Article Link: Storywork in STEM-Art: Making, Materiality and Robotics within Everyday Acts of Indigenous Presence and Resurgence
The family-based robotics workshop presented in the article is another recent example of integrating Indigenous approaches grounded in storytelling to enhance youth’s interest in the computing field. Also, after reading Kawagley and Barnhardt (1998) this week, I consider this article as exemplary of the merge between the Western and Indigenous system as the authors present Western technology and traditional knowledge as equal and complementary epistemologies. The figure below is the theoretical framework of their work; they conceptualized strand1 as the Indigenous knowledge systems and incorporated storytelling, teachings about identity, intergenerational place-based knowledge, and communal responsibilities. In the second strand (strand 2), they enacted making, materiality, robotics, and scratch founded by the constructionist view. They explain that as the strands twist and intertwine the cordage (used in the article to bring together these domains), each strand strengthens, and together, they enhance Indigenous resurgence, and the family and community end. The researchers reported that their approach allowed students to see computer programming and robotics as tools for creating, collaborating, and engaging in cultural practices (Tzou et al., 2019).
Theoretical Framework – The intertwining of Indigenous Knowledge Systems and Materiality and Engagement towards Indigenous resurgence (Tzou et ai., 2014, p.311).
Reference
- Kawagley, A. O., & Barnhardt, R. (1998). Education indigenous to place: Western science meets native reality. (Links to an external site.) Fairbanks: Alaska Native Knowledge Network.
- Tzou, C., Meixi, Suárez, E., Bell, P., LaBonte, D., Starks, E., & Bang, M. (2019;2016;). Storywork in STEM-art: Making, materiality and robotics within everyday acts of indigenous presence and resurgence. Cognition and Instruction, 37(3), 306-326. https://doi.org/10.1080/07370008.2019.1624547