Advancing equity in middle school science: the role of classroom cultures and curricular structures
Date
2023
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Abstract
This dissertation explores the role of classroom culture in shaping equitable student experiences and outcomes in science education, and examines how curricular structures might further reinforce equity. Here, equity in science education means supporting student identification, belonging, and learning in science, with particular attention to disrupting historical patterns of inequity that have created barriers to participation for students from historically marginalized populations. Classroom culture is a critical component of equity because it shapes student experiences and opportunities within science and determines whose voices, experiences, epistemologies, and cultural connections have credence within science learning. For their part, curricula shape how students interact with science content and serve to expand or constrain the breadth, depth, and rigor of the content that students experience. The outcomes of study are student interest and belonging, both critical for broadening participation in science because they are associated not only with improved learning, but also with meaningful participation in classroom science communities, course-taking patterns, and career decisions. The first two papers in this dissertation draw on large-scale survey data from 847 middle-school students in more than 30 OpenSciEd classrooms across the country. We use hierarchical linear modeling with students nested within classrooms to examine the extent of classroom-level variation in classroom culture, and how key features of equitable science classroom cultures relate to student interest and belonging in science. In both cases, we find significant classroom-level variation in culture, suggesting that classroom culture can be an important lever for equitable transformation. The first paper explores the relationship between classrooms reflecting collective enterprise and care with student interest in science. We find a strong and consistent relationship between collective enterprise and care, respectively, with student interest. We propose that these attributes of classroom culture may bolster student interest in science by supporting relationships and by connecting with the cognitive, emotional, and values-related components of interest. The second paper examines how classroom epistemologies of science relate to students' sense of belonging in science. Again we find a strong and consistent relationship between classrooms reflecting broader and more flexible epistemologies of science, with belonging in science. We consider the tensions between the science-as-practice vision of science education and the pervasive cultures of school science to contextualize the observed variation in classroom epistemologies of science. We argue that a concerted "epistemic boost" in science education may be necessary to fully realize the science-as-practice vision of science education. Finally, the third paper uses data from 38 teacher interviews to understand aspects of the science curriculum that teachers found supported their efforts to build equitable science classrooms. While many curricula address equity through increased representation of minority scientists or through guidance for teachers around equitable instruction, I argue that the design of curricular structures has been underappreciated as a potential venue for bolstering equitable science participation opportunities for students. I propose that curricular structures designed to support deep and authentic content learning can serve double duty by structuring student learning tasks and participation in ways that reinforce equitable classroom cultures. Collectively, these three papers contribute to the goal of expanding opportunities for students to connect with and succeed in science. They focus on valuable potential levers for equity, namely classroom culture and curricular structures. They help us to understand how relational and epistemic aspects of the classroom culture, and intentionally designed curricular structures, have the potential to expand how students understand science as a discipline, its value and relevance for their lives, and their own place within the world of science.
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Subject
education equity
classroom culture
science education