Research on analogies in science education has focussed on student interpretation of teacher and textbook analogies, psychological aspects of learning with analogies and structured approaches for teaching with analogies. Few studies have investigated how analogies might be pivotal in students’ growing participation in chemical discourse. To study analogies in this way requires a sociocultural perspective on learning that focuses on ways in which language, signs, symbols and practices mediate participation in chemical discourse. This study reports research findings from a teacher-research study of two analogy-writing activities in a chemistry class. The study began with a theoretical model, Third Space, which informed analyses and interpretation of data. Third Space was operationalized into two sub-constructs called Dialogical Interactions and Hybrid Discourses. The aims of this study were to investigate sociocultural aspects of learning chemistry with analogies in order to identify classroom activities where students generate Dialogical Interactions and Hybrid Discourses, and to refine the operationalization of Third Space. These aims were addressed through three research questions. The research questions were studied through an instrumental case study design. The study was conducted in my Year 11 chemistry class at City State High School for the duration of one Semester. Data were generated through a range of data collection methods and analysed through discourse analysis using the Dialogical Interactions and Hybrid Discourse sub-constructs as coding categories. Results indicated that student interactions differed between analogical activities and mathematical problem-solving activities. Specifically, students drew on discourses other than school chemical discourse to construct analogies and their growing participation in chemical discourse was tracked using the Third Space model as an interpretive lens. Results of this study led to modification of the theoretical model adopted at the beginning of the study to a new model called Merged Discourse. Merged Discourse represents the mutual relationship that formed during analogical activities between the Analog Discourse and the Target Discourse. This model can be used for interpreting and analysing classroom discourse centred on analogical activities from sociocultural perspectives. That is, it can be used to code classroom discourse to reveal students’ growing participation with chemical (or scientific) discourse consistent with sociocultural perspectives on learning.

Abstract The goal of this research is to develop a research process that explores the role Inuit teachers play in the development of Inuit culture in the classroom. A participatory action research approach was used with the objectives of: (1) examining how Inuit teachers view their cultural role; and (2) exploring how Inuit teachers teach their culture. Research activities were grounded in Indigenous education, intercultural learning and postcolonial theories. From this frame of reference, two project activities were developed in partnership with the Kativik School Board in Nunavik, Canada: a teacher training course and a teacher survey. The teacher training course attempted to create a ‘third space’ in which decolonization could be discussed and teachers could reflect about cultural influences on their own practice. The teacher survey constructs a ‘snap-shot’ of Inuit teacher perspectives on the topic of Inuit culture in their classrooms. Analysis of data involved qualitative methodologies including content analysis for the course and a series of verification interviews with senior stakeholders. A quantitative approach was used for analysis of the teacher survey. Data suggest that Inuit culture is being taught in classrooms; however few opportunities exist for Inuit teachers to discuss the implications of their practice. Conclusions point to the need for further development of Inuit-specific and Inuit-led research spaces - third spaces - in which Inuit culture can be articulated, and reflected upon. Limiting factors exist, however, with regard to how these spaces can be developed including language used for dialogue, authority within the space and length of time for dialogue. Decolonizing cultural competency is introduced in concert with third space theory as a pathway toward articulating collaborative research spaces in which Inuit can work in their own language and construct Inuit-specific strategies and content to decolonize their educational systems. / Tiivistelmä Tämän tutkimuksen tavoite on paneutua natiivi inuiittiopettajien rooliin inuiittikulttuurin kehittämiseksi kouluopetuksessa. Tutkimuksessa käytettiin osallistavaa toimintatutkimusta, jonka tavoitteena oli selvittää: (1) miten inuiittiopettajat näkevät oman kulttuuriroolinsa ja (2) miten inuiittiopettajat opettavat omaa kulttuuriaan. Tutkimuksen teoriaperustana käytettiin alkuperäiskansojen opetuksen, monikulttuurikasvatuksen ja postkolonialismin teorioita. Tutkimus toteutettiin kahtena osaprojektina; opettajien koulutuskurssi ja kyselytutkimus. Nämä tutkimusprojektit suunniteltiin ja toteutettiin yhteistyössä Kativikin opetuslautakunnan kanssa Nunavikissa Kanadassa. Tutkimuksessa toteutetulla opettajankoulutuskurssilla pyrittiin luomaan ”kolmas tila”, jossa opettajat voivat syventyä keskustelemaan dekolonisaation käsitteistöstä ja voivat pohtia oman työnsä kulttuurisia vaikutuksia. Opettajien parissa tehty kyselytutkimus puolestaan on ’pikakatselmus’ inuiittiopettajien näkemyksiin inuiittikulttuurin roolista heidän luokkahuoneissaan. Tutkimusaineisto analysoitiin kvalitatiivisin ja kvantitatiivisin menetelmin. Opettajankoulutuskurssin tutkimusaineiston analysointiin käytettiin kvantitatiivista sisällönanalyysia, jonka tuloksia validoitiin haastattelemalla kokeneita inuiittiasiantuntijoita. Opettajainkyselytutkimus puolestaan analysoitiin kvantitatiivisesti. Tutkimus osoittaa, että inuiittikulttuuria opetetaan luokkahuoneissa mutta inuiittiopettajilla on harvoin mahdollisuus yhdessä pohtia työnsä merkityksiä. Tutkimustulosten perusteella voidaan tehdä johtopäätös, että olisi tarpeen kehittää inuiittikeskeisiä ja inuiittien johtamia tutkimusympäristöjä - kolmas tila – joissa inuiittikulttuuria voidaan artikuloida ja pohtia. Tätä pohdintaa rajoittavia tekijöitä ovat kuitenkin dialogissa käytettävä kieli, kolmannen tilan auktoriteettikysymykset ja dialogiin käytettävä aika. Kulttuurikompetenssin dekolonisaatio ja kolmas tila esitetään tutkimuksessa keinoina kuvata yhteistoiminnallisia tutkimustiloja, joissa inuiitit voivat toimia omalla kielellään sekä kehittää inuiittikeskeisiä strategioita ja sisältöjä inuiittiopetuksen rakenteiden dekoloniasoimiseksi.

This study explores theoretical and pedagogical implications of space, language, and power in renegotiating identity for immigrant English Language Learners (ELLs) in secondary schools in the United States. The primary research question explored in the study is: How does spoken and written language and discourse shape the production of third spaces for renegotiating immigrant student identity in the ELL writing classroom? I adopt an epistemological lens of space from a postmodern geographic perspective that contends that space is socially produced and is co-constituted by material, abstract and lived spaces. The theoretical framework draws on constructs of social space, space-time, and the chronotope propose reconsideration of third spaces for immigrant ELLs. The context of the study is an intermediate ELL writing classroom designed around immigrant students developing academic and critical literacy grounded in their lived spaces of immigration. The methodology employed combines ethnography of the classroom space with critical discourse analysis of critical spatial events that are analyzed as moments of spatial production. Ethnographic narrative of the classroom space, governed by guiding concepts of critical literacy and shared behavioral norms, centers on the focal immigration unit in which student immigration narratives provide overarching chronotopes of immigrant student identities. Analysis of classroom spatial production highlights tensions in social space that are mediated by language, discourse and communication surrounding immigrant identities. Transcript analysis of critical spatial events traces intersecting space-times at global, local and micro-local scales of classroom discourse. Findings from ethnographic case study of one immigrant Latino male, who aspires to become a hip hop DJ, illustrate how hip hop discourses frame the chronotope of immigration and represent a shared third space between the teacher and focal student. This study contributes new ideas in theory and research methods by operationalizing third spaces for immigrant ELL student. Implications also follow for curriculum and instruction rooted in lived spaces of experience and for critical reflective practice for educators.

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In a third space, the boundaries between educational contexts and school disciplines are blurred to look at content from multiple perspectives. Out-of-school organisations, like museums, can offer educational resources that launch a museum-school partnership into a third space. This thesis describes the conceptualisation and validation of such a third space. An interdisciplinary museum programme that supports the cooperation between museum educators and teachers to encourage students in an art-based exploration of science issues is presented. A systematic comparison of the museum programme with the established Framework for Museum Practice resulted in applicable design recommendations for informal educators and schools that strive for a third space. Within an art-based science teaching strategy, this thesis additionally analysed students’ transformative aesthetic experiences and what role imagination plays in those. A newly developed visual analysis indicates how the museum programme offers students opportunities to look at complex aspects of the world depicted by contemporary art and to discern and value their intricacy. The results show how the interdisciplinary approach to science issues allows links between the conceptual and the emotional. By using their own eyes and each other’s company, students observe and create science-related art, expanding their knowledge, perceptions, values, and feelings. It is the imagination that drives cognitive operations, enabling students to envision other perspectives while at the same time considering their own subjectivity. With the conceptualisation of a third space, this thesis coins a suggestion to put the purpose of ‘subjectification’ into science education practice. In addition, it strengthens the position of Arts (A) in Science Technology Engineering Arts and Mathematics (STEAM) education by indicating the benefits of combining the cognitive with the affective and using the hands in conjunction with the head. / Students can discover the complexities of images, objects, and aspects of the world with their powerful eyes. With their imaginative minds, they can envision diverse perspectives while at the same time considering their own subjectivity. This thesis shows that by using their eyes and imagination in an art-based exploration of science issues, students can expand their knowledge, perceptions, values, and feelings. The presented art-based teaching approach is enveloped by an interdisciplinary museum programme that allows links between the conceptual and the emotional. Its design is conceptualised in this thesis as a third space, crossing boundaries between educational contexts and school disciplines. Guidelines are offered to support museum-school partnerships and an instructional design that builds on the framework of transformative aesthetic experiences. In addition, embodied and intuitive aspects of the imagination in conjunction with rationality about science issues, direct a discussion about the purpose of ‘subjectification’ in science education.

This dissertation interprets a qualitative study designed to investigate the pedagogical practices of experienced science teachers who, through their teaching practices, promote learning and achievement of urban African American middle school students between the ages 10-13 years. Based upon the theoretical frameworks of the theory of third space and culturally-responsive pedagogy, this study targeted the pedagogical practices that connected home-to-school experiences. The study sample consisted of 17 students, 2 experienced science teachers, and 1 principal from the same urban middle school. Data collected over a six-month period include in-depth individual interviews, classroom observations, audio recordings, videotaping, and review of documentation. Interviews focused on the participants' experiences, views, and the role each played in learning and achievement. Classroom observations provided additional insights into the classroom setting, participants' actions, and participants' interactions with the teachers and other students. The student focus group emphasized the students' perspectives of their teacher and her teaching strategies. A whole-text analysis of the interview transcripts, observational field notes, video recording and documents generated three major categories: connection to students, classroom management, and instructional pedagogy. The following significant findings emerged from the data: (a) the beliefs and views of teachers affect their classroom practices; (b) when teachers build rapport with African American students, they are better able to create trust, increase the comfort level in their classroom, and motivate learning; (c) a teacher's use of home-to-school connections motivates students' interest in learning while helping them to make connections to curriculum, (d) the type of classroom management practices a teacher uses can enhance effective content implementation, and (e) a teacher's varied instructional pedagogical practices can provide African American students the opportunity they need to demonstrate knowledge and achievement. Implications for middle school teachers, students, parents, administrators, and teacher educators are included. Suggestions for future research are also provided. The results from this qualitative study strongly suggest that third space theory provides a theoretical framework for understanding the connections necessary for bridging a culturally-responsive disposition and a continuum between home and school experiences, which is critical in a science classroom populated by urban African American students. / Ph. D.

The content and understanding of student life has changed noticeably since the 1980s, and during this it also had to adapt the media and digital spaces into its existence as well. This can also be argued as having led to a change in how students perceive that they can create and maintain specific use of spaces within a work life balance for the student life. Under such terms, student life thus becomes focused on acquiring knowledge and skills through studies, identity creation, socialization and media literacy in present day context. It thus raises the question of how student work life balance can be different between male and female students, as while earlier research has mapped out the effect of student life during the pandemic, one also needs to explore how use of space, gender workload, social capital in a post pandemic setting. This has been done from a faculty perspective, where phenomenon such as gender norms, social capital and academic housework have shown that the workload between male and female professors are perceived differently as well as changing their view on work life balance and use of space. Thus, this thesis aims to explore how students use spaces in a manner that creates hybrid/third spaces that allows for creation of social capital and identity creation alongside being able to study in various places due to digitalization being present at the university, in their social media and their home. How the media presence has affected the student ability to plan a work life balance thorough use of hybrid spaces, and how use and space perception can differ between gender will be explored and analyzed through a thematic analysis and interviews with students. In the analysis it will then be explored with how perception of aspects such as workload, spatial use, normative expectation, media literacy and similarity themes to understand how they as factors create a normative growing ground for gendered expectations on male and female students. / <p>En masteruppsats från masterprogrammet i Geomedia vid Karlstad Universitet. Valde de nationella ämneskategorier som fångade in programmets inriktning.</p>

In the past 30 years there has been a rapid and exponential growth in the numbers of people electing to complete all or part of their studies outside of their country of origin. This phenomenon has attracted considerable research attention, not least from those who are interested to describe the benefits seen to accrue from the opportunity this provides for an extended encounter with linguistic and cultural diversity. Notably, the widespread assumption that this can generate a new form of learning, commonly referred to as intercultural learning, which is understood to comprise increased tolerance, empathy and openness to the linguistic and cultural other. Despite the limited research data to substantiate these claims, among those interested to develop educational responses to globalization, the potential of intercultural contact to generate intercultural learning has considerable appeal and has been co-opted in the development of policy and practice to promote global citizenship at all levels of education. This has contributed to the emergence of a particular discourse about intercultural learning and is further fuelling the development of both short and long-stay study abroad programmes. This discourse is, however, increasingly called into question on account of the perceived overly-simplistic constructions of interculturality and learning on which it is premised. In particular, there is a growing recognition of the need to develop situated accounts of people’s everyday encounters with linguistic and cultural others which acknowledge the exigencies of the setting, as well as the impact of wider political economic and historical discourses on their positioning in intercultural encounters. The generation of ‘thick’ descriptions of people’s lived experiences of interculturality in global educational contact zones, it is argued, can lead to a more nuanced account of the intercultural learning these can afford. This was the aim of the study reported in this thesis. The study undertaken explores the relationship between an experience of interculturality and learning among 14 international students during their year-long sojourn at a university in the UK. Drawing upon a socially constructed relational understanding of learning informed by the transactional and dialogic conceptualization of learning developed by Dewey and Bakhtin among others, the study sought to generate a narrative account of participants’ experiences and learning generated from periodic individual and group interviews over the year as well as reflective accounts in participants portfolios and other opportunistic conversations recorded in the researcher log. Primary analysis of the data revealed that participants’ experiences generated a number of forms of learning. One of these, ‘learning about self in relation to linguistic and cultural other’ was identified as a form of intercultural learning, comprising learning to be more open to the other and learning about linguistic and cultural positioning. This was subsequently explored in more depth, revealing a complex interplay between these two elements and the strategic actions taken by participants to manage their encounters with linguistic and cultural others. These results revealed considerable differences in the learning trajectories and outcomes resulting from their intercultural encounter. The findings also point to the importance of sustained commitment to intercultural dialogue on the part of individuals and the perception of their ethical treatment by others as important to the direction their learning trajectories take. On the basis of these findings, it is argued that while an encounter with linguistic and cultural other may lead to increased tolerance, empathy and openness to other associated with the way intercultural learning is employed in much of the research literature, the strategic actions learners take to negotiate their linguistic and cultural positioning will critically inform the extent to which they develop these qualities. The thesis concludes with a discussion of the ways in which a situated and relational conceptualization of interculturality and learning is seen to contribute to a more informed and deeper understanding of the sorts of intercultural learning that are made possible by an intercultural encounter. I also identify a number of research agendas which can build upon the insights provided by the study.

<p>The thesis examines local and global functions of code-switching and code-mixing in Chicano theater, i.e. in writing intended for performance. The data of this study consists of three published plays by Chicana playwright Cherríe Moraga. </p><p>Distinguishing between code-switching and code-mixing, the investigation explores local and global functions of these phenomena. Local functions of code-switching are functions that can be seen in the text and, as a consequence, can be regarded as meaningful for the audience of the plays. These functions are examined, focussing on five loci in which code-switching is frequent and has clear local functions. The loci are quotations, interjections, reiterations, ‘gaps’ and word/language play. </p><p>Global functions of code-switching and code-mixing operate on a higher level and are not necessarily detected in the actual texts. These functions are discussed, focussing on two main areas, namely power relations (addressing questions of domination, resistance and empowerment) and identity construction (addressing questions of how identity can be reflected by use of language and how identity is constructed and reconstructed by means of language). </p><p>The study suggests that code-switching fills creative, artistic and stylistic functions in the plays and that code-switching and code-mixing can serve as responses to domination in that they can be used to resist, challenge and ultimately transform power relations.</p>

The thesis examines local and global functions of code-switching and code-mixing in Chicano theater, i.e. in writing intended for performance. The data of this study consists of three published plays by Chicana playwright Cherríe Moraga. Distinguishing between code-switching and code-mixing, the investigation explores local and global functions of these phenomena. Local functions of code-switching are functions that can be seen in the text and, as a consequence, can be regarded as meaningful for the audience of the plays. These functions are examined, focussing on five loci in which code-switching is frequent and has clear local functions. The loci are quotations, interjections, reiterations, ‘gaps’ and word/language play. Global functions of code-switching and code-mixing operate on a higher level and are not necessarily detected in the actual texts. These functions are discussed, focussing on two main areas, namely power relations (addressing questions of domination, resistance and empowerment) and identity construction (addressing questions of how identity can be reflected by use of language and how identity is constructed and reconstructed by means of language). The study suggests that code-switching fills creative, artistic and stylistic functions in the plays and that code-switching and code-mixing can serve as responses to domination in that they can be used to resist, challenge and ultimately transform power relations.