New Perspectives in Science Education

In this qualitative study I analyzed classroom interactions to understand how students and teacher co-construct particular views of the nature of science (NOS) and how these, in turn, afford or constrain students’ negotiation of identities aligned to these particular views of science. The data for this study includes over two months of daily classroom video-recordings in two secondary science courses in an urban school in a large Canadian city. Ethnographic data collection methods were used, and multimodal discourse analysis constituted the analytical framework for interpreting the data. Through an analysis of students and teacher’s interactions, I show how not only a particular view of the nature of science is constructed during and through this interaction, but also how students position themselves in relation to this view of science, in terms of negotiating science aligned identities. Analysis of these interactions contributes to research in teaching and learning science by exposing and turning visible otherwise invisible aspects of the structure of science classrooms that may hinder student’s achievements in science, particularly in relation to students’ identification with science.