Educational Digital Media Tools to Reformulate Activity and Object in Indigenous Science and Environmental Education

Authors

  • Reynaldo A. Morales Researcher

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.37467/gka-revedu.v8.2666

Keywords:

Indigenous Digital Storytelling, Indigenous Science and Environmental Education, Indigenous Community Science Education

Abstract

This paper examines the functioning of and underlying assumptions about digital media in collaborative curriculum design processes in public science and environmental education, and community-designed action research learning programs. The article discusses teaching practices in US rural Northeast Wisconsin among Native Youth learning processes, from the complementation and articulation of formal and informal education to meaningful engagement and participation in science. The focus on the transformative use of digital media in science community education is intended to serve two interrelated purposes: First, it helps to address cultural-historical relations around the production of knowledge and relevant curriculums and pedagogies for rural tribal youth. Second, it intersects with the opportunities for the transferability of activity systems and action research centered around the production of mediational artifacts designed for the collective negotiation between First Nations Tribal communities and western modeled schools, institutions, workplaces, and societal roles. The transferability of this model envisions the incorporation of local actors and institutions in a deep artifact-based dialogue around epistemologies of self-determination and sustainability for Peoples who are fighting for their survival. These propositions take a new level when the transformative power of digital media shifts representations of power in historically marginalized communities, serving a larger activity of reorganizing ecologies of learning in education for culturally distinctive communities of practice.

References

Angen, M. J. (2000). Evaluating interpretive inquiry: Reviewing the validity debate and opening the dialogue. Qualitative health research, 10(3), 378-395. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/104973200129118516

Barab, S. A., & Plucker, J. A. (2002). Smart people or smart contexts? Cognition, ability, and talent development in an age of situated approaches to knowing and learning. Educational Psychologist, 37(3), 165-182. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1207/S15326985EP3703_3

Roth, W. M., & Lee, Y. J. (2007). “Vygotsky’s neglected legacy”: Cultural historical activity theory. Review of Educational Research, 77(2), 186-232. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3102/0034654306298273

Engeström, Y. (1991). Non-scolae sed vitae discimus: Toward overcoming the encapsulation of school learning. Learning and instruction, 1(3), 243-259. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/0959-4752(91)90006-T

Engeström, Y., & Sannino, A. (2010). Studies of expansive learning: Foundations, findings and future challenges. Educational Research Review, 5(1), 1-24. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.edurev.2009.12.002

Smith, L. T. (1999). Decolonizing methodologies: Research and indigenous peoples. Zed books.

Bang, M., Medin, D., Washinawatok, K., & Chapman, S. (2010). Innovations in culturally based science education through partnerships and community. In M. S. Khine, & I. M. Saleh (Eds.), New science of learning (pp. 569-592). New York: Springer. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-5716-0_28

Bang, M., Medin, D. L., & Atran, S. (2007). Cultural mosaics and mental models of nature. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 104(35), 13868-13874. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0706627104

Wilson (Waziyatawin), W. A., & Yellowbird, M., (Eds.). (2007). For indigenous eyes only: A decolonization handbook. Santa Fe, NM: School of American Research Press.

LaFrance, J., & Nichols, R. (2009). Indigenous evaluation framework: Telling our story in our place and time. Alexandria, VA: American Indian Higher Education Consortium & National Science Foundation.

Gutiérrez, K. D., & Rogoff, B. (2003). Cultural ways of learning: Individual traits or repertoires of practice. Educational researcher, 32(5), 19-25. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X032005019

Engeström, Y., Engeström, R., & Suntio, A. (2002). Can a school community learn to manage its own future? An activity-theoretical study of expansive learning among middle school teachers. In G. Wells &G. Claxton (eds.), Learning for life in the 21st century: Sociocultural perspectives on the future of education (pp. 211-224). London: Blackwell. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470753545.ch16

Engeström, Y. (1999). Activity theory and individual and social transformation. In Y. Engeström, R. Miettinen, & R-. Punamäki (eds.), Perspectives on activity theory (pp. 19-38). New York: Cambridge University Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511812774.003

Engestrom, Y. (2000). Activity theory as a framework for analyzing and redesigning work. Ergonomics, 43(7), 960-974. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/001401300409143

Engeström, Y. (2004). New forms of learning in co-configuration work. Journal of Workplace Learning, 16(1/2), 11-21. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/13665620410521477

Engeström, Y., & Hasu, M. (2000). Measurement in action: an activity-theoretical perspective on producer–user interaction. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 53(1), 61-89. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1006/ijhc.2000.0375

Tomasello, M. (1999). The human adaptation for culture. Annual Review of Anthropology, 28, 509-529. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.anthro.28.1.509

Gutiérrez, K., & Vossoughi, S. (2010). Lifting off the ground to return anew”: Documenting and designing for equity and transformation through social design experiments. Journal of Teacher Education, 61(1-2), 100-117. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0022487109347877

Ladson-Billings, G. (Ed.). (2003). Critical race theory perspectives on the social studies: The profession, policies, and curriculum. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing.

Downloads

Published

2020-10-05

How to Cite

Morales , R. A. (2020). Educational Digital Media Tools to Reformulate Activity and Object in Indigenous Science and Environmental Education. EDU REVIEW. International Education and Learning Review / Revista Internacional De Educación Y Aprendizaje, 8(3), pp. 127–134. https://doi.org/10.37467/gka-revedu.v8.2666

Issue

Section

Research articles