Two metaphors for learning revisited: What did the participation metaphor do for us in the last four decades?

Learning has been described by two conceptual metaphors: as individual acquisition of knowledge (acquisition metaphor), and as an enculturation into a subject community (participation metaphor). On the other hand, academics' conceptions of teaching are usually reported to vary between teacher and student orientation. In order to integrate metaphors of learning with research on conceptions of teaching, we analyzed 36 academics' metaphors of teaching by content analysis. We found four different categories of metaphors: transmission and construction (based on the acquisition metaphor), and apprenticeship and community growth (based on the participation metaphor). The metaphors had systematic relations to intentions and approaches in teaching reported by the academics. These results imply that the ‘teacher versus student orientation’ framework can be improved by including the dimension of learning as acquisition versus learning as participation.

Anna Sfard raised the methodological discourse in the CSCL community to a higher niveau of self-understanding a decade ago with her analysis of our two prevalent metaphors for learning: the acquisition metaphor (AM) and the participation metaphor (PM). Despite her persuasive argument in favor of PM and a claim that AM and PM are as incommensurable as day and night, she asked us to retain the use of both metaphors and to take them as complementary in the sense of the quantum particle/wave theory, concluding that

A pragmatic theory of learning is introduced as a possible way of creating organizational learning and learning organizations. This learning theory rests upon what may be termed the inquiry metaphor. Two other metaphors of learning—the knowledge acquisition and the participation metaphor—are introduced as they are mirrored in the literature and in organizational development in practice. It is argued that the important element of organizational learning and learning organizations is the creation of an experimental arena for learning in which employees are able to engage in inquiry into workplace problems and, by doing so, develop their experiences with work and workplaces.

Editor’s note: This article is part of a series in Medical Education entitled ‘Dialogue’. Each publication in the series will be a transcription of an e-mail discussion about a current issue in the field held by two scholars who have approached the issue from different perspectives. For further details, see the editorial published in Med Educ 2012;46(9):826–7. In this issue, Douglas P Larsen, Director for Medical Student Education for the Division of Paediatric Neurology, Washington University in St Louis, and Tim Dornan, Professor of Medical Education, Faculty of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences, Maastricht University, discuss the roles that testing, broadly defined, and social interaction play in the acquisition and retention of medical knowledge.

This article is a sequel to the conversation on learning initiated by the editors of Educational Researcher in volume 25, number 4. The author’s first aim is to elicit the metaphors for learning that guide our work as learners, teachers, and researchers. Two such metaphors are identified: the acquisition metaphor and the participation metaphor. Subsequently, their entailments are discussed and evaluated. Although some of the implications are deemed desirable and others are regarded as harmful, the article neither speaks against a particular metaphor nor tries to make a case for the other. Rather, these interpretations and applications of the metaphors undergo critical evaluation. In the end, the question of theoretical unification of the research on learning is addressed, wherein the purpose is to show how too great a devotion to one particular metaphor can lead to theoretical distortions and to undesirable practices.

This article is a sequel to the conversation on learning initiated by the editors of Educational Researcher in volume 25, number 4. The author’s first aim is to elicit the metaphors for learning that guide our work as learners, teachers, and researchers. Two such metaphors are identified: the acquisition metaphor and the participation metaphor. Subsequently, their entailments are discussed and evaluated. Although some of the implications are deemed desirable and others are regarded as harmful, the article neither speaks against a particular metaphor nor tries to make a case for the other. Rather, these interpretations and applications of the metaphors undergo critical evaluation. In the end, the question of theoretical unification of the research on learning is addressed, wherein the purpose is to show how too great a devotion to one particular metaphor can lead to theoretical distortions and to undesirable practices.

The authors analyze and compare three models of innovative knowledge communities: Nonaka and Takeuchi’s model of knowledge-creation, Engeström’s model of expansive learning, and Bereiter’s model of knowledge building. Despite basic differences, these models have pertinent features in common: Most fundamentally, they emphasize dynamic processes for transforming prevailing knowledge and practices. Beyond characterizing learning as knowledge acquisition (the acquisition metaphor) and as participation in a social community (the participation metaphor), the authors of this article distinguish a third aspect: learning (and intelligent activity in general) as knowledge creation (the knowledge-creation metaphor). This approach focuses on investigating mediated processes of knowledge creation that have become especially important in a knowledge society.

Varieties of work related learning

Many studies of comprehension strategies instruction rely on an internalization metaphor of strategy learning. In this view, strategies eventually enter students' heads after repeated interactions with teachers who introduce strategies and control how they are used. In this article, the author discusses the limitations of the internalization view and proposes an alternative model of strategy learning. It is argued that learning to read strategically is really a process of learning to participate in textual interactions using the language and procedures of strategic readers. The author lays out specific components of strategy learning consistent with this participation view, including: coming to view reading as a strategic process; mastering the procedures and dialogue of strategic reading; and considering the possibility for resistance of the strategic reading identity. He describes key issues made evident by the participation metaphor that teachers should address as they continue to teach comprehension strategies.

Entrepreneurship education and pedagogic reforms advocating the increased use of progressive educational methods have been promoted by the Chinese government. In practice, this has led to a fusion of the more traditional teaching approach and more progressive approaches. This has led to calls for entrepreneurship education to be contextualized within the Chinese context, against the backdrop of the progressive pedagogic reforms. This paper addresses this by exploring how Chinese educators are responding to directives encouraging progressive pedagogic entrepreneurship education, by applying the lens of Sfard's knowledge acquisition and participation-orientation learning metaphors. Interviews were conducted with fifteen educators and analysis of their narratives of practice was undertaken to identify knowledge acquisition and participation-orientation metaphors to elicit the approaches adopted in the classroom. The results indicate that both acquisition and participation approaches are adopted by educators, but in a way that reflects the traditional and cultural heritage that values knowledge. Educators still relied heavily on the transmission-acquisition metaphor, however the encouragement to introduce more progressive practices could be observed in two ways, the constructivist acquisition metaphor, and the participation metaphor. The former appeared more developed and the latter less so, although both are desirable in the light of the education reforms.

Different schools apply different educational approaches, and different learning concepts interpret knowledge in different ways. The two dominant perspectives classify learning as the acquisition of knowledge, or as participation in school practices. In order to support teachers in choosing the educational method that best fits their teaching perspective, it is important to increase our understanding of underlying interactional processes. This study addresses this question, by analyzing the interaction between students during a joint drawing task. Forty-three grade three Italian students participated in this study: 22 students attended a classroom based on the acquisition metaphor of learning (teacher-centered approach), whereas 21 attended classrooms based on the participation metaphor of learning (Senzazaino: Without a backpack for School Communities). Students worked in pairs and each pair had to draw their school. Each session was video-recorded and transcribed. Students’ interactions were subject to micro-level analysis in terms of discourse moves, communicative functions and interaction sequence. Data substantially confirmed that the educational environment influences students’ interactive dynamics and communication patterns from the early grades onwards. Joint drawing was shown to be partially dependent on context. The theoretical and practical implications of this are discussed in the article.

A tension has been identified between the acquisition and participation metaphors for learning, and it is generally agreed that this tension has still not been adequately resolved. In this paper, we offer an alternative to the acquisition and participation metaphors for learning: the metaphor of mastering. Our claim is that the mastering metaphor, as grounded in inferentialism, allows one to treat both the acquisition and participation dimensions of learning as complementary and mutually constitutive. Inferentialism is a semantic theory which explains concept formation in terms of the inferences individuals make in the context of an intersubjective practice of acknowledging, attributing, and challenging one another's commitments. We first introduce the key concepts of inferentialism and consider the perspective on learning that inferentialism inspires. Then, we condense the lessons of the inferentialist concepts into a single mastering metaphor for learning and argue that learning consists in the process by which learners come to master concepts and practices. We conclude by discussing how the mastering metaphor could be put to work in a theoretical reconciliation of the cognitive and sociocultural dimensions of learning.

This multi-university, three-year longitudinal study examined the relationship among seven secondary science teachers‘ personal, student and scientific epistemologies. Paying close attention to each participant‘s use of metaphor when speaking about his/her learning, students‘ learning and the products/processes of science, we were able to discern each participant‘s epistemological stance as indicating the acquisition metaphor of learning or the participation metaphor of learning or some combination of the two (pluralistic). We compared video recordings of each participant‘s classroom teaching practice to develop an understanding for how their epistemological stance might relate to that practice. Based on our results, we contradict the current paradigm that beliefs guide practice, by positing that practice might actually determine beliefs. Where teachers having more field experiences were more likely to talk about learning through doing (participation) and those whose practice emphasized knowledge transfer, adhered to the acquisition metaphor for student learning. If teacher practice influenced their beliefs, this has profound implications for the structure of teacher education programs.

CSCL is based on the idea that computer applications can scaffold and implement advanced socio-cognitive processes for knowledge sharing and knowledge building. But do we really understand these processes that are supposed to be implemented? This paper will focus on the of CSCL. We will analyze three models of innovative knowledge communities in order to better understand basic epistemological processes of knowledge advancement: i.e., Nonaka and Takeuchi's model of knowledge-creation, Yrjo Engestrom's expansive learning model, and Carl Bereiter's theory of knowledge building. It is argued that these models provide a way of overcoming the dichotomy of the acquisition and participation metaphors of learning by providing a third metaphor of learning as a process of knowledge creation. In order to facilitate educational change through CSCL also certain kind of larger social infrastructure is needed that supports these epistemological processes.

CSCL is based on the idea that computer applications can scaffold and implement advanced sociocognitive processes for knowledge sharing and knowledge building. But do we really understand these processes that are supposed to be implemented? This paper will focus on the "epistemological infrastructure" of CSCL. We will analyze three models of innovative knowledge communities in order to better understand basic epistemological processes of knowledge advancement: i.e., Nonaka and Takeuchi's model of knowledge-creation, Yrjö Engeström's expansive learning model, and Carl Bereiter's theory of knowledge building. It is argued that these models provide a way of overcoming the dichotomy of the acquisition and participation metaphors of learning by providing a third metaphor of learning as a process of knowledge creation. In order to facilitate educational change through CSCL also certain kind of larger social infrastructure is needed that supports these epistemological processes.