What counts as scientific practice? A taxonomy of scientists' ways of thinking and doing

Abstract

Education reformers advocating the use of GIS in K-12 science classrooms claim that the tool provides authentic contexts for students to think and act scientifically. However few stud- ies, if any, have empirically investigated the latter. I observed a marine ecology laboratory to de- termine what counts as scientific practice, and then an 8th grade oceanography classroom to see whether and how these practices played out there, especially around participants' use of GIS soft- ware. This paper focuses on the methods I used to draw meaningful comparisons between the novice and expert settings I studied. In particular, it describes the taxonomy of scientific practices derived from my laboratory observations, and then the nature of work in the lab as seen through this framework.