Learning Progressions and Progress: An Introduction to Our Focus on Learning Progressions

Abstract

The learning progressions agenda in science education was conceived with progressive aims. In this Focus section, four pieces bear witness to the progress that learning progressions have realized, some of which is a straight return on investment, some of which is unexpected, and some of which is conceivable only in light of the work that has been done. Learningprogressionshaveconstitutedanalysesofhowsophisticatedscientificideascanbe decomposed into simpler ones. They have constituted educational expertise and empirical dataonhowstudentscanshiftintheirunderstandingfromsimpletomoresophisticated.But learning progressions also have brought attention to other basic and important issues. As Lehrer and Schauble (2015) point out, learning progressions locate a “middle ground” that sits between context-free accounts of learning that have questionable utility and alternative accounts hopelessly tailored to “fleeting fluctuations of situation and setting.” Learning progressions hold constant a conceptual context so that other issues can become visible. The four pieces in this set articulate some of these issues. One motivation behind the learning progression endeavor is to provide curricular guides to inform instructional designs and assessments. This has led to questions about what kind of prescriptive role learning progressions should play. As Hammer and Sikorski (2015) point out, the complexity of how students learn suggests that caution is in order regarding this. The authors acutely identify ways in which learning undeniably is sometimes (and