Undergraduate science research projects and students - School of ...

Undergraduate Learning in Science Project Working Paper 5If the purpose of developing undergraduate students’ profiles ofepistemological and sociological reasoning is to influence the implicitknowledge drawn upon to inform actions, we see an argument for basingteaching in specific contexts. For example, students’ understanding of themodel-like nature of particular scientific knowledge claims and theimplications of this for data handling in their disciplines might better bedeveloped through research projects, other laboratory-based work or workwith secondary data sets, rather than by attending philosophy of sciencelectures on the nature of scientific knowledge. In this way, knowledge isbeing learnt in contexts similar to those in which the knowledge is used byprofessional scientists (Seely Brown et al 1989). Such contexts will betermed ‘authentic’ in the remainder of this paper.Approaches to developing students’ implicit epistemological and sociologicalknowledge of science in authentic contexts can be characterised on aspectrum. One extreme might best be characterised as a form of ‘osmosis’:put the student in an authentic context and wait for appropriate learning tohappen. At the other extreme, explicit instruction would be presented aboutthe epistemological and sociological underpinnings of authentic contexts.The research projects investigated in this study fall at various points on thisspectrum. In some cases, project supervisors commented that they usedparticular teaching techniques to make the nature of an area of researchexplicit to students, whereas in other cases it was apparent that no attemptwas made to address this issue explicitly in projects. (The approaches ofsupervisors to this aspect of teaching are discussed in Ryder and Leach1996a). Some departments also address the nature of knowledge claims andtheir warranting in their particular discipline area explicitly in tutorials andlectures.One powerful way of explicitly encouraging students to reflect on their workin an authentic setting is to require them to give talks about their project workto other students and researchers. Such seminars can be made a regularfeature of student project work and could also include seminars given byexperienced researchers in which they describe their activities as a scientist.Furthermore, students whose project work takes place within an activeresearch laboratory and who feel that they are part of a small researchcommunity will be continually exposed to images of authentic science. Sucha working environment also encourages informal exchanges between thestudent and other researchers (particularly PhD researchers) which can helpto develop the student’s images of the activities of a scientist in theirdiscipline.The ‘osmosis’ approach to developing students’ implicit knowledge hassome merits. There is considerable evidence that implicit, useableknowledge is often developed in this way (e.g. Nunes et al 1993). However,it is not hard to imagine that students’ learning in authentic contexts could beenhanced if particular aspects of the context were made more explicit. Wesaw a case of this in student J’s response to a TV programme describing anexample of theory change in her subject area. On the other hand, teaching79