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

van Aalst, Jan

A common reason for the failure of efforts at knowledge creation in school is their lack of authentic problems (Bereiter and Scardamalia 2003) . Asking students to investigate what interested them about SARS and Avian Flu held some attraction from this point of view because there was a lack of knowledge, the topics were discussed in society, and students could pursue their own questions. These are considered good things by proponents of socio-scientific issues in teaching (Walker and Zeidler 2007 ). Yet, the students' interests frequently took them into areas where they could not build on their initial knowledge. It is possible that the extensive reliance on knowledge sharing resulted in part from a general lack of knowledge that led the students to explore opinions and "chart the territory," and from a lack of concepts and perspectives that could be used to question sources. Some students seemed to suggest that what they were doing lacked authenticity as schoolwork because the depth of knowledge was inferior to what was normally expected of them: