Introduction

In the emerging need for more qualified professional training, the labor market requires educational institutions to use new mechanisms to achieve their educational objectives. In this context, physical laboratories emerge as necessary instruments to reach the final goals of good professional training. In addition to traditional physical laboratories, we have added available technological resources, which add value to the student’s final education, as they allow for greater interactivity, autonomy, and the realization of knowledge. In this line, Lawn and Grosvenor (2005, p.7) draw attention to “the materiality of learning, ‘that is, the ways that objects are given meaning, how they are used, and how they are linked into heterogeneous active networks, in which people, objects and routines are closely connected.” (Eady & Lockyer, 2013; Lawn & Grosvenor, 2005; Tondeur et al., 2015).

In this study, we analyze how the physical technological laboratory can influence the teaching and learning processes as a mediating component between the teacher and the student. Although this area of research is partially addressed by some authors (Hofstein, 2017; Kirschner & Meester, 1988; Lopes & Costa, 2021), it was identified that there are still many aspects to be considered and clarified.

In particular, this study aims to find epistemic patterns that help investigate how the teacher and the student can take better advantage of the human–machine interaction through the technological physical laboratory, thus contributing to and facilitating the final learning of the student. Technological physical laboratories can play an important role in students’ cognitive development. When used under certain methodological rules, they can help develop new work skills, thus generating a better preparation for the student for his professional life (Lynch, 1991; Nolen & Koretsky, 2018). It may also provide improvements in the conduct of teaching practices concerning applying better methodological methods in using these instruments.

Fundamentally, the study carried out aims to answer the following research questions: What is the role of the teacher in the students learning during the activity in the laboratory: how does he facilitate and allow the students to use and get the best out of work in the laboratory to your learning in epistemic terms? How does one transform a physical laboratory into an epistemic tool?

Framework

To seek solutions to improve the quality of learning in professional training, we have artifacts as mediating elements that add value to learning outcomes (Stojanov et al., 2017). One of the teacher’s goals is to make the student learn to solve real-world problems (Miranda et al., 2022). This fact, associated with highly technological environments in which student learning has to be directly associated with the technologies in the labor market, serves as a reason for adopting laboratory resources (Tondeur et al., 2015). This brings us to the use of the Technological Physical Laboratory (TPL) (Bernhard, 2018; Nolen & Koretsky, 2018; Shapin, 1988), where its structure is rich in technological devices that constitute a promising scenario for the acquisition of knowledge through its use and manipulations (Park & Jo, 2016; Stojanov et al., 2017). The TPL is a set of technological artifacts, which are used in a planned and structured way (Tondeur et al., 2015), is the learning environment of this study.

In this research, we used activity theory (Engeström, 1987, 1999; Sannino & Engeström, 2018) as a magnifying glass to understand how an activity system can account for an educational system using artifacts as a guiding element. Activity theory is based on the perspective that activity, which is more collective than individual, becomes a driving force for human development. It also points out that the mediating triad of “subject, object, and artifacts” enables various activity systems to generate a direct link between individuals, objects, and the real world. For this learning environment to come together, people, the environment, culture, motivations, beliefs, artifacts, and all the elements of the educational space’s ecosystem that result in interactions beneficial to the student’s learning are considered (Nardi, 1996).

To be more specific, the focus of the study is to identify the conditions that allow transforming the available artifacts into epistemic tools for students. (Kelly & Cunningham, 2019; Tan & Barton, 2019). As an environment that propels this learning, we insert the physical laboratories, which can influence the learning process through diversified practices (Knorr-Cetina, 2007; Miller et al., 2018; Saraiva et al., 2012). These practices aim to go beyond abstract work, generating a new context-specific practice called epistemic practices (Aleixandre & Crujeiras, 2017; Barzilai & Chinn, 2018; Cunningham & Kelly, 2017; Hopwood & Nerland, 2019; Kelly, 2008; Kelly & Peter, 2018; Markauskaite & Goodyear, 2017a; Nerland & Jensen, 2012). This creates a learning possibility from abstract to concrete and vice versa for the students. The conceptual approach to different degrees of acquired knowledge is part of the process of understanding meanings within the context of epistemic practices. Thus, the gradation of the epistemic degrees is intended to represent the degree of abstraction of the student’s knowledge with the teacher’s assistance (Jiménez-Aleixandre & Reigosa, 2006; Kelly & Takao, 2002).

On the other hand, we have the actions triggered by the teacher’s effort, called epistemic movement (Lidar et al., 2006; Maceno et al., 2017; Silva, 2015). These movements produce reactions in the student, leading them to the use and reuse of artifacts, generating physical interactions (Hofstein, 2017; Rabardel, 1995; Verillon & Rabardel, 1995; Woods & Roth, 1988) that well-structured, transform the tools (Lindfors et al., 2020; McDonald et al., 2005) in epistemic tools (Kelly & Cunningham, 2019; Lopes, 2019). These teacher actions encourage the production of autonomous student actions to build their learning path (Gutiérrez Ortiz et al., 2021; Menekse & Chi, 2019; Stefanou et al., 2004).

All these actions together trigger a process of improving digital resources, in which these resources are transformed into useful and beneficial tools (Drijvers et al., 2009, 2010; Lopes, 2019; Lopes & Costa, 2019). Either the steps are at times teacher-centered or other times student-centered.

In the quest to find elements related to this study, we present the characterization of the settings that will support the study’s theoretical basis (Table 1).

Table 1 Characterization of the study settings
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Description of the study and methodological aspects

Study design

Based on classes taught in a physical laboratory, an exploratory study was carried out to analyze how the physical laboratory can facilitate the teaching and learning processes, having as main actors the teacher and the student in the context of the use and reuse of laboratory artifacts.

The present study is qualitative (Bardin, 2002; Gibbs, 2009), through the study of two cases (Cohen et al., 2018; Yin, 2018) that allow identifying the conditions that lead the physical laboratory to be transformed into an epistemic tool. This study is a systemic approach to how the physical laboratory can and should be used as a teaching tool.

Thus, we intend to observe, explore, detect and understand the factors that mediate the teaching and learning processes within an educational and training context.

Participants

Three classes of laboratory practice were recorded in the TPL of a Federal Institute in Northeast Brazil. Two professors and three different curricular units were chosen, from the Computer Networks course, at the institution, whose content is of a theoretical/practical nature. The classes were recorded on videos with the support of the institution’s audiovisual resources sector. Two professors with different profiles were chosen but active in curricular units that use the technological resources of the laboratory.

The first professor has an undergraduate degree in Computer Networks from the Institute, with a master’s degree in Informatics, a doctoral student in Informatics, eight years of professional experience at the institution as a professor, and three years of experience in the job market. This professor was responsible for teaching two classes: the first, designated class 1, teacher 1, whose content is designing a topology of a computer network, lasted 130 min; and the second class, class 3, teacher 1, whose content is the creation of local networks, lasted 110 min.

The second professor is trained as a Technologist in Data Processing, with a Master’s degree in Informatics, and a Ph.D. in Electrical and Computing Engineering, with 17 years of professional experience at the institution and no experience in the job market. This teacher was responsible for the class, designated class 2, teacher 2, whose content was transported layer protocols and whose duration was 120 min.

The chosen classes were from the first, second, and last semesters of the Computer Networks course at the institution, with 63 students. These classes were selected because they were studying a discipline whose content is practical and, therefore, could create a real perspective of using the resources available in the laboratory for handling and the necessary laboratory practices. The group of participating students had ages between 18 and 30.

Data collection and transformation

Data collection took place through the procedure of recording classes and direct observations by the researcher, although without any intervention. These videos were transcribed and used to make a structured text, following a specific protocol called multimodal narration. A multimodal narration consists of a documental instrument that records what happens in the classroom chronologically, self-contained, and multimodal (Lopes et al., 2014, 2018, 2019). The chosen classes were selected by the profile of the activities linked to the direct use and manipulation of equipment.

Strict analysis and procedures

The analysis was performed to answer the research questions based on data originating from the categorization generated by the content analysis technique (Bardin, 2002; Gibbs, 2009), arising from the mentioned multimodal narrations. Thus, to parameterize the present study, three dimensions were defined (student—general elements—teacher). The student dimension is composed of the elements that deal with the student’s relationship to achieve the objectives of the knowledge acquisition and production process, framed here as part of the presented epistemic dimension (Méheut, 2005; Méheut & Psillos, 2004; Reveles et al., 2004; Silva & Wartha, 2018). The dimension of general elements, essential for the system’s functioning in general (physical interaction, performing tasks, complying with rules, etc.), is part of the pedagogical dimension. Finally, the teacher elements are framed here as belonging to the pedagogical dimension, except for the teacher’s epistemic movements in the epistemic dimension (Jiménez-Aleixandre & Reigosa, 2006; Méheut, 2005; Méheut & Psillos, 2004). These relationships will take place in such a way that the dimensions complement each other, creating a structure that sustains the mediations between the different actors that are part of the teaching and learning processes and/or by the very appropriation of the use and reuse of existing artifacts in the physical laboratory, thus providing a correlation of links between the setting mediators of these relationships for the acquisition of knowledge.

For a better understanding of the setting elements in this study, we define “Case” as being delimited by a unit of analysis where the defining event is when an action begins and ends or when there is a change of settings (student and/or professor and/or laboratory). “Variables” as the settings inherent to the teacher’s and student’s actions with the use and handling of the technological physical laboratory and which correspond to the categories of analysis. “Episodes” as delimited events that occur in the MN, which can be part of a class where the task is started and completed in a well-defined way.

The NVivo V12 software was used to organize and support the content analysis, resulting in a validated coded matrix, and then used for data analysis. The matrix validation process took place in two stages: (a) a test, produced by the researcher, and (b) a retest, produced by the external evaluator, with a time interval of 14 days from one stage to another. After the matrices resulting from the test and retest, two statistical methods were adopted to validate these data.

Firstly, the stability calculation method was carried out using the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC), which resulted in a value of over 0.798 for the 15 variables, with a 95% confidence interval. The second was an analysis of the degree of agreement of the results found by the two evaluators, in which it was found that the percentages of agreement varied between 78 and 100% for the 15 variables.

In both procedures, we took a sample of all the cases, in a percentage of 20%, to assess whether the interpretation of the categories was correct. Then, if some variables differed more, the respective definitions were reviewed, and the analysis was redone in all cases. These procedures were carried out using the SPSS v. 25 application, using the statistical functions to check their validation.

With this matrix validated, the cluster analysis technique was performed, applying the concept of hierarchical grouping using Ward’s method (Hair et al., 2009). The quadratic Euclidean distance is an interval measure, thus generating a dendrogram for data analysis and thus identifying the groups that have similarities. We considered the cut line at 1.5 units of distance for the descriptive analysis of the regroupings.

Thus, seven patterns were found, summarizing the three class groupings in a joint analysis between PG1, PG2, PG3, PG4, PG5, PG6, and PG7. They include the groups of analysis units characterized by a certain subset of variables in the relationships between the elements of the system, be it the teacher, the student, and the use of the laboratory during classes in the physical technological laboratory.

As shown above (Table 1), 15 variables that directly affect the results of the answers to the research questions were analyzed and duly classified (Table 2).

Table 2 Relevant variables to answer the research questions
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As a result of identifying the patterns found in the content analysis, we need to conceptualize the learning degrees to understand and analyze the results of the clusters more accurately. Thus, the epistemic degrees were structured (Table 3).

Table 3 Degree of quality of students’ epistemic practices
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It is pointed out that these degrees, defined in Table 3, arise from the gradation of the quality of epistemic practices, where a weighting of these degrees present in each grouping was made. These degrees represent variable groupings where a gradation of the degrees of quality of these epistemic practices is adopted.

The epistemic degree is defined as the quality of the epistemic practices produced by the student during the activity execution. The grades vary from G 1 to G 5. This quality of epistemic practice grades depends on the professor’s attitude toward the activities and the orientation of the work to be developed.

Thus, grade G 1 (the lowest grade of quality of this variable in the clusters) corresponds to activities and work situations centered on the teacher and with almost no student intervention, evolving to grade G 5 (the highest grade of quality of this variable in the clusters). In which the activities and work situations are now centered on the student with occasional support from the teacher.

The following definitions were adopted to understand the other concepts involved in data analysis (Table 4).

Table 4 Definition of analyzed variables
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The grades presented in Table 4 assume a scale from 1 to 5, with 5 being the highest grade and 1 the lowest grade of the quality of these variables in the groupings, noting that in the control grade, this happens oppositely, that is, the greater the control, the less student participation.

Finally, in the search for evidence of the construction of new knowledge, we validated this hypothesis using Bloom’s Taxonomy. Bloom’s taxonomy was used to test and identify the scope of new learning (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001; Fuller et al., 2007; Masapanta-Carrión & Velázquez-Iturbide, 2018).

To consider that new knowledge had been produced, the cognitive levels of “analyze”, “evaluate”, and “create” were used as indicators of the production of new knowledge in all the cases of multimodal narrations in this research.

Results

To answer the two research questions set out in the introduction, we begin by presenting global results. Then, in the first subsection, we will present the results for research question 1 and the second subsection for question 2.

Table 5 presents a summary description of the teacher’s and student’s behavior patterns, which allows for finding the relationships between the epistemic movements, the teacher’s controls, the student’s epistemic practices, and the physical interactions in this relationship.

Table 5 Summary of the characteristics of the patterns found
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From Table 5, we can draw the following conclusions:

The highest degree of epistemic practices occurs when the control is equal to or less than 3, the epistemic movements are medium, and the I.F.A. is high. That is, the quality of the students’ epistemic practices is higher when the teacher’s control is lower, concomitantly, with high I.F.A. use (PG4, PG5 Standards). In contrast, the quality of students’ epistemic practices is lowest when teacher control is high (Standards PG1 and PG3).

The lowest degree of epistemic practices occurs when the control is high. The PG2, PG6, and PG7 patterns present intermediate situations. Note that PG4 and PG5 standards are found in the three classes, and PG1 and PG3 standards are also found in the three classes. Therefore, the trends found are independent of the teacher and the student.

Analysis of patterns for studying the role of the teacher in helping students to take advantage of laboratory work for their learning in epistemic terms

The graphs (Figs. 1, 4, 7) represent the patterns found as a function of the time elapsed in each class.

The Timeline of Fig. 1 represents the 1st class lasted 130 min.

Fig. 1
figure 1

Occurrence of actions (Class 1, Teacher 1)

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At the beginning of this class, with the PG3 pattern, the teacher begins his work by imposing in a very intense way the adoption of controls, which hold the student’s attention and, together with some specific epistemic movements, favor the teacher’s mastery about the students, where such action inhibits the student’s autonomy. Although the purpose is to prepare the student to perceive the most appropriate route for carrying out the activities in the following phases, it is noted that these actions greatly block the promotion of epistemic practices. This set of actions takes around 40 min of class.

In the next phase of the class, which lasted 13 min, the teacher already gives the student a certain degree of freedom, promoting actions that produce epistemic practices at a satisfactory degree, using the PG2 standard (Fig. 2).

Fig. 2
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Extract from the multimodal narration (1MN_EP2_C49), referring to the PG2 pattern

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The graphical representation next to each figure—Figs. 2, 3, 5, 6, and—refers to the presence or absence of the variables defined in each case.

Almost halfway through the class, at 53 min, the teacher adopts the PG4 standard. In this pattern, the student works with a greater degree of freedom, having almost no interference from the teacher, only providing occasional support, lowering controls to the lowest possible degree, as well as epistemic movements at a low degree. These actions promote the highest degree of epistemic practices concerning the previous pattern, reaching the highest degree of promoting epistemic practices. This composition of epistemic movements and controls provided a substantial and maximum increase in the quality and quantity of epistemic practices. In addition to adopting these general variables at an intermediate degree, this pattern found a high degree of physical interactions with the laboratory artifacts. Thus, allowing the student to follow his epistemic learning itinerary fully and autonomously (Fig. 3).

Fig. 3
figure 3

Extract from the multimodal narration (1MN_EP2_C54), referring to the PG4 standard

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In the end, with 25 min left to conclude the class, the teacher adopted the PG6 standard, seeking to balance his actions of epistemic movement and control in a way that continues to promote epistemic practices to significant degrees.

However, these actions continue to be guided by the teacher, who exercises epistemic movement and control to keep the student in the total activity of promoting epistemic practices moderately.

Therefore, the teacher arrives at the best moment of the class, when he allows the student to promote epistemic practices at the highest degree, having as a starting point the management of controls and epistemic movements. Those epistemic movements are developed to the degree that allows the student to explore the use and reuse of artifacts in their fullness. The teacher starts with the PG3 standard (maximum control) and goes without this PG2 control until he reduces it to the minimum PG4.

Thus, in this class, the pattern best generated an epistemic learning environment with the teacher’s orchestration fully and autonomously was the PG4 pattern.

The timeline in Fig. 4 represents the 2nd class, which lasted 110 min.

Fig. 4
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Occurrence of actions (Class 2, Teacher 2)

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Class 2, teacher 2, began with the teacher imposing a very intense pace, applying controls that led the focus of the class to be centered on the teacher. However, on the other hand, it weakens the student’s autonomy. In these moments of the class, the teacher strongly uses this resource to capture the student’s attention and to prepare the student to have a more appropriate environment for carrying out the activities in the following phases. This set of actions takes around 12 min when the PG3 standard is identified. In the PG3 pattern, there is the use of control by the teacher, thus appropriately inhibiting the promotion of epistemic practices, reaching the lowest degree.

In the sequence of the class, also lasting 12 min, the teacher starts to act with new behavior, now with the PG1 pattern, beginning to adopt epistemic movements in a slightly higher way, but with controls with moderate intensity, thus generating, likewise, epistemic practices at the lowest degree. With that, he continues to inhibit the promotion of epistemic practices, reaching the lowest possible degree (Fig. 5).

Fig. 5
figure 5

Extract from the multimodal narration (2MN_EP1_C44), referring to the PG1 pattern

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In the continuation of the class, the teacher returns to use the initial pattern of the class, the PG3 pattern. Around 13 min, it continues to apply the typical control of this pattern that directly inhibits the promotion of epistemic practices.

For approximately 37 min, now in the PG2 pattern, the teacher adopts a new posture, starting to use this new pattern, where he decreases the controls he exercises over the student and maintains the same degree of epistemic movement concerning the previous pattern. In this way, it intensifies and increases the promotion of epistemic practices, raising the student to moderate epistemic learning.

Soon after, using the PG5 pattern, for approximately 25 min, the teacher tries to balance the epistemic movements with the controls at an intermediate degree. It is noteworthy that, in addition to the adoption of these actions involving these variables at an intermediate degree, there is the presence of physical interactions with the laboratory artifacts at a high degree, which enriches the epistemic learning environment (Fig. 6).

Fig. 6
figure 6

Extract from the multimodal narration (2MN_EP2_C106), referring to the PG5 pattern

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To end the class, for almost 11 min, the teacher adopts the posture of continuing with some controls to give guidance. Still, at the same time, it allows the student to continue to promote his actions autonomously and spontaneously, but guided by the teacher, adopting the PG2 pattern again. On the contrary, in PG1 and PG3, control is high and epistemic practices reach the lowest degree.

Therefore, the teacher arrives at the best moment of the class, when he produces a beneficial effect of having control and epistemic movements at an intermediate degree. At that time, he allows the student to promote epistemic practices at the highest degree while simultaneously exploring the use and handling of artifacts in their fullness. Thus, in this class, the pattern that best generated an epistemic learning environment with the teacher’s orchestration fully and autonomously was the PG5 pattern.

To reach the highest degree of epistemic practices (PG5), the teacher starts with high control (PG3) and gradually relinquishes this control (PG1, PG2) while increasing the degree of epistemic movement (PG2).

The timeline of Fig. 7 represents the 3rd class that lasted 120 min.

Fig. 7
figure 7

Occurrence of actions (Class 3, Teacher 1)

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Class 3, teacher 1, begins with the PG1 pattern, where the teacher spends about half of the class implementing concepts, using epistemic movement with low intensity but with moderate control. This set of actions creates a situation that inhibits the promotion of epistemic practices, reaching its lowest degree. The time spent of 60 min demonstrates that the teacher spent more time inhibiting actions from promoting epistemic practices, leading the student to have less freedom of action in this first moment of the class. Then, in the PG6 pattern, during 12 min, the student starts to act and promote a considerable number of epistemic practices to a moderate degree. These actions are guided by the teacher, who tries very hard to maintain the same degree of learning, thus trying to balance his actions with the student’s actions (Fig. 8).

Fig. 8
figure 8

Extract from the multimodal narration (3MN_EP2_C38), referring to the PG6 standard

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In the next set of actions that lasts around 23 min, the teacher adopts the PG5 pattern, using a new set of actions with epistemic movements and controls at an intermediate degree, reaching the highest degree and promoting autonomous epistemic practices and spontaneity. This composition provided a substantial and maximum increase in epistemic practices, quality, and quantity. In this pattern—in addition to these variables’ intermediate degree adoption—there was a high degree of physical interactions with the laboratory artifacts observed. That pattern allows the student to follow his epistemic learning itinerary fully and autonomously. This fact demonstrates that, if well used, these epistemic movements and controls can achieve a certain degree of benefit for student learning. In sequence, the teacher adopts the PG7 pattern, lasting about 25 min. Here, the teacher returns to acting with epistemic movements at a higher degree but lowering the controls even more, which will generate a degree of epistemic practices at a satisfactory degree. However, at the same time, it allows the student to continue to use the artifacts in work practice autonomously and generate a moderate number of epistemic practices.

Therefore, the teacher arrives at the best moment of the class, when he produces a beneficial effect of having control and epistemic movements at an intermediate degree. That allows the student to be able to promote epistemic practices at the highest degree at the same time that he explores the use and handling of artifacts in their fullness. Thus, in this class, the pattern best generated an epistemic learning environment with the teacher’s orchestration autonomously and effectively was the PG5 pattern.

In this class, the teacher’s control decreases in degree but remains at an intermediate degree. To achieve a higher degree of epistemic practices, the teacher must increase the quality of the epistemic movement.

Therefore, the procedure adopted by the teacher in the three classes is similar, changing only the turning time used for each of them. Note that PG4 or PG5 patterns are found in the three classes; PG1 or PG3 standards are also found in the three classes. Therefore, it is clear that the trends found are independent of the teacher and the class. It is observed that teachers use the PG1 and PG3 standards for the beginning of classes and other standards for the continuation and conclusion of classes.

How does a physical laboratory become an epistemic tool—analysis of patterns due to acquiring new knowledge?

First, we need to note that to have the laboratory as an epistemic tool, we need to produce new knowledge. For this, it will be necessary to find evidence of this phenomenon in the existing narrations.

As mentioned in section ”Strict analysis and procedures”, Bloom’s Taxonomy was used to identify signs of the production of new knowledge. Considering that if we analyzed and identified the cognitive level of the activities carried out by the student during the class, specifically the levels to analyze, evaluate, and create, this would indicate the production of new knowledge. This result leads us to understand that Bloom’s Taxonomy would work as an anchor to find evidence of this new knowledge production. Bloom’s Taxonomy allowed us to infer that if cognitive activities reach these levels, we can say that there are indications that these activities are producing new knowledge.

To do this, we mapped all the “cases” that make up the groupings found in the three multimodal narratives and identified those in which elements of the cognitive domain were involved. Thus, we located which patterns had the levels to analyze, evaluate, and create. Applying Bloom’s Taxonomy to the units of analysis in this study, we realized that the patterns presented evidence cases that identify occurrences of new knowledge creation. These occurrences are because these patterns are characterized by the constitution of actions that generate epistemic practices associated with new knowledge, as seen in Fig. 9.

Fig. 9
figure 9

Demonstration of creating foreground by default

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Thus, from the data obtained and analyzed, the pattern that most contributed to new knowledge was the PG4 pattern, with 21% of its cases in these listed conditions. Next, we have the PG2 and PG6 patterns have a smaller percentage of their cases contributing to the construction of new knowledge. The PG5 and PG7 patterns contributed little to this construction, with percentages below 5% of their cases. Patterns PG1 and PG3 patterns did not present new knowledge.

PG5 pattern does not produce new knowledge, despite being characterized by a high degree of epistemic practices. The same happens with the PG7 pattern.

It is then observed that the standards where students produce new knowledge by students are those in which epistemic practices are at a high degree (4 or 5), but not all patterns where this happens, new knowledge is produced (Table 6).

Table 6 Distribution of time for the production of new knowledge present in specific standards
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In class 1, teacher 1, students’ patterns for producing new knowledge are all present: PG2, PG4, and PG6.

New knowledge is generated throughout the 2nd part of the class and in different degrees of abstraction, as can be seen in Fig. 1 and Table 6. This class was the one that showed the best use for promoting new knowledge, using around 90 min of class to achieve this result.

As for the 2nd class, by teacher 2, there is the production of new knowledge where only the PG2 standard is present, at least in two parts of the class, as can be seen in Fig. 4 and Table 6, using around 48 min to have this result.

In the 3rd class, held by teacher 1, new knowledge is generated in a very short period, just 12 min, and the only pattern in which it is present is the PG6 pattern, as seen in Fig. 7 and Table 6.

Analyzing the patterns in which the students produce new knowledge, it is verified that in these patterns, the degree of epistemic practices is high and, concomitantly, the teacher’s control is low (PG2 and PG4) or, if not low, the epistemic movement has to be high (PG6).

In turn, analyzing the orchestration of mediation patterns, it is verified that once a pattern is reached that allows the generation of new knowledge, this ceases to happen when the teacher lowers the control and increases the degree of epistemic movement (class 2) or maintaining the control, lowers the epistemic movement or increases the epistemic movement decreases the control (class 3) that is, in any class when what the teacher does (EM and CT) is contradictory.

Discussion

Analyzing patterns for studying the teacher’s role in helping students to take advantage of laboratory work for their learning in epistemic terms allows us to answer the first research question.

Based on the results of Tables 1 and 4, Figs. 1, 4, and 7, the teacher uses mediation actions, whether in the pedagogical dimension or the epistemic dimension, to endow the student with attributes that allow them to act in an autonomous and informed way, promoting epistemic practices in sufficiently significant quality and quantity. The quality of the students’ epistemic practices is increased by lowering the teacher’s controls. And if, in this dynamic, control increases, more significant effort is needed from the teacher so that epistemic practices continue to a high degree.

It is noticed that, in the three classes, the teacher adopts a mediator posture that facilitates the student’s learning path. This attitude is materialized when the teacher maintains control of the class and makes an effort to get the student to promote epistemic practices in significant numbers. The procedure adopted by the teacher in the three classes is similar, changing only the turning time used for each one. It is observed that teachers use the PG1 and PG3 standards for the beginning of classes and other standards for the continuation and conclusion of classes. Therefore, it can be inferred that the teacher’s role is to mediate between the student and the artifacts available in the physical laboratory, allowing the student to improve in the pursuit of knowledge increasingly.

Given this, we can establish the first contribution: (1) The teacher’s mediation action facilitates and allows the students to learn using the physical laboratory. In particular: the quality of the students’ epistemic practices is increased, lowering the teacher’s controls, and if in the teacher’s mediation dynamics, the increase in control is more significant, the effort is necessary for the epistemic practices to continue to a high degree.

With possible limitations and certain conditions, in this context, if there is a mediation orchestration by the teacher in the physical laboratory use-reuse of artifacts. Also, the student can make the most of learning and promote epistemic practices significantly and with the desired quality. Pattern orchestration, in this study, refers to the sequence and articulation between the patterns adopted by the teacher during classes.

In particular, patterns PG1 and PG3 always occur at the beginning of classes and follow with patterns where epistemic practices are of the highest degree. Although this aspect is a condition for generating new knowledge, this does not always happen in all patterns. It happens like this due to the orchestration of the teacher’s mediation patterns incurrence implemented during the classes.

We can still establish the second contribution: (2) The orchestration of the teacher’s mediation patterns is essential to achieve beneficial results in student learning using the artifacts of the physical laboratory of Computer Networks. In particular, patterns with greater teacher control precede patterns in which epistemic practices are of the highest degree (with less teacher control and more significant physical interaction of students). Despite this orchestration being a condition for generating new knowledge, this does not always happen due to internal incurrence in some patterns of teacher mediation (degree of control in contradiction with the degree of epistemic movement).

Analyzing the patterns due to the acquisition of new knowledge by the students allows us to know how a physical laboratory is transformed into an epistemic tool, allowing us to answer the second research question.

Thus, analyzing the results found in the teacher’s settings, it can be seen that the teacher plays an essential role in directing the key activities that allow the student to produce epistemic practices. These practices arise from the guidance the teacher imposes in the classroom, adopting effort and controls to transform the student’s actions into epistemic learning.

From the student’s perspective, it is seen that he develops actions that lead him to produce significant epistemic practices. In many moments, these practices result in the promotion of new knowledge. It is observed in the context of the analysis that the production of new knowledge is not directly linked to the position of epistemic practices being at the highest possible degree. We can produce new knowledge in patterns where the maximum epistemic degree reached is the intermediate degree. However, even so, new knowledge was produced.

Given the results of Table 2, 5, 6, Figs. 1, 4, 7, and 9 regarding the teacher’s settings and in the outlined student context and under similar conditions, new knowledge was generated in all classes, whether by teacher 1 or teacher 2 was inferred. As seen in Table 6 and Fig. 9, these actions allowed the student to transform the task into an opportunity to generate very in addition to what was achieved with the internalization of new concepts or the use and reuse of artifacts. In this perspective, it was possible that these epistemic practices in all classes could be transformed into epistemic learning and, therefore, into new knowledge, even if in different durations for each class.

Therefore, based on the premise that there was the production of new knowledge, it can be inferred that the physical laboratory was elevated from a laboratory of tools to a laboratory of epistemic tools.

Given this scenario, we can establish a third contribution: (3) For the physical laboratory to become an epistemic tool, the mediation standards must allow students to develop epistemic practices to a high or very high degree and a certain orchestration of the teacher’s mediation standards. However, not always in such mediation patterns, new knowledge is produced. Furthermore, this does not occur continuously in patterns where there is knowledge production.

Next, we will discuss with the literature the importance of each contribution to teaching and learning processes using physical laboratories in Computer Networks courses and what conclusions we can draw about each.

Contribution (1)

In the results, it is seen that the role of mediation of the teacher is fundamental so that the teacher can contribute and direct the student to improve the quality of learning. According to Lopes (2012), the teacher’s mediation is a structural basis to promote the student’s productive involvement, which is essential for the student to be able to act autonomously and thus produce significant epistemic actions. Therefore, it is seen that the teacher’s mediation is crucial for the generation of epistemic practices (Kelly, 2008, 2016; Markauskaite & Goodyear, 2017b) with the use and reuse of the physical laboratory (Bernhard, 2018). Therefore, the teacher’s mediation is a structuring point for achieving beneficial results involved in the mediation of learning using the physical laboratory of Computer Networks. Although the teacher’s mediation is widely discussed in some studies, the specificity of the context presented here using the physical laboratory has not yet been adequately studied. Therefore, it is a new contribution in terms of epistemic movements and controls by the teacher and epistemic practices and physical interaction by the student.

This contribution reveals that the teacher’s mediation action during the use of the laboratory artifacts by the student has greater or lesser influence depending on how the teacher applies the controls during the class (Dao & Iwashita, 2018; Saraiva et al., 2012) The adoption of control can adopt or remove from the student the premise of producing more or less epistemic practices (Kelly, 2008; Markauskaite & Goodyear, 2017b) while carrying out the activity (Lopes, Cunha, et al., 2012). In the present study, the control (Chou & Liu, 2005) is a central point for whether the promotion of epistemic practices and even physical interaction of the student exists. Depending on how the teacher conducts this application of controls in the classroom, the student will have different results in these practices’ production and, thus, improve or not the learning outcomes.

This guidance by the teacher can promote, more or less, the student’s ability to carry out more purposeful learning, allowing or not the student to decide to conduct his training path and gain knowledge. When this control is to remove authority from the student in the promotion of knowledge, this must be well-directed so as not to reduce the productive involvement of the student and leave him out of the possibility of being self-sufficient in his learning (Lopes, Cunha, et al., 2012).

In this scenario, when dealing with an event in which the teacher needs or decides to increase control (Chou & Liu, 2005), it is seen to maintain the epistemic practices (Cunningham & Kelly, 2017; Markauskaite & Goodyear, 2017a) to a high degree. The need to increase the quality of epistemic movements (Lidar et al., 2006; Maceno et al., 2017) to guarantee the maintenance of the promotion of epistemic practices. This conjunction needs to have a mediation orchestration, thus allowing the rise of epistemic practices by the student.

This contribution is vital in identifying that the teacher is a mediator between the student’s actions, the use and reuse of the artifacts of the physical laboratory, and the student’s final learning. The teacher’s presence in the teaching and learning processes using the physical laboratory and its settings (epistemic movement of the teacher, control of the teacher, the epistemic practice of the students, and physical interaction of the students with the laboratory), which was not yet studied in this context, being, a contribution presented by this study.

Contribution (2)

This contribution shows that orchestrating the teacher’s mediation patterns is imperative to achieve beneficial results for the student’s epistemic learning (Markauskaite & Goodyear, 2017a; Nerland & Jensen, 2012). The mediation patterns of teacher orchestration (Lopes et al., 2008; Lopes, Silva, et al., 2012) assume the same behavior in the three classes. And those patterns have a higher degree of teacher’s control (seen in PG1 and PG3) and are always preceded by the higher degree patterns of present epistemic practices. There is less teacher interference in patterns with more epistemic practices. However, this interference is not always harmful since, in many situations, the teacher acts or interferes to guide the student to carry out activities directly linked to the promotion of physical interactions (Goodwin, 2005; Lynch, 1991) and, as a consequence, generating epistemic practices (Knorr-Cetina, 1999) in number and quality. In this situation, its mediation orchestration favors the teaching and learning processes, increasing the possibility of raising the student’s degree of epistemic practices.

Thus, it can be understood that the patterns allow an orchestration of mediation by the teacher to favor the teaching and learning processes in an epistemic way, thus guaranteeing a good use of the laboratory resources in line with the teacher’s skills in the perspective of learning improvement.

The results show that in the context of work in the physical laboratory of networks, the orchestrations of mediation patterns adopted by the teacher influence the students’ epistemic practices (Aleixandre & Crujeiras, 2017; Kelly, 2008, 2016; Kelly & Peter, 2018).

The actions taken by the teacher can have a more significant impact on the use of the laboratory when they are prolonged beyond its direct action. Those actions happen when there is an “orchestration” of the teacher’s mediation patterns to trigger a better use of technological resources, giving the student more significant learning opportunities. From the perspective of the teacher’s role in conducting the teaching processes, it should be noted that in the context of using the physical laboratory (Bernhard, 2018), mediation standards are achieved thanks to the teacher’s actions that generate significant results in the quality of classes (Sezen‐Barrie et al., 2020).

A new contribution arose that may develop teachers’ actions to achieve better results in the teaching and learning processes, using the laboratory resources not yet explored and not mentioned in the literature. Therefore, it contributes to using the technology laboratory as an epistemic tool laboratory. This contribution reveals that the teacher’s action—in addition to having immediate consequences—can significantly impact epistemic practices on a larger temporal scale if there is an “orchestration” of the teacher’s mediation patterns. These patterns of orchestrations are focused on the active presence of the teacher’s intentions and interactions in being the mediator of the learning produced, serving as a bridge between student learning and the artifacts of the physical laboratory.

Another important issue observed in the analysis is that a sequence of mediation patterns by the teacher is needed to allow the student to produce new knowledge, either by reducing control or by increasing the epistemic movement.

The results show that by adopting an orchestration of the teacher’s mediation patterns, it is essential for the student to develop their activities and produce beneficial results in their learning. This orchestration of patterns provides an increase in epistemic practices in number and quality.

This articulation between mediation patterns has two specificities if one intends to promote epistemic practices: (i) The succession of mediation patterns has to occur so that the teacher’s control decreases. (ii) The new knowledge provided in the previous condition ceases if the degree of control contradicts the degree of quality of the epistemic movement.

This contribution is important in providing the teacher with standardized actions that generate positive results in conducting the student’s training path in the learning process using the physical laboratory. A part of the contribution is compatible with the literature (the promotion of epistemic practices occurs whenever, after an initial control by the teacher, it starts to drop), in particular, the literature on scaffolding (Belland, 2014; Gonulal & Loewen, 2018; Kim et al., 2019), although this study places it specifically in the context of epistemic practices. However, a new aspect was identified (contradiction between control and the degree of quality of the epistemic movement) that occurs with some frequency, and it is necessary to study this phenomenon in a specific way.

Contribution (3)

For the laboratory to be transformed into an epistemic tool, it is necessary to produce epistemic practices (Markauskaite & Goodyear, 2017b; Nerland & Jensen, 2012) to a high degree. Nevertheless, this alone does not guarantee the production of new knowledge (Hakkarainen, 2009). It is necessary that in the dynamics of the class, the student recognizes that the teacher lowers the control (Chou & Liu, 2005) and starts to allow the student to produce new knowledge. It is evident that if the students do not recognize the opportunity given by the teacher to learn for themselves, lowering the control that he exercises over the students’ activity, they do not produce new knowledge, even if they have produced epistemic practices. Those actions happen in class 2 and class 3, wherein patterns 5 and 7 have epistemic practices, but there is no construction of new knowledge. The class with the most extended production of new knowledge was class 1, by teacher 1, as there is the production of new knowledge in a large part of the class time.

It is noticed that in patterns with new knowledge, the epistemic movement (Lidar et al., 2006; Maceno et al., 2017) appears to equal or greater degree than the control, or the degree of control is low. In the mediation pattern following the pattern in which there is the construction of new knowledge, if the teacher’s degree of epistemic movement decreases or the degree of control increases, there is no construction of new knowledge.

Therefore, the present study, at first, points to the use of the technological physical laboratory as an epistemic tool that generates new knowledge, obeying the mediation standards adopted by the teacher that substantially improve the quality of student learning using the physical laboratory. The study also shows that it is not obvious for an experienced teacher to develop and give control to students, linearly achieving results throughout the educational learning process during the lesson. This contribution points to evidence that the appropriate use of the physical laboratory generates opportunities for the student to promote new knowledge, depending on the teacher’s dynamics regarding control and epistemic movement during the classes.

It can be seen from the graphs in Figs. 1, 4, 7 that, in the three classes, there was no continuous production of new knowledge, although it can be seen that the teacher made an effort, and the student was involved in this. Through Table 6, the class that best presents itself in this scenario is class 1, teacher 1, with 69% of the time performing the production of new knowledge, then the second class, teacher 2, with 47% of that time producing new knowledge and, finally, the third class, teacher 1, with 10% of that time generating new knowledge. From this perspective, it is clear that for new knowledge to exist, it is necessary to produce epistemic practices, but this is not a sine qua non-condition for this to happen. The reasons for defending this behavior were not fully perceptible in this study.

In the context studied, it is clear that this contribution needs to be better studied to strengthen the use of the physical laboratory in Computer Networks courses due to the patterns that can generate new knowledge.

Conclusions

This paper aims to identify the teaching and learning practices in the practical classes of Computer Network Technology courses, which promote the use of the Physical Laboratory (PL) as a tool to improve learning in terms of knowledge. More specifically, verifying the role of the teacher in the student’s learning during the laboratory activity and the conditions to transform a physical laboratory into an epistemic “tool”. Thus, the following conclusions can be drawn:

The first conclusion that stands out is the importance of the teacher’s role in this process, as he is the one who guides the paths of learning, directing and supporting the student’s decisions and uncertainties on the learning path during the use and reuse of laboratory artifacts. This direction and support take place during the knowledge construction process. In that process, the teacher uses the settings (epistemic movements and controls) to impose a direction, thus creating patterns of mediation between the student’s learning with the use of the artifacts of the laboratory, thus promoting more or less epistemic practices, depending on the degree of use adopted by the teacher.

The second is that the teacher’s action can significantly promote epistemic practices—which extend beyond their direct action—if there is an “orchestration” of the teacher’s mediation patterns. How the teacher moves from teaching centered on the teacher (going through various forms of collaborative work with students with different degrees of autonomy from them) to teaching centered on students with a high degree of autonomy from the latter reveals how he deliberately performs “orchestration” of their mediation standards. This mediation pattern orchestration is perceived throughout the three classes, leading the student to the use and reuse of the laboratory beyond a simple tool as an essential element for achieving the results of active and profitable learning.

The third is that to transform the physical laboratory into a laboratory of epistemic tools, mediation standards must allow students to develop epistemic practices to a high or very high degree, and there is a certain orchestration of mediation. Despite being a necessary condition, it is insufficient, as the results point to a new direction of investigation to understand what else is needed to produce new knowledge.

Despite having answered the two research questions, this research presents a structural limitation to the study: its deepening with a larger sample and the participation of more teachers. Despite these limitations, the results presented were promising and indicated a good laboratory practice (face-to-face) that raises the quality of teaching and learning processes.

Thus, in future studies, it is expected to be able to increase the sample size, as well as the number of teachers. Soon, and in the future, it could deepen the analysis of the other attributes of this learning ecosystem. Another aspect of being deepened is the contribution (3), where it was impossible to identify the reasons that led to the non-production of knowledge continuously in most classes (2 and 3). Last but not least, a contribution for future application is to consider and suggest including the results of this research in professional qualification and teacher training programs, both in initial and continuing training.

A direct implication of our investigation was to contribute with answers that support improving teaching and learning processes using the physical laboratory. Therefore, this helps the decisions to improve laboratory practices in other higher education institutions in Brazil in Computer Networks courses and other related areas.

In the future, it would also be essential to accompany students in their workplace as workers. In that way, it would be interesting to question the workers (former students) to tell us to what extent their contact with the physical laboratory and its artifacts facilitated or not this current work of theirs and what is the importance of access to the physical laboratory in their training.