Research

My research is guided by two distinct, yet related lines of analytic interest that describe my scholarly activities as an educational psychologist and more specifically as a learning sciences researcher.  First, I study the development of practice-linked identities, a concept used to describe how people identify with particular ways of knowing, acting, and valuing, are positioned to participate in social practices, and take on particular types of identification through their engagement in social practices.  The term practice-linked identity is used to distinguish this view of identity development from more individually-focused, psychological perspectives on identity that do not consider how people form understandings of themselves through engagement in culturally and historically situated and socially enacted practices.  While identities are not solely the accumulation of micro-level interactions, a focus on how identification occurs in local exchanges along with an analysis of how this relates to given social identities (e.g., ethnicity, gender) can help educators arrange learning environments to facilitate the emergence of identities of competence for all students.

Second, I study how students engage in project-based learning, especially in the areas of mathematics and science.  Project-based curricula are designed to provide students with authentic opportunities to explore concepts over extended periods of time.  What projects can afford students has been well-identified in the literature; project-based learning in mathematics and science can increase students’ motivation to learn, deepen their conceptual understanding, and help them learn skills in the context of solving real-world problems.  While project-based learning has great potential, projects are not easy to enact successfully in the classroom. The questions that interest me focus on the how of teaching and learning in projects:  How do students become engaged in projects?  How might teachers organize project-based learning so they can offer more equitable opportunities for students from diverse ethnic, linguistic, and socioeconomic backgrounds to participate in disciplinary practices?

Selected Publications
Jurow, A. S., & Creighton, L. (in press). Improvisational Science Discourse: Teaching Science in 2 K-1 Classrooms. To be published in Linguistics and Education.

Jurow, A.S. (2005). Shifting engagements in figured worlds: Middle school mathematics students’ participation in an architectural design project. The Journal of the Learning Sciences.

Jurow, A.S. (2004).  Generalizing in Interaction: Middle School Mathematics Students Making Mathematical Generalizations in a Population-Modeling Project.  Mind, Culture, and Activity: An International Journal.

Jurow, A.S. (2002). Following kids, not scripts. Connections, Fall.