Thesis advisor: Katherine L. McNeill / Recent science education reform documents and standards, such as the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), call for school science to better reflect authentic scientific endeavors by highlighting the centrality of students engaging in science practices. This dissertation study focuses specifically on argumentation (through the modality of talk), one of the eight science practices emphasized in the NGSS. Although extensively studied, argumentation rarely occurs in classrooms. The absence of this science practice in classrooms is partly due to the student-driven exchanges required by argumentation differing greatly from the interactions that occur during traditional instruction, where students primarily speak to and through the teacher. To transform the type of talk that occurs in science classrooms it is necessary to examine discourse patterns, as well as the roles classroom members take on, in order to identify and develop strategies that can facilitate the shift in discourse norms. This dissertation employs a mixed-methods approach, using social network analysis (SNA), multiple case study methodology, and discourse analysis (DA), to deeply examine video recordings of three middle school classrooms engaged in argumentation through a science seminar (a type of whole class debate). Findings from the SNA highlight the importance of argumentation research integrating a focus on argument structure with dialogic interactions, and point to the benefits of using multiple types of representations to capture engagement in this science practice. Furthermore, examining the manner by which teachers articulated student expectations and goals for the argumentation activity suggest the need to continue supporting teachers in developing and using rich instructional strategies to help students with the dialogic component of argumentation. Additionally, this work sheds light on the importance of how teachers frame the goals for student engagement in this science practice, specifically as being either individual goals or communal goals. Lastly, findings from the DA stress the relationship between discourse patterns and interactional norms, and also suggest the need to expand our perspectives of who can prompt for critique during an argumentation activity.

This study utilized ethnographic methodology to describe the communicative interactional patterns in families with a member who has breast cancer. Three breast cancer patients whose families were between the adolescent and launching of children developmental lifestage (McGoldrick & Carter, 1982) were chosen for the study. Data were collected from a series of three interview sessions over a period of four weeks with a two week time lapse between each of the interview sessions. Interview sessions were conducted in the families' homes by the researcher. All interviews were video and audio tape recorded for the purpose of preserving data for transcribing and coding. Research questions examined individual perception of meaning in regard to the disease, the structure and organization of the family in relation to the illness, and the effects of family communicative interaction on the course and management of the disease. Findings indicated that family members' responses to the diagnosis of "breast cancer were influenced by multi-generational "beliefs. All three families formulated a collective belief which supported the mother's belief about the disease. Each of the three families were mother-centered, and each mother seemed to use a metacommunicative approach to mediating family transactions. Each of the three fathers were reported as having been isolated and withdrawn within the family at various times. However, each father appeared to play a protective role in deflecting tension and stress away from the mother. All three couples appeared to have constructed an egalitarian relationship with an implicit agreement as to who was more skilled to hold the power within a particular context. In all three families, the generational boundaries were clearly defined. Conflict and affect were most generally expressed in an indirect manner through wit and sarcasm. However, because each of these three families were structured to allow for personal autonomous functioning of each individual member, patients were supported in seeking a modality outside of the family system to express more ambivalent feelings.

Text in Afrikaans / Die objek van studie in hierdie proefskrif is ietwat ongewoon. Die studie is outobiografies en is gegrond op die aanname dat daar tussen die psigoterapeut, sy geskiedenis, die wetenskap (etnografie en tweede-orde kubernetika) en die klient(e) 'n unieke patroonverband bestaan. Die psigoterapeut in die platteland het weens afstand of finansies nie altyd die voorreg om supervisie van 'n eksterne supervisor te ontvang nie. In so 'n situasie kan selfsupervisie, deurdat dit 'n proses van selfontdekking is, 'n belangrike rol in die psigoterapeut se selfontwikkeling speel. Selfsupervisie plaas die klem op die psigoterapeut as persoon en as terapeut; oor wie hy is, waar hy vandaan kom en waarheen hy binne die psigoterapeutiese proses op pad is. Vir enige psigoterapeut is dit belangrik om na 'n hoer vlak van psigoterapie te streef. Hierdie strewe impliseer 'n proses van selfondersoek, delwing, selfevaluasie en disseksie. Hierdie proses is aan die hand van dagboekinskrywings gedoen, waar die psigoterapeut sy daaglikse ervarings en gebeurtenisse vanuit die verlede interpreteer het. Dit plaas die psigoterapeut as hoofspeler, met sy familiegeskiedenis en huidige interpersoonlike opset as inherente deel van sy mondering, op die voorgrond. In hierdie proses word die psigoterapeut sentraal geplaas met die klem op eie verantwoordelikheid met betrekking tot die proses van selfsupervisie. Die probleme wat deur hierdie persoonlik gekleurde, wetenskaplike studie aangespreek word, is probleme wat die psigoterapeut deur middel van sy selfsupervisie ge1dentifiseer het. So 'n selfondersoek lei tot 'n diepere selfkennis wat die psigoterapeut tot voordeel van homself, sy gesinsisteem en klientsisteem kan gebruik. Hierdie studie is 'n poging om 'n nuwe wyse van navorsing te identifiseer. Dit is omvattend en lei tot persoonlike vervulling asook diepere selfkennis en is 'n man waardeur ander psigoterapeute ook hulself en hul werelde kan ontdek. Dit is 'n stadige en pynlike proses. Hoofstukke 1 tot 4 is die teoretiese, wetenskaplike beredenering van die studie en hoofstukke 5 tot 12 is 'n uitbeelding van die geskiedenis van die psigoterapeut. Hoofstuk 13 plaas selfsupervisie as selfevalueringsmetode binne die psigoterapeutiese beroep. / The object of this study somewhat unusual. The study is an autobiography based on the assumption that there exists an unique patterned connection between the psychotherapist, his history, science (ethnography and second-order cybernetics), and his clients. Due to distance or financial problems, a rural psychotherapist cannot experience the privilege of supervision with an external supervisor. In such a situation selfsupervision could play an important role in the self-development, because it includes a search of self that will lead to more effectiveness in psychotherapy. Self-supervision focuses on the psychotherapist as a person and therapist, who he is, where he comes from, and in what direction he, as a psychotherapist, is developing within the psychotherapeutic process. It is important to any psychotherapist to strive towards a higher level of psychotherapy. This implies a process of selfinvestigation, dissection and self-evaluation. This process was conducted by means of diary entries in which the psychotherapist interpreted his daily experiences and events in terms of his past. This places the psychotherapist, with his family history and current interpersonal situation, as intrinsic parts of himself, in the foreground. In this process the psychotherapist takes centre stage with emphasis on his responsibility concerning the process of self-supervision. The problems addressed by this personally coloured, scientific study, are problems that the psychotherapist identified through the process of self-supervision and introspection. Such introspection leads to a deeper personal knowledge which the psychotherapist can use to his own benefit but also to the benefit of his family and client system. This study is an attempt to identify a new way of research. It is comprehensive and leads to personal fulfilment and deeper self-knowledge and is also a method by which other psychotherapists could discover themselves and their worlds. It is a slow and painful process. Chapters 1 to 4 comprise of the theoretical rationale of the study and chapters 5 to 12 depict the history of the psychotherapist. Chapter 13 situates self-supervision as a method of self-evaluation in the profession of psychotherapy. / Psychology / D. Litt. et Phil.

Text in Afrikaans / Die objek van studie in hierdie proefskrif is ietwat ongewoon. Die studie is outobiografies en is gegrond op die aanname dat daar tussen die psigoterapeut, sy geskiedenis, die wetenskap (etnografie en tweede-orde kubernetika) en die klient(e) 'n unieke patroonverband bestaan. Die psigoterapeut in die platteland het weens afstand of finansies nie altyd die voorreg om supervisie van 'n eksterne supervisor te ontvang nie. In so 'n situasie kan selfsupervisie, deurdat dit 'n proses van selfontdekking is, 'n belangrike rol in die psigoterapeut se selfontwikkeling speel. Selfsupervisie plaas die klem op die psigoterapeut as persoon en as terapeut; oor wie hy is, waar hy vandaan kom en waarheen hy binne die psigoterapeutiese proses op pad is. Vir enige psigoterapeut is dit belangrik om na 'n hoer vlak van psigoterapie te streef. Hierdie strewe impliseer 'n proses van selfondersoek, delwing, selfevaluasie en disseksie. Hierdie proses is aan die hand van dagboekinskrywings gedoen, waar die psigoterapeut sy daaglikse ervarings en gebeurtenisse vanuit die verlede interpreteer het. Dit plaas die psigoterapeut as hoofspeler, met sy familiegeskiedenis en huidige interpersoonlike opset as inherente deel van sy mondering, op die voorgrond. In hierdie proses word die psigoterapeut sentraal geplaas met die klem op eie verantwoordelikheid met betrekking tot die proses van selfsupervisie. Die probleme wat deur hierdie persoonlik gekleurde, wetenskaplike studie aangespreek word, is probleme wat die psigoterapeut deur middel van sy selfsupervisie ge1dentifiseer het. So 'n selfondersoek lei tot 'n diepere selfkennis wat die psigoterapeut tot voordeel van homself, sy gesinsisteem en klientsisteem kan gebruik. Hierdie studie is 'n poging om 'n nuwe wyse van navorsing te identifiseer. Dit is omvattend en lei tot persoonlike vervulling asook diepere selfkennis en is 'n man waardeur ander psigoterapeute ook hulself en hul werelde kan ontdek. Dit is 'n stadige en pynlike proses. Hoofstukke 1 tot 4 is die teoretiese, wetenskaplike beredenering van die studie en hoofstukke 5 tot 12 is 'n uitbeelding van die geskiedenis van die psigoterapeut. Hoofstuk 13 plaas selfsupervisie as selfevalueringsmetode binne die psigoterapeutiese beroep. / The object of this study somewhat unusual. The study is an autobiography based on the assumption that there exists an unique patterned connection between the psychotherapist, his history, science (ethnography and second-order cybernetics), and his clients. Due to distance or financial problems, a rural psychotherapist cannot experience the privilege of supervision with an external supervisor. In such a situation selfsupervision could play an important role in the self-development, because it includes a search of self that will lead to more effectiveness in psychotherapy. Self-supervision focuses on the psychotherapist as a person and therapist, who he is, where he comes from, and in what direction he, as a psychotherapist, is developing within the psychotherapeutic process. It is important to any psychotherapist to strive towards a higher level of psychotherapy. This implies a process of selfinvestigation, dissection and self-evaluation. This process was conducted by means of diary entries in which the psychotherapist interpreted his daily experiences and events in terms of his past. This places the psychotherapist, with his family history and current interpersonal situation, as intrinsic parts of himself, in the foreground. In this process the psychotherapist takes centre stage with emphasis on his responsibility concerning the process of self-supervision. The problems addressed by this personally coloured, scientific study, are problems that the psychotherapist identified through the process of self-supervision and introspection. Such introspection leads to a deeper personal knowledge which the psychotherapist can use to his own benefit but also to the benefit of his family and client system. This study is an attempt to identify a new way of research. It is comprehensive and leads to personal fulfilment and deeper self-knowledge and is also a method by which other psychotherapists could discover themselves and their worlds. It is a slow and painful process. Chapters 1 to 4 comprise of the theoretical rationale of the study and chapters 5 to 12 depict the history of the psychotherapist. Chapter 13 situates self-supervision as a method of self-evaluation in the profession of psychotherapy. / Psychology / D. Litt. et Phil.