Distinguishing knowledge-sharing, knowledge-construction, and knowledge-creation discourses

van Aalst, Jan

The relatively clear identification of Group D's discourse as knowledge sharing is more disconcerting in a classroom generally oriented toward student centered and constructivist learning. Nevertheless, my work with many teachers in the last decade suggests it is a common occurrence. Perhaps in this case context dependence mattered less, and the results may point to deeply held beliefs such as quick learning (Schommer 1990 ) and achievement motivation. Indeed, Group D's results on the summary notes were second to Group A's. Group C was also problematic. Like Group A, it expended much effort on maintaining its sense of community, but was relatively inactive in posing questions and working with information (see Table 4 ), and created fewer summary notes. We also know the group had less time for its inquiry than the others because coming up with research questions took longer than planned. Although motivation could have been a factor, this was probably an example of an inadequate level of guidance (Hmelo-Silver et al. 2007 ). Nevertheless, cases like this, in which students are unable to manage inquiries very well, are also common in project-based science (Krajcik et al. 1998; Polman 2000) .