Browsing by Author "Silva, Maximiliano"

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    Argumentation Skills Mediate the Effect of Peer Argumentation on Content Knowledge in Middle-School Students
    (2021) Larrain, Antonia; Singer, Vivian; Strasser, Katherine; Howe, Christine; Lopez, Patricia; Pinochet, Jorge; Moran, Camila; Sanchez, Alvaro; Silva, Maximiliano; Villavicencio, Constanza
    There is compelling evidence that arguing with peers in educational contexts fosters students' content knowledge and argumentation skills. Indeed, curricula have already been developed that, through tailored support for peer argumentation. promote both content knowledge and argumentation skills simultaneously. However, we do not yet know how to optimize the occurrence of peer argumentation, although there are suggestions in the literature that computers may have a role to play. Likewise, there are uncertainties about the mechanisms through which the benefits of peer argumentation are achieved, especially whether (and how) there is interdependence across the two types of benefit. In this paper, we report a quasi-experimental study randomized at class level, which addresses these two issues. A total of 502 fourth-grade students and 20 classes and teachers covered a module in science under three conditions: (1) using a curriculum that was already known to promote peer argumentation and content knowledge (standard support). (2) using the same curriculum but with additional computer-based support (computer-enhanced support), and (3) a routinely taught control group. Students' argumentation skills and content knowledge were assessed. Content knowledge was assessed prior to and after the intervention, with immediate and delayed posttests. Multiple regression analyses showed that peer argumentation was indeed most frequent in the computer-enhanced condition. Moreover, on the basis of a multilevel path analysis, we found that individual contributions to peer argumentation had a direct effect on posttest argumentation skills and an indirect effect on posttest content knowledge, both immediate and delayed. The indirect effect of argumentation on delayed posttest content knowledge was mediated by immediate posttest knowledge and posttest argumentation skills.
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    Playful stances for developing pre-service teachers' epistemic cognition: Addressing cognitive, emotional, and identity complexities of epistemic change through play
    (2025) Sebastian, Christian; Vergara, Martin; Lissi, Maria Rosa; Pino, Catalina Henriquez; Silva, Maximiliano; Perez-Cotapos, Maria Asuncion
    Background: Teachers who show more developed epistemic cognition teach better and promote more and better learning in their students. Studies indicate that teacher training impacts little on student teachers' epistemic cognition development. One of the difficulties of epistemic cognition interventions is that, beyond the conceptual level, epistemic change implies identity challenge and emotional distress. Both benefit from a playful setting to be managed. We designed and implemented a university course as a socio-constructivist playful training experience. In a previous study, using growth curve analysis, we showed that this course promoted epistemic cognition development in student teachers. Aims: In this study we analyzed the experience of the course participants to characterize the lived process of change and to propose ways of understanding the relationship between a game-based course and epistemic change. Participants: Twenty-five female student teachers in their second, third, or fourth year of study participated in the study. Methods: Both small and whole group interactions from 15 training sessions, and 8 individual interviews after the course, were recorded and qualitatively analyzed to explore the students' experiences. Results: The analysis allows us to acknowledge changes in the students' attitudes towards the course, their roles in the classroom, and conceptual understandings that we organized in four phases from initial bewilderment and resistance, to the active and applied integration of knowledge. Conclusions: We discuss how different levels and layers of playfulness can sustain the difficulties student teachers' face during their epistemic change process.
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    The Effect of Peer-Group Argumentative Dialogue on Delayed Gains in Scientific Content Knowledge
    (2018) Larraín, Antonia; Freire, Paulina; Grau Cárdenas, Valeska Valentina; López, Patricia; Salvat, Ignacia; Silva, Maximiliano; Gastellu, Vicente
    Experimental evidence has shown the effect of peer-group argumentation on scientific concept development. However, questions regarding how and why it happens remain. The aim of this study is to contribute, with experimental evidence gathered in naturalistic settings (classrooms), to the understanding of the relationship between peer-group argumentation and content knowledge learning, exploring the role that individual argumentative skills play. In total, sixty-one fourth-grade students (aged 9-10 years) participated in the study (thirty-nine female). One teacher was invited to teach a thematic unit (Forces), with lesson plans especially developed to foster argumentation in the classroom. The second teacher taught as usual. Students' conceptual understanding and argumentative skills were evaluated individually, both before and after the lessons. Although there were no differences in the immediate post-test scores between groups (after controlling for pre-test), the intervention group showed significantly higher scores in delayed post-tests. Regression analyses showed that the ratio of argumentative utterances per minute of group work predicted students' scores in delayed post-test disciplinary content knowledge after controlling for initial levels of learning. Argumentation skill gains did not impact learning, but initial levels of argumentation skills predicted delayed scientific content knowledge post-test. (c) 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
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    The role of inner speech in the effect of argumentation among peers on learning: a case analysis
    (2024) Larrain, Antonia; Freire, Paulina; Salvat, Ignacia; Lopez, Patricia; Moran, Camila; Sanchez, Alvaro; Silva, Maximiliano; Villavicencio, Constanza; Grau, Valeska; Cerda, Barbara; Salinas, Pedro
    Different studies suggest that collaborative argumentation among peers promotes school learning, especially the comprehension of concepts. However, the available evidence shows that the relationship between argumentation and learning is not direct but instead mediated by development processes that, in turn, promote learning. The goal of this study is to understand the mediating role that the development of argumentative inner speech may play in the process of constructing knowledge through collaborative argumentation. A case study was conducted in which one child (fourth grade) was tracked throughout an entire unit in which he and his peers argued collaboratively class after class. We assessed the students individually before and after in their learning (oral and written) and written argumentation skills. The collaborative work from all the classes was videoed and analysed through discourse analysis. The student showed significant progress in both delayed learning and written argumentation compared to the group. Furthermore, the analysis of oral tests shows that the argumentative interactions that initially appeared in the discussions among peers were internalized so he could understand the concepts involved on an individual level. The article discusses the implications of these results in understanding the role of discursive interactions in school learning processes.