains largely unexplored. As part of a design-based research program to support promisingness judgments, the present study implemented an intervention in a sixth grade science class, with the goal of exploring the potential of promisingness judgments to foster scientific understanding and epistemic beliefs. Aided by a Promising Ideas Tool and pedagogical supports designed for this intervention, students explored the concept of promisingness, judged the promisingness of their community ideas, and engaged in iterative cycles of idea refinement. Results indicated that students were capable of improving their understanding of promisingness and making promisingness judgments deemed sensible by domain experts. The conceptual understanding and epistemic beliefs displayed by students improved over the course of the intervention, and such improvement happened in tandem with students’ understanding of promisingness. The implications of this exploratory study and future research are discussed.

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Acknowledgments

The author’s travel to the research site was funded by the School of Graduate Studies Travel Grant at the University of Toronto. The author thanks Jennifer González Abril, Fernando Díaz del Castillo, James D. Slotta, and the Institute for Knowledge Innovation and Technology for their generous support for this research.

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  1. Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto, 252 Bloor Street West, Toronto, ON, M5S 1V6, Canada

    Bodong Chen

  2. Department of Curriculum and Instruction, College of Education and Human Development, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, 159 Pillsbury Drive S.E., Minneapolis, MN, 55455, USA

    Bodong Chen

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Chen, B. Fostering scientific understanding and epistemic beliefs through judgments of promisingness. Education Tech Research Dev 65, 255–277 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11423-016-9467-0

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