• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.41 no.3
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• pp.193-202
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• 2021

This study aims to identify what kind of epistemological resources were activated in unproductive and productive practice by students participating in scientific argumentation, and to explore which contexts result in changes in argumentative practice. We collected transcriptions of participants' argumentative lessons and interview, participants' work sheets, and researchers' field notes. The analysis revealed that the focus group activated different kinds of epistemological resources depending on their practice; propagated, belief, and accumulation in unproductive practice and constructed, understanding, accumulation, formation and rebuttal in productive practice. We found two contextual cues that led to these changes; unfamiliar form of argumentative task was provided and emotional, epistemic, and conceptual support of the epistemic authority. This work can be provided as additional case studies to analyze changes in practice according to learner context-dependent epistemology, and we expect to contribute to discussions of productive epistemology and stabilization for students' authentic science engagement.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.63-75
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• 2017

The purpose of this study is to explore the effect of responsive teaching on students' productive argumentation practice. The participating students predicted the results of an activity to measure in which location on the body (the head, spine, or back of the hand) they would feel a cellphone's vibrations faster. They then engaged in the activity and built an argument to justify it. We interviewed the teacher to understand her thoughts regarding what was expected in the class. We also recorded and transcribed the class and the interview, for use in the analysis of the students' epistemological framing and the teacher's responsive practice in small group argumentation. We discovered that the teacher intervened in the groups with questions that elicited students' thoughts as starting points for her responsive practice. Her eliciting questions led the students to talk about their ideas, supporting their engagement in the argumentation. The teacher's understanding of the argumentation lesson and her behavior to understand the students' ideas reflected her productive framing, which led her to elicit students' ideas and to support their active interaction during the small-group argumentation. She presented rebuttals against students' ideas, engaging in the argumentation as another participant, not as an evaluator. This supported the equality of intellectual authority in the group and showed students how to engage in the argumentation, supporting students' productive framing. As a result of these responsive teaching practices, the students shifted their epistemological framing, resulting in productive argumentation practice. The results of this study will contribute to developing teachers' responsive teaching strategies to support students' productive framing in science classrooms.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.39 no.6
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• pp.739-753
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• 2019

The purpose of this study is to explore characteristics and limitations of a novice teachers's responsive teaching practice, who framed argumentation productively. One novice teacher and two eighth-grade classes participated in this study. Two of the small student groups with active teacher intervention were selected as focus groups. Students engaged in argumentation activity where they built an argument for hearing if the eardrum was torn. We recorded the class and interviews with the teacher and the students, which were transcribed for use in the analysis of the teacher's responsive teaching practices and epistemological, positional framing. We discovered that teacher thought that he should position himself as a facilitator to encourage students to present ideas clearly and to reach consensus. His framing was consistent in responsive teaching practices. Positioning himself as a facilitator, after he framed the discussion as idea sharing discussion by eliciting and probing students' idea, he framed the discussion as argumentative discussion by taking up students' idea and pointing out disagreement between them. As a result, members of small group 1 engaged in argumentative discussion and reached consensus. However, the teacher's productive framing did not guarantee students' productive argumentation practice. In small group 2, he did not elicit and probe students' ideas successfully. As a result, members of small group 2 did not engaged in argumentative discussions. He responded limitedly to the lack of students' conceptions because of lack of understanding about learners. Also, he mainly attended to students' reasoning, and not to students' framing about argumentation because he considered argumentation only as a tool for conceptual learning. The result of this study will contribute to the establishment of responsive teaching in science classrooms.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.39 no.1
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• pp.1-12
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• 2019

This study aims to explore students' epistemic practices and considerations, which are explained as underlying epistemic thoughts that guide their epistemic practices, during argumentation in science classrooms. We also investigated how collaborative reflection facilitated the development of such epistemic considerations. Two seventh-grade classes participated in this study by engaging in argumentation activities and collaborative reflection after classes. A group with students' change in epistemic aspects and the influence of collaborative reflection clearly revealed from their practices was chosen as a focus group. We recorded their class discussions and collaborative reflections with the researchers. Transcriptions of the recordings and checklists we collected during the collaborative reflections were used for analysis. Results showed evident changes in the students' epistemic considerations and practices and four factors facilitating such developments were identified. First, the researcher facilitating the students to recognize each other as collaborators during collaborative reflection led development of epistemic considerations on "audience using the knowledge products." Second, the collaborative reflection facilitated construction of context for peer interactions where the students encouraged each other to participate in the discussion, resulting in the development of other students' epistemic considerations on "justifications in knowledge products." Third, the items provided on the checklists explicitly delineated expectations on their practices in argumentation, also facilitating development of epistemic considerations. Lastly, the students' imitation of the researcher's pattern of discourse facilitated construction of causal explanation and development of epistemic considerations on "nature of the knowledge products." This study will contribute to the construction of strategies that develop students' epistemic considerations and productive epistemic practices in argumentation.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.45-61
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• 2016

The purpose of this study is to explore students' epistemic goals and considerations in designing an experiment task and to investigate how a shift in the students' epistemology affected their argumentation. Four 7th grade students were selected as a focus group. According to the results, when they designed their own experiment, their epistemic goal was 'scientific sense-making' and their epistemic considerations - the perception of the nature of the knowledge product was 'this experiment should explain how something happened', the perception of the justification was 'we need to use our interpretation of the data' and the perception of the audience was 'constructor' - contributed to designing their experiment actively. When students tried to select one argument, their epistemic goal shifted to 'winning a debate', showing 'my experiment is better than the others' with the perception of the audience, 'competitor'. Consequently, students only deprecated the limits of different experiment so that they did not explore the meaning of each experiment design deeply. Eventually, student A's experiment design was selected due to time restrictions. When they elaborated upon their result, their epistemic goal shifted to 'scientific sensemaking', reviewing 'how this experiment design is scientifically valid' through scientific justification - we need justification to make members accept it - acting as 'cooperator'. Consequently, all members engaged in a productive argumentation that led to the development of the group result. This study lays the foundation for future work on understanding students' epistemic goals and considerations to prompt productive argumentation in science classrooms.