Abstracts - Earli

practices are organized around shared objects, which often emerge in the process itself, throughnegotiation or disturbance. Shared objects can be material, procedural or conceptual. (ibid:141).For pedagogical practice it is important to be aware of the many aspects of the object in order to beable to identify knowledge creation. In knowledge creation practices such objects guide our effortstowards collectively developing a shared representation of a new phenomenon, what we do not yetknow. From various positions such issues have been addressed in education as well as in workinglife (Cope & Kalantzis, 2000; Gee, Hull, & Lankshear, 1996; Wells & Claxton, 2002). We presenta case of knowledge creation in which a group of learners (age 17) struggle to make sense of atragic incident (Sep 2004); the hostage situation and ensuing battle between Chechen rebels andRussian soldiers at School No 1 in Beslan where 344 people, 186 school children among them,died. The object of their collective efforts is partly material in the form of different representationsof the group’s insights. These material instances are intended to serve as learning objects forclassmates. Partly, the object is immaterial and ideational in the sense that it emerges as acollective focus or conceptualization for the group’s activities. In both cases we see a process of agroup coming-to-know (Wells, 2002).G 1230 August 2007 08:30 - 10:30Room: 0.83 EötvösSymposiumCognitive neuroscience meets educationChair: Elsbeth Stern, ETH Zurich, SwitzerlandChair: Daniel Ansari, University Western Ontario, CanadaOrganiser: Elsbeth Stern, ETH Zurich, SwitzerlandDiscussant: Elsbeth Stern, ETH Zurich, SwitzerlandScientific progress in the field of neuroscience as well as the enormous public interest in itsfindings has raised an ongoing debate about the potential of neuroscience to inform educationalreform. Undoubtedly, appropriate brain functioning is the prerequisite for successful schooling.Therefore, addressing questions concerning the interaction between instruction, knowledgeacquisition, and brain functioning is a worthwhile goal of future research. However, it has becomea matter of concern for many educational researchers that practitioners and policy-makersresponsible for educational reforms increasingly ground their decisions on a pseudo-scientificbackground of brain functioning rather than on the large body of sound research on classroomfunctioning. It has become dangerously fashionable to label very general and mostly trivialpedagogical advice as "brain-based learning", while the more precise and applicable knowledgefrom traditional research about how to design powerful learning environments is ignored.Nonetheless, while unrealistic expectations concerning the educational implications ofneuroscience have to be scaled down, an interdisciplinary discourse between educational researchand cognitive neuroscience may contribute to a better understanding of schooling. The symposiumwill deal with this question. In the first talk, some fundamental remarks on appropriate scientificargumentation will be made referring to a theory of science. Addressing selected topics of learningresearch, it will be discussed whether referring to neuroscience will or will not strengthen theirtheoretical background. The two subsequent talks will deal with the neural bases of quantificationand the implications for understanding the difficulties encountered in learning mathematics. The– 394 –