The theme of this symposium is teaching and/as epistemic practices. Teachers are supposed to teach (about) epistemic practices and teaching is itself (hopefully) a kind of epistemic practice.

Over the last decades there has been a growing focus on ‘practice’ within social and learning theories. The practice turn has been used as a summarizing denomination for different ways of finding the roots of knowledge in human actions and experiences. It is through action and interaction within practices that mind, rationality and knowledge are constituted and social life is organized, reproduced and transformed. Schatzki (2001) describes it as “a loose but nevertheless definable movement of thought that is unified around the idea that the field of practices is the place to investigate such phenomena as agency, knowledge, language, ethics, power and science”.

In educational research different socio-cultural approaches (such as situated learning and activity theory) and pragmatic perspectives have been growing. However, the focus has more been on learning processes and identity formation than on the knowledge/content of education. In this symposium the purpose is to go beyond “communities of practice” (Wenger, 1998, Amin & Roberts, 2008) and focus on the knowledge/content as epistemic practices. The epistemic practice turn (different anti-cartesian views of knowledge as rooted in practice and constituted through interaction) pave the way for a reconceptualisation of the knowledge/content of education, of school subjects as well as how disciplinary differences be described in terms of epistemic practices?

The concept of epistemic practice has been used with different basic theoretical assumptions (Kelly, 2008, Knorr Cetina, 2001, Schaffer, 2006). These have consequences for what one sees as constitutive for the content/knowledge with implications for teaching and learning. These and other differences will be explored and mirrored in the different papers.

Epistemic practices are characterized by specific ways of doing, being and knowing as well as by specific values and ways of thinking. According to Shaffer (2006) these contribute to forming a kind of epistemic frame for what becomes possible for and expected of participants – although they do not determine the participators.

Teachers that represent a specific subject, are seen as participators in two epistemic practices: that of the subject - the ways of doing thinking and knowing related to science, mathematics, history, literature etc – and that of teachers related to the teaching of science, mathematics, history, literature etc.

Amin, A. & Roberts, J.(2008) Knowing in action: Beyond communities of practice. Research Policy: Vol.37:2, 353-369

Sandoval, W.A. & Reiser, B.J. (2003). Explanation-driven inquiry: Integrating conceptual and epistemic scaffolds for scientific inquiry. Science Education, Vol 88 p 345-372. 

Kelly, G (2008) Learning science: Discursive practices. In M. Martin-Jones, A. M. de Mejia and N. H. Hornberger (eds), Encyclopedia of Language and Education, 2nd Edition, Volume 3: Discourse and Education, 329–340. Springer Science+Business Media LLC

-Schaffer, D. (2006) Epistemic frames for epistemic game

-Schatzki, T., Knorr Cetina, K. & von Savigny (eds) (2001) The practice turn in contemporary theory

-Wenger, E. (1998) Communities of practice. Learning, meaning and identity. Cambridge University Press