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Guest Editors' Introduction: Rethinking Methodology in the Learning Sciences

Item

Title

Guest Editors' Introduction: Rethinking Methodology in the Learning Sciences

Abstract/Description

Situative (Brown, Collins, & Duguid, 1989; Greeno, 1997; Kirshner & Whitson,1997; Lave & Wenger, 1991) and distributed (Pea, 1993; Salomon, 1993) theories of cognition increasingly are being proposed as alternatives to the traditional individualist notion offered by cognitive psychology. From this perspective, knowledge, perhaps more aptly termed knowing about, is no longer conceived of as astatic structure residing in the individual’s head; instead, knowing is a process dis-tributed across the knower, the environment in which knowing occurs, and the activity in which the learner is participating. Thus, knowing and context are irreducibly co-constituted (Barab, Hay, Barnett, & Squire, in press; Greeno, 1998), and learning is (re)conceived as fundamentally constitutive of the contextual particulars in which it is nested (Cobb & Yackel, 1996; Lave, 1997). Environments developed to support such learning, what we are calling dynamical learning environments (DLEs), are not simply backdrops for supporting the transmission of content, but are considered dynamic arenas supporting trajectories of participation that are reciprocally constituted by and within context (Barab & Duffy, 2000; Cobb & Bowers,1999). How one begins to account for learning and the potential of a learning context to support learning is the focus of this special issue.

Date

Volume

10

Issue

1-2

Pages

5-15

Resource type

Research/Scholarly Media

Resource status/form

Published Text

Scholarship genre

Commentary/Editorial
Methodological

IRE Approach/Concept

Open access/full-text available

Yes

Peer reviewed

Yes

ISSN

1050-8406

Citation

Barab, S. A., & Kirshner, D. (2001). Guest Editors’ Introduction: Rethinking Methodology in the Learning Sciences. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 10(1–2), 5–15. https://doi.org/10.1207/S15327809JLS10-1-2_2

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