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Structure, agency, and the development of students’ identities as learners

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Abstract

This paper focuses on the role of dominant school discourses in structuring how students position themselves and others relative to a community centered on science. The study was conducted in a diverse, eighth grade classroom in an urban magnet school. I argue that dominant discourses portray a limited view of available subject positions, in that the purpose of learning science is associated with a dichotomous view of people as being either college-bound or not. I explore how these limited subject positions can pose contradictions with some students’ interests, constrain students’ visions of possibilities, exacerbate disadvantages based on race and class, and interfere with students acquiring identities as science learners. However, there are also possibilities for resistance, agency and self-definition through students’ talk.

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Acknowledgments

The research in this manuscript is supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. REC-0107022. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this dissertation are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Pennsylvania, 3700 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA

    Stacy Olitsky

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  1. Stacy Olitsky
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Correspondence to Stacy Olitsky.

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Stacy Olitskycurrently works as a researcher for the Math and Science Partnership of Greater Philadelphia and is a lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania. She has a doctoral degree in Education and Sociology from the University of Pennsylvania. She has spent the past several years working on a longitudinal, ethnographic study of science education in an urban magnet school. Her research interests include the relationship of identity and science learning, interaction rituals in classrooms, in-field and out-of-field science teaching, the influence of social capital and cultural capital on science learning, activity theory and classroom change, and students’ experiences with school choice.

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Olitsky, S. Structure, agency, and the development of students’ identities as learners. Cult.Scie.Edu. 1, 745–766 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11422-006-9033-x

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