Teleology as a tacit dimension of teaching and learning evolution: A sociological approach to classroom interaction in science education

Abstract

Teleology has been described as an intuitive cognitive bias and as a major type of student conception. There is controversy regarding whether teleological explanations are a central obstacle to, are legitimate in, or are even supportive of science learning. However, interaction in science classrooms has not yet been investigated with regard to teleology. Consequently, this study addresses the question of how teleological explanations emerge in science classroom interactions about evolution and how teachers and students address emerging teleology. In this article, we introduce a theoretical and methodological framework drawing from the sociology of knowledge and systems theory, suggesting that this framework may enrich the understanding of knowledge construction and of social practices in the science classroom because it enables distinguishing between explicit and tacit knowledge. We investigated seven secondary school units about evolution and present data from four grade-12 classes in Germany, a country with very few creationists, to contrast two ways in which teleology is addressed. In the first type, the teachers combine intentional and need-based teleological explanations with aspects of scientific theories in an ambiguous way. Contrastingly, in the second type, the teachers construct a duality between correct mechanistic and incorrect teleological explanations by discrediting preceding scientific theories. In the discussion, we argue that the presented sociological approach can also be valuable in other science education contexts, such as creationism, the nature of science and socio-scientific issues, because classroom interaction involves tacit communication, such as a tacit epistemology, which are essential grounds for the students' knowledge construction.

Teleological explanations in evolution classes: video-based analyses of teaching and learning processes across a seventh-grade teaching unit

“…This type of ambiguous teaching practice is not restricted to the teaching sequences analyzed in this paper; it can also be found in grade 12 high school classes (Gresch and Martens 2019), which suggests that the presented interactions can also be observed in other classes taught by different teachers. Although there is some evidence that teleological explanations are more frequent at a younger age (Kelemen 1999;Zohar and Ginossar 1998), the teaching practices in the presented seventh-grade unit are comparable to similar types of teaching practices in high school classes.…”

“…Although there is some evidence that teleological explanations are more frequent at a younger age (Kelemen 1999;Zohar and Ginossar 1998), the teaching practices in the presented seventh-grade unit are comparable to similar types of teaching practices in high school classes. In contrast, teachers of a different type of teaching habitus (Gresch and Martens 2019) reject teleological explanations throughout the unit. Classroom interactions are structured by a polarization of correct student answers, scientific explanations and Darwin's evolutionary theory on the one hand and incorrect student answers, teleological explanations and Lamarck's evolutionary theory on the other hand.…”

“…Overall, anthropic, teleological and essentialist language could be observed in 43-60% of the content minutes per class session. Regarding teaching practices at high school, Gresch and Martens (2019) showed that some twelfth-grade high school teachers combine teleological and scientifically correct explanations in the classroom. The teachers' teaching habitus is characterized by ambiguity regarding the combination of teleological and scientifically correct explanations, which offers opportunities for students to reproduce teleological explanations.…”

“…For this case study, one-seventh-grade biology course on evolution is purposefully selected from a larger research project (cf. Gresch and Martens 2019) because teleological explanations can be observed throughout the entire unit.…”

Cognitive Construal-Consistent Instructor Language in the Undergraduate Biology Classroom

“…Although instructors’ construal-consistent language might have the potential to both reinforce construal-consistent misconceptions about biology and serve as a pedagogical tool in science education, little research has investigated whether instructors use construal-consistent language in the biology classroom, and the handful of studies largely focus on high school settings. These studies have demonstrated that high school teachers use teleological language when teaching biology (see, e.g., Nehm and Schonfeld, 2007; Gresch and Martens, 2019). The use of cognitive construals in undergraduate biology classrooms and the prevalence of anthropic and essentialist language in biology classrooms remain underinvestigated.…”