Sini Davies

Abstract:

This investigation involved carrying out interventions that engaged teams of lower-secondary (13–14-year-old) Finnish students in using traditional and digital fabrication technologies to make materially embodied collaborative inventions. By relying on video data and ethnographic observations of the student teams’ collaborative invention processes, the investigation focused on investigating 1) how the teams generated and developed their design ideas in their materially anchored making process and 2) what kinds of maker practices they relied on during open-ended invention projects. The study focused on a microanalytic study of three teams of students, and we utilized and developed visual data analysis methods. Our findings reveal the complex nature of the student teams’ materially contextualized ideation and the knowledge creation activities that took place within their projects. The findings suggest that open-ended, materially mediated co-invention projects offer ample opportunities for creative cultural participation and practice-based knowledge creation in schools.