No abstract

No abstract

Writing in science can be challenging for all learners, and it is especially so for students with cognitive or language-based learning difficulties. We examined the effects of a cognitive apprenticeship on student disciplinary writing skills as well as near and far transfer of learning outcomes. This instructional approach included a gradual release of responsibility for learning through four, 3-day investigations that included authentic scientific experiments, small- and whole-group discussions, and the construction and revision of scientific arguments. Intervention students showed significant gains for both near (effect size = 1.08) and far (effect size = 0.76) transfer disciplinary writing outcomes. These results held true even when compared with a nonequivalent control group (effect size = 1.95). Students with disabilities demonstrated similar rates of growth as peers without disabilities, especially with respect to the quality of their claims and ability to provide scientific evidence. This study provides additional data on the value of cognitive apprenticeships in middle school science classrooms, and the results indicate the importance of discussion in helping students to think and write more like scientists.

Students with disabilities (SWD) in general education science classes are expected to engage in the scientific practices and potentially in the writing of arguments drawn from evidence. Currently, however, there are few research-based instructional approaches for teaching argument writing for these students. The present article responds to this need through the application of an instructional model that promises to improve the ability of SWDs to write scientific arguments. We approach this work in multiple ways. First, we clarify our target group, students with high incidence disabilities (learning disability, ADHD, and students with speech and language impairments), and discuss common cognitive challenges they experience. We then explore the role of argumentation in science, review research on both experts’ (scientists’) and novices’ (students’) argument writing and highlight successful cognitive strategies for teaching argument writing with neurotypical learners. We further discuss SWDs’ general writing challenges and how researchers have improved their abilities to comprehend and evaluate scientific information and improve their domain-general writing. Cognitive apprenticeships appear advantageous for teaching SWDs science content and how to write scientific arguments, as this form of instruction begins with problem solving tasks that connect literacy (e.g., reading, writing, argumentation discourse) with epistemic reasoning in a given domain. We illustrate the potential of such apprenticeships by analyzing the conceptual quality of arguments written by three SWDs who participated in a larger quantitative study in which they and others showed improvement in the structure of their arguments. We end with suggestions for further research to expand the use of cognitive apprenticeships.

Despite broad consensus on the value of classroom dialog for promoting scientific argumentation, tensions have emerged in the literature regarding the degree to which teachers should guide the dialogic process (dialogic stance). We use the lens of responsive teaching to examine how one teacher adjusts his instruction to foster dialog in three middle‐school science classrooms. Applying grounded theory to classroom dialogs and teacher interview data, we examine the dynamic interplay of the teacher's overarching goal and moment‐to‐moment pedagogical aims to understand shifts in his dialogic stance. Our findings illustrate the value of foregrounding responsiveness to students' disciplinary thinking when offering guidance to teachers about when and how to support students in peer‐based argumentative dialog.