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The Influence of Curriculum, Instruction, Technology, and Social Interactions on Two Fifth-Grade Students’ Epistemologies in Modeling Throughout a Model-Based Curriculum Unit

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Abstract

In the past decade, reform efforts in science education have increasingly attended to engaging students in scientific practices such as scientific modeling. Engaging students in scientific modeling can help them develop their epistemologies by allowing them to attend to the roles of mechanism and empirical evidence when constructing and revising models. In this article, we present our in-depth case study of how two fifth graders—Brian and Joon—who were students in a public school classroom located in a Midwestern state shifted their epistemologies in modeling as they participated in the enactment of a technologically enhanced, model-based curriculum unit on evaporation and condensation. First, analyses of Brian’s and Joon’s models indicate that their epistemologies in modeling related to explanation and empirical evidence shifted productively throughout the unit. Additionally, while their initial and final epistemologies in modeling were similar, the pathways in which their epistemologies in modeling shifted differed. Next, analyses of the classroom activities illustrate how various components of the learning ecology including technological tools, the teacher’s scaffolding remarks, and students’ collective activities and conversations, were marshaled in the service of the two students’ shifting epistemologies in modeling. These findings suggest a nuanced view of individual learners’ engagement in scientific modeling, their epistemological shifts in the practice, and the roles of technology and other components of a modeling-oriented learning environment for such shifts.

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Notes

  1. The only two directions as to how to construct a model that the student notebook provided were to “show how [evaporation] happens over time” and to “capture not just “what happens to the water” but “why or how it happens.””

  2. Although he did not represent these entities fully in the picture, his written explanation that emphasizes the role of the air evidently indicates that he used these entities as a major explanatory feature.

  3. We do not present Joon’s initial model of condensation here because it is nearly identical to his second model of condensation (Fig. 6) except that it does not include humidity and weight. Therefore, to better understand the following descriptions, refer to Fig. 6.

  4. Recall that his EIM related to explanation did not change at this time.

  5. Because this activity was undertaken rather briefly, we do not analyze it in this article.

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Acknowledgments

This research was funded by the National Science Foundation under the grants DRL1020316 and ESI-0628199 to the MoDeLS and Scientific Practices projects at Northwestern University. We appreciate our colleagues, Hayat Hokayem, Li Zhan, Jing Chen, Mete Akcaoglu, and Li Ke, for their work in these projects. The opinions expressed herein are those of the authors and not necessarily those of any one or party mentioned above.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Handong International School, Namsong-ri, Heunghae-eup, Buk-gu, Pohang-si, Gyeongsangbuk-do, Seoul, 791-941, Republic of Korea

    Hamin Baek

  2. Michigan State University, Erickson Hall, 620 Farm Lane, Room 349, East Lansing, MI, 48824, USA

    Christina V. Schwarz

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  1. Hamin Baek
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Correspondence to Hamin Baek.

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Baek, H., Schwarz, C.V. The Influence of Curriculum, Instruction, Technology, and Social Interactions on Two Fifth-Grade Students’ Epistemologies in Modeling Throughout a Model-Based Curriculum Unit. J Sci Educ Technol 24, 216–233 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10956-014-9532-6

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