New Perspectives in Science Education

Science virtual labs and computer simulations (using learning technologies) are relatively new practices in science classrooms and research is limited on their influences on students’ science learning and students science identities (Bryan et al., 2012). Learning technologies are particularly found helpful for emergent bilingual/multilingual students because they provide an individual, visual, and sound supports for developing both language skills and for making difficult science content accessible. This study draws on social theories of practice in which identity is described as a product of the social reality constructed in practice and through materials used within different fields (Bourdieu & Johnson, 1993). Holland et al (2004) name the relations between identities and fields as “figured worlds.” The primary focus of the study was to explore affordances and limitations of virtual labs as mediums to support students’ science knowledge and science identity development. The data for the study is based on a yearlong fieldwork research conducted in two eighth- grade science classrooms. The study was conducted in a rural middle school in the Southern United States. Through analyzing observations, interviews, and conversations with 24 students, the present study examines how in the events of “figuring” science worlds and practices using virtual labs, English language learner students were interpreting, appropriating, and contesting their science identities.