Tool catalogue frame-based information tools

In the perception, knowledge production and policymaking on complex issues (‘wicked problems’), such as climate change, frames and framing play an important but often hidden role. Frames relate to one’s ‘schemas of interpretation’; the conceptual images, values, starting points, and mental models that one may have of an issue. This can include, for instance, one’s problem definition, perceptions of the cause-effect relationships in an issue, one’s primary goals, perception of one’s and others’ roles and responsibilities relating to the issue, and views on suitable strategies and interaction with (other) stakeholders (cf. Dewulf et al., 2005)

Editorial: High-Quality Knowledge for Climate Adaptation: Revisiting Criteria of Credibility, Legitimacy, Salience, and Usability

Editorial on the Research Topic High-Quality Knowledge for Climate Adaptation: Revisiting Criteria of Credibility, Legitimacy, Salience, and Usability Climate adaptation in human systems is a process of learning and adjustment (IPCC, 2022). It involves continuously re-building a stock of knowledge, skills and foresight for anticipating, interpreting and acting relative to actual or expected climate. But what distinguishes knowledge of “high quality” for climate adaptation? This raises important ontological, epistemological and methodological questions, and at their core are the quality criteria people apply in appraising knowledge. Climate-adaptive knowledges have long been inherent to societies relationship to their environment, for example in cultural patterns of seasonal activities (Kwiecien et al., 2021). Over the past 20 years climate adaptation has become a topic of scientific enquiry across diverse disciplines, with efforts to fit that science to societal contexts and norms of quality for decision-making (see e.g., “climate services”; Hewitt et al., 2012). As such, societies have come to make sense of climatic change by juggling a repertoire of traditional, local, practical, scientific and technical knowledges—from proverbs to tailored forecasts—all assessed against different criteria of quality. Notwithstanding this plurality, certain principles have emerged in the scientific literature as fundamental to appraising knowledges' fitness for adaptive action. Specifically, the principles of credibility, legitimacy, and salience (Cash et al., 2003), as well as usability and usefulness (Lemos and Morehouse, 2005). These remain influential, but there is nuance to knowledge quality that broad principles miss. We argue for more critical studies of knowledge quality to uncover what principles mean in particular contexts, and what other criteria are appropriate. This special issue assembles nine articles from 37 authors, which take up the quality of adaptive knowledge as a topic. Three important themes emerge across these articles.publishedVersio

Learning and the development of social identities in the subjects Care and Technology

This article discusses the way in which social identities structure the learning processes of students in two subjects in the Dutch secondary school curriculum - Care and Technology. It analyzes interviews with 23 students and their teachers with a view to explaining the disappointing results in these subjects in terms of breaking through gender and class-related preferences and learning outcomes. The subjects Care and Technology refer on the one hand to social practices with which groups of students identify in different ways. On the other hand students also appear to make active use of these subjects in their identity development. We argue for explicitly combining the notion that learning is peripheral participation in social practices with analyses of the power relationships that structure those practices. Also the question should be addressed of how the relative autonomy of the school can be used for organizing learning experiences in such a way that social positions and identities are not inhibitive, and the restrictive character of social identities is challenged

Making Sense Through Participation

In this chapter we discuss the issue of social differences in relation to learning. In theories on co-operative learning or collaborative learning social differences are treated as characteristics of individual learners. The focus on learning as a social process is primarily elaborated in terms of interaction between pupils and the combined construction of knowledge. Sociocultural theory (Vygotsky, Lave & Wenger), however, understands ‘social’ not only in terms of knowledge/meaning being constructed in interaction with others, but also in terms of the cultural practices/activities informing these interaction processes. Learning can be understood as increasing participating in communities of practice. As social differences are an intrinsic part of the culture in which students are learning to participate, these are also an inherent aspect of learning processes in schools. Students learn to participate in practices in different ways, depending on their social position, and thus develop distinguished cultural identities. In this chapter we elaborate on this tenet, using examples from various empirical research projects on learning in secondary education. We not only show how social differences in the cultural practices that underpin learning influence what is learned by whom, but also explore the consequences of this perspective for the pedagogical space of the school