Imagination and Its Contributions to Learning in Science
01 Jan 2015-pp 39-57
TL;DR: This paper examined the young learner's imaginary play world and explored how this lays an important foundation for scientific thinking and found that young learners continually move between reality and imaginary situations in play, and this builds the foundations for thinking with concepts in science.
Abstract: This chapter examined the young learner’s imaginary play world and explored how this lays an important foundation for scientific thinking Vygotsky (J Rus East Eur Psychol 42(1):7–97, 2004) argued that ‘imagination is not just an idle mental amusement, not merely an activity without consequences in reality, but rather a function essential to life’ (p 13) Imagination becomes the means for broadening a person’s experience Vygotsky (J Rus East Eur Psychol 42(1):7–97, 2004) suggests that humans imagine what they cannot see, conceptualise what they hear from others, and think about what they have not yet experienced That is, a person ‘is not limited to the narrow circle and narrow boundaries of his [sic] own experience but can venture far beyond these boundaries, assimilating, with the help of his imagination someone else’s historical or social experience’ (Vygotsky, J Rus East Eur Psychol 42(1):7–97, 2004: 17) In this chapter we examined the young child’s learning in science through an examination of imagination and creativity in science Because young learners continually move between reality and imaginary situations in play, it was shown in this chapter that this builds the foundations for thinking with concepts in science We show through empirical research of science with fairytales how the young learner explores science concepts through their play The concepts of collective investigations, emotional filtering, duality of emotions and thinking, flickering, and affective imagination are discussed These are brought together under the concept of perezhevanie
Citations
More filters
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examined how students' discursive identities were managed and recognized in the moment and over time during dialogic teaching and what consequences these negotiations had for their engagement in science learning.
39 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the value of looking beyond the written and spoken word in science education research and practice at the early childhood level is discussed, and one plurilingual child's descr...
Abstract: This manuscript elaborates the value of looking beyond the written and spoken word in science education research and practice at the early childhood level. We examine one plurilingual child’s descr...
26 citations
TL;DR: The authors argued that perezhivanie is best understood as an intellectual gestalt reflecting the intellectualisation of perception and, ontologically, as an apperceptual "organ of selection" of consciousness and personality reflecting the child's individual social situation of development.
Abstract: The concept of perezhivanie, Vygotsky's "last word" on psychology, has been among the most difficult of his theoretical constructs to define and operationalise in research. Drawing on close analysis of key texts, this article identifies and examines three defining attributes of perezhivanie found throughout Vygotsky's works. The attributes are: perezhivanie as a prism of psychological development, as a unit of human consciousness, and as intelligent perception of one's environment. In contrast with common understandings of perezhivanie as "emotional experience", privileging it as affect, this article highlights the intellectual basis of perezhivanie in Vygotsky's writings with particular reference to his notions of "generalised" and "intelligent perception". The article argues that perezhivanie is best understood, psychologically, as an intellectual gestalt reflecting the intellectualisation of perception and, ontologically, as an apperceptual "organ of selection" of consciousness and personality "refracting" the child's individual social situation of development.International Research in Early Childhood Education, vol. 7, no. 1, p. 5-33
21 citations
Additional excerpts
...…(Michell, 2012), art and drama (Connery, John-Steiner, & Marjanovic-Shane, 2010; Davis, 2015), language learning (Mok, 2015), science learning (Fleer, 2014; Schmidt, Lyutkh, & Shumow, 2012), assessment experience (Quiñones & Fleer, 2008), parent caregiver interaction (Brennan, 2014; Chen,…...
[...]
...2013a, 2013b), human identity (Esteban-Guitart & Moll, 2014a, 2014b; Nogueira, 2014), emotions in learning (Stone & Thompson, 2014; Vadeboncoeur & Collie, 2013), classroom discourse (Adams & March, 2014; Sannino, 2008), student academic engagement (Michell, 2012), art and drama (Connery, John-Steiner, & Marjanovic-Shane, 2010; Davis, 2015), language learning (Mok, 2015), science learning (Fleer, 2014; Schmidt, Lyutkh, & Shumow, 2012), assessment experience (Quiñones & Fleer, 2008), parent caregiver interaction (Brennan, 2014; Chen, 2015), and teacher cognition and learning (Cross, 2012; Dang, 2013; Golombek & Doran, 2014; Yang, 2015)....
[...]
26 Jul 2017
TL;DR: In this paper, a conceptual framework for studying the dynamics of imagination in science classroom interactions is proposed, where the authors argue that imagination is a constitutive element of science learning and illustrate a case study of imagination from a Finnish primary science classroom community.
Abstract: In this paper, we introduce a conceptual framework for researching the dynamics of imagination in science classroom interactions. While educational interest in imagination has recently increased, prior research has not adequately accounted for how imagination is realized in and through classroom interactions, nor has it created a framework for its empirical investigation. Drawing on a theory of imagination situated in cultural psychology (Zittoun et al., 2013; Zittoun & Gillespie, 2016), we propose such a framework. We illustrate our framework with a telling case (Mitchell, 1984) of imagination from a Finnish primary science classroom community. Our illustration focuses on the dynamics of imagination as it unfolds in classroom interactions and how qualitatively distinct loops of imagination are formed. In specific, we show how the students’ meaning making expands in time and space and can become more refined and differentiated through loops of imagination and their dynamics. In all, our paper argues that imagination is a constitutive element of science learning. Our proposed conceptual framework provides potential avenues for further empirical research on the dynamics of imagination in science learning and teaching.
14 citations
Cites background from "Imagination and Its Contributions t..."
...For example, Fleer (2015) showed how imagination, emotions and concept formation are united in children’s interaction with their lifeworlds....
[...]
...Imagination is increasingly identified as an important aspect of learning (Nemirovsky, Rasmussen, Sweeney & Wawro, 2012; Pelaprat & Cole, 2011; Zittoun & Gillespie, 2016; Fleer, 2015)....
[...]
...Like others, we consider imagination as a socially mediated process (Zittoun & Gillespie, 2016; Fleer, 2015; Pelaprat & Cole, 2011)....
[...]
...Although imagination in science learning has been previously conceptualized as a situated and shared process (e.g., Fleer, 2015), prior research has not provided for a framework for studying the dynamics of imagination in classroom interactions....
[...]
References
More filters
Book•
[...]
TL;DR: Wertsch as mentioned in this paper argues that current approaches to social issues have been blinded by the narrow confines of increasing specialization in social sciences, and proposes a method of sociocultural analysis that connects the various perspectives of the social sciences in an integrated, non-reductive fashion.
Abstract: Contemporary social problems typically involve many complex, interrelated dimensions--psychological, cultural, and institutional, among others. But today, the social sciences have fragmented into isolated disciplines lacking a common language, and analyses of social problems have polarized into approaches that focus on an individual's mental functioning over social settings, or vice versa. In Mind as Action, James V. Wertsch argues that current approaches to social issues have been blinded by the narrow confines of increasing specialization in the social sciences. In response to this conceptual blindness, he proposes a method of sociocultural analysis that connects the various perspectives of the social sciences in an integrated, nonreductive fashion. Wertsch maintains that we can use mediated action, which he defines as the irreducible tension between active agents and cultural tools, as a productive method of explicating the complicated relationships between human action and its manifold cultural, institutional, and historical contexts. Drawing on the ideas of Lev Vygotsky, Mikhail Bakhtin, and Kenneth Burke, as well as research from various fields, this book traces the implications of mediated action for a sociocultural analysis of the mind, as well as for some of today's most pressing social issues. Wertsch's investigation of forms of mediated action such as stereotypes and historical narratives provide valuable new insights into issues such as the mastery, appropriation, and resistance of culture. By providing an analytic unit that has the possibility of operating at the crossroads of various disciplines, Mind as Action will be important reading for academics, students, and researchers in psychology, linguistics, cognitive science, sociology, literary analysis, and philosophy (http://books.google.com/books?id=73Vv7Y3vf14C&printsec=frontcover&hl=fr#v=onepage&q&f=false)
3,168 citations
TL;DR: In this article, play and its role in the preschooler's development are discussed. But play is not the leading form of activity for a child of this age, or is it simply the predominant form.
Abstract: In speaking of play and its role in the preschooler's development, we are concerned with two fundamental questions: first, how play itself arises in development — its origin and genesis; second, the role of this developmental activity, which we call play, as a form of development in the child of preschool age. Is play the leading form of activity for a child of this age, or is it simply the predominant form?
2,303 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors distinguish between two basic forms of human behavior: reproductive and creative, and distinguish between the two types of activities of a person that create anything new, creative activity.
Abstract: We call any activity of a person that creates anything new, creative activity. This includes the creation of any kind of inner world or construction of the mind that is experienced and observed only in humans. Looking at human behavior, we can distinguish two basic forms of construction. One form of activity can be called reproductive, and is closely connected with memory, its essence consisting in a person's reproducing or retrieving traces of previous impressions. When I remember the house in which I spent my childhood or a remote country I sometimes visit, I reproduce traces of the impressions I obtained in early childhood or at a time of a journey. In general, in all these cases this activity of mine is not creating anything new; basically, it is more or less just a return of what was.
1,454 citations
Book•
[...]
01 Jan 1994
TL;DR: Vygotsky and Vyacheslavskiy as discussed by the authors described the development of academic concepts in school aged children, and the problem of the cultural development of the child: the tools and symbols in child development.
Abstract: Preface. Introduction. 1. Introduction to the Russian translation of Freuda s Beyond the pleasure principle: Lev Vygotsky and Alexander Lurina. 2. Principles of social education for deaf and dumb children in Russia: Lev Vygotsky. 3. The methods of reflexological and psychological investigation: Lev Vygotsky. 4. The problem of the cultural behaviour of the child: Alexander Luria. 5. The problem of the cultural development of the child: Lev Vygotsky. 6. Methods for investigating concepts: Leonid Sakharov. 7. Tool and Symbol in child development: Lev Vygotsky and Alexander Luria. 8. The socialist alteration: Lev Vygotsky. 9. The development of thinking and concept formation in adolescence: Lev Vygotsky. 10. Imagination and creativity of the adolescent: Lev Vygotsky. 11. The development of voluntary attention in the child: Aleksej Leonta ev. 12. Thought in schizophrenia: Lev Vygotsky. 13. Fascism in psychoneurology: Lev Vygotsky. 14. The problem of the environment: Lev Vygotsky. 15. The development of academic concepts in school aged children: Lev Vygotsky. Name Index. Subject Index.
459 citations
TL;DR: The scope of young children's teleological tendency to view entities as 'designed for purposes' is explored, finding that, unlike adults, pre-schoolers tend to attribute functions to all kinds of objects.
327 citations