Weaving together the past, present and future in whole class conversations: analyzing the emergence of a hybrid educational chronotope connecting everyday experiences and school science

Abstract

ABSTRACT In sociocultural research, many scholars have studied the relationship between students’ everyday lives outside of school and classroom learning. This article contributes to this area by focusing explicitly on the timespace dimensions of meaning making in science education. We draw on Bakhtin’s notion of the chronotope to examine how students can become engaged in science learning through telling stories of personal relevance. We analyze an especially interesting example of a whole-class conversation, and show how students’ stories become resources in the co-construction of a hybrid chronotope in which multiple students are activated and engaged in science learning.