A summary of the key ideas in the book "Epistemic fluency in higher education". Based on the seminar: Epistemic fluency in higher education: bridging actionable knowledgeable and knowledgeable action" 15 November 2016 16:30 Seminar Room G Speaker: Lina Markauskaite, Associate Professor,  Centre for Research on Learning and Innovation, University of Sydney Conveners: Dr Ian Thompson and Professor Harry Daniels, OSAT What does it take to be a productive member of a multidisciplinary team working on a complex problem? How do people get better at these things? How can researchers get deeper insight in these valued capacities; and how can teachers help students develop them? Working on real-world professional problems usually requires the combination of different kinds of specialised and context-dependent knowledge, as well as different ways of knowing. People who are flexible and adept with respect to different ways of knowing about the world can be said to possess epistemic fluency. Drawing upon and extending the notion of epistemic fluency, in this research seminar, I will present some key ideas that we developed studying how university teachers teach and students learn complex professional knowledge and skills. Our account combines grounded and enacted cognition with sociocultural and material perspectives of human knowing and focus on capacities that underpin knowledgeable action and innovative professional work.  In this seminar, I will discuss critical roles of grounded conceptual knowledge, ability to embrace professional materially-grounded ways of knowing and students’ capacities to construct their epistemic environments.

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Epistemic fluency in
higher education:
Bridging actionable
knowledge and
knowledgeable action
Lina Markauskaitė
Acknowledgements:
ARC DP0988307
Peter Goodyear, Agnieszka Bachfischer and many
others
15 November 2016 @ OSAT, Oxford

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Why epistemic fluency?
Some trends &
expectations from (future)
professionals
1. Evidence-generating practice
2. Relational expertise
3. “Second-hand” knowledge
4. Open innovation & co-
configuration
What does it mean for HE?
Knowledge
Flexibility,
Adaptability
?
Moving away
from
knowledge
“…learning for an unknown future has
to be a learning understood neither in
terms of knowledge or skills but of
human qualities and dispositions.”
“Learning for an unknown future”
(Barnett, 2004, 247)
Rethinking
knowledge &
skills: Epistemic
fluency

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Aims/Questions
1. What is the nature of actionable professional knowledge and knowing?
2. How is such knowledge taught and learnt in professional education?
3. How could this be done better?
To develop a “suitcase” of tools that help us understand learning for
complex knowledge-rich professional work
Focus – professional knowledgeable action and innovation

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Today
Context
1. Roots and key concepts
Few examples
2. Professional epistemic games
3. Assembling epistemic environments
4. Constructing actionable concepts

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Roots and key
concepts

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Actionable knowledge
Knowledge as a tool for action
“People who use tools actively rather
than just acquire them . . . build an
increasingly rich understanding of the
world in which they use the tools and of
the tools themselves”
(Brown et al, 1989, 33)
Actionable knowledge is
“knowledge that is particularly
useful to get things accomplished in
practical activities”
(After Yinger & Lee, 1993, 100)

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Epistemic games
“When people engage in
investigations – legal,
scientific, moral, political, or
other kinds – characteristic
moves occur again and again”
(Perkins, 1997, 50)
Epistemic games are
patterns of inquiry that have
characteristic forms, moves,
goals and rules used by
different epistemic
communities to conduct
inquiries
(Morrison & Collins, 1996)
Examples
– Creating a list
– Creating a taxonomy
– Making a comparison
– Proving a theorem
– Doing a controlled
experiment

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Epistemic fluency defined...
Epistemic fluency is an ability “to
use and recognise a relatively large
number of epistemic games”
(Morrison & Collins, 1996, 108)
But…
“...decision making, problem
solving, and like kinds of thinking do
not have specifically epistemic
goals – goals of building knowledge
and understanding”
(Perkins, 1997, 55)
...through epistemic games

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Epistemic fluency (re)defined
Epistemic fluency as a
capacity…
1. to integrate different kinds of
knowledge
2. to coordinate different ways of
knowing
3. to assemble epistemic
environment
4. to construct consci(enci)ous
self

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Knowledge(ing): Culture, practice and
resourcefulness
(Personal) epistemic-
conceptual resourcefulness
(Local) epistemic practices
(Global) knowledge cultures
Actionable
knowledge(ing)
Innovation

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Some key concepts
Objects are entities people act
towards and/or act with
(Star, 2010)
Epistemic objects (artefacts)
The lack in completeness of
being is crucial: objects of
knowledge in many fields have
material instantiations, but they
must simultaneously be
conceived of as unfolding
structures of absences...
(Knorr Cetina, 2001)
Objects are the foundation of enduring professional practices, discovery
and innovation . . . and human consciousness and learning
Objectual “epistemic practice” perspective

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Some key concepts
“…the amalgam of places, bodies, voices, skills, practices, technical
devices, theories, social strategies and collective work, that together
constitutes techno-scientific knowledge practices”
(Turnbull, 2000, 44)
Epistemic assemblage

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Some key concepts
“Deep learning” & five
approaches in psychology
1. Phenomenological
2. Neuro-psychological
3. Environmentalist
4. Situated or sociocultural
5. Mentalist
“Closing escape routes” for
mind
“Opening escape routes” for
mind
Grounded cognition:
embodied, extended,
enculturated, enacted,
existential mind

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Information Processing view of mind: Adaptive
Control of Thought-Rational (ACT-R)
architecture
From “Deep learning”, Ohlsson, 2011

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Conceptual understanding is a capacity to construct situated
conceptualisations
Some key concepts
1. selected properties
2. information about the background settings
3. possible actions
4. perceptions of internal states: affects, motivations, AND cognitive
states and operations
Grounded, (multi)modal view of conceptual knowledge
Barsalou, 1999, 2009
Aspirin

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Some key concepts
...a multimodal assemblage that characterises the “machinery” for
knowledge construction
(Knorr-Cetina, 2007)
A multimodal view
Epistemic...
(Meta)cognitive
Social
Embodied &
Embrained
Material Epistemic

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Our conceptual-empirical work
1. Epistemic objects and artefacts
2. Inscriptions and inscriptional
practices
3. Epistemic tools and infrastructures:
creating epistemic assemblages
4. *Epistemic games
5. *Conceptual and epistemic
resourcefulness
Analytical lenses
6. *Entwinement of
social, material and
embodied with cognition
in professional
knowledge practices

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Method: “Cognitive-cultural archaeology”
Phase 1 Phase 2
Disciplines Pharmacy
Nursing
Social work
School counseling
Education
Pharmacy
Education
Sample 20 professional practice
courses
24 projects-assessment tasks
3 tutorial groups
2 students’ groups
Data Course resources
Interviews
Observations
Course resources
Open interviews
Methods Epistemic interviewing
Cognitive task analysis
Ethno- audio/video taped
observations
Analysis of professional practice tasks and students’ activities

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Learning to play
epistemic games

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Epistemic games in professional learning
To uncover characteristic ways of
knowing that future professionals
learn to enact when they are
performing complex knowledge-
demanding professional tasks
Aim
But...
“...decision making, problem
solving, and like kinds of
thinking do not have specifically
epistemic goals – goals of
building knowledge and
understanding”
(Perkins, 1997, 55)

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From “formal” to “functional” epistemic games
Formal epistemic games –
patterns of inquiry that are used in
a system of formal professional
reasoning and judgement
Functional epistemic games –
patterns of inquiry which contribute
to the way participants generate
(situated) knowledge that informs
their action
(After Greeno, 2012)

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Principles for identifying and sorting out
games
1. A distinct functional epistemic
goal and recognisable form of
the outcome
2. Identifiable characteristic
moves, rules and other
generative mechanisms and
principles of how to proceed
1. Epistemic agenda
2. Epistemic focus
3. Nature of object
4. Nature of expertise
Sorting out gamesIdentifying games

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Findings: Playing & weaving epistemic games
Epistemic
games
2. Situated
problem-solving
games
3. Meta-professional
games
Research
games
Producing games
Coding games
Concept combination
games
Articulation
games
Evaluation
games
Making games
4. Trans-professional
games
Sense-making
games
Exchanging
games
1. Propositional
games
6. Weaving
games
5. Translational
public games
Conceptual tool-
making games
Routine games
Semi-scripted
games
Concept
games
Public tool-
making games
Organising games
Open games
Investigative
discourse
games
Decomposing &
assembling games
Flexible
games
Semi-constrained
games
Situation-specific
games
Standardisation
discourse games
Conceptual
discourse games
Informal discourse
games

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Propositional (formal) games
Research games
Concept combination games
Conceptual tool games
Example: A conceptual tool
game
Epistemic agenda – to enhance conceptual understanding that informs action

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Translational public discourse games
Reading games
Concept games
Public tool-making games
Example: A tool-making game
Epistemic agenda – to extend professional knowledgeable action to the actions of
others in everyday world

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Weaving games
Open games
Semi-scripted games
Routine games
Example: An open game
Epistemic agenda – to weave language, physical and symbolic actions for
enhancing functionality of professional knowledgeable work

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Summary: Functional epistemic games
Game Epistemic agenda
Propositional games Enhancing conceptual understanding
Situated problem-solving Enhancing situated understanding
Meta-professional games Enhancing professional perception
Trans-professional games Enhancing joint knowledgeable action
Translational public games Extending professional knowledgeable action
to “lay” others
“Weaving” games Enhancing functionality of professional
knowledgeable work through embodied
action, and social and material environment

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Key insights
1. From cognitive and discourse structures to physicality and
materiality of epistemic games
2. From enhancing individual understanding to all
microsystem’s capacity for knowledgeable action
3. From construction of a knowledge object to a dynamic
system and its environment for knowledgeable activity
Professional learning for knowledgeable action goes far
beyond formal epistemic games

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Epistemic
resourcefulnessAssembling epistemic
environment

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Case: Teaching to “work scientifically”
 Preservice primary
teachers
 Learning to teach science
through inquiry
 Developing lesson plans
& resources, teaching,
reflecting/improving
 Teaching about material
properties with nappies,
chips, etc.

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Assembling epistemic environment
Agi: Um two things you could put in the lesson
plan. (…) we could do the nametags.
(…)
Nat: Do you reckon ((seems confused about
using nametags))?
Agi: It means when you look at a student, you
do – you can use their name.
Nat: I felt so bad for that kid that I was like – I
picked her out (…)
Tweaking physical environment to compensate for the lack of situated
knowledge
[Environment]
[Environment]
[Self-Emotions]
[Self-Cognition]
[Environment]
[Self-
Emotions/Reflection]

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Assembling epistemic environment and
constructing conscious self
Tweaking an epistemic form to scaffold one’s knowledgeable
decisions

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Main insights
1. Seeing self, others and environment as a dynamic
epistemic assemblage is central to professional
knowing
2. Professional actionable knowing is inseparable from
capacities to (co)construct epistemic environments
that enhance knowledgeable actions

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Conceptual
resourcefulnessConstructing actionable
concepts

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Integrating mind, body, social and
environment into one (multimodal)
actionable concept
Agi: And so they’ve got four – I don’t know how
many layers in a nappy. This is layer A, B, C, D
((draws)). So then they test A, B, C, D, for … [4
seconds] I don’t know what it is, like hard err
waterproof I think. Maybe we can divide them
into groups. Maybe so, group 1 // test =
(…)
Jill: // And then we also need less stuff, we
don’t need to like have… [4 seconds] and if
there’s three [groups], are there three things
that are being tested then one of us can be in
each of these groups.
Designing a worksheet for a “scientific
experiment”
[Material]
[Symbolic]
[Cognitive/
Conceptual]
[Social]
[Cognitive/Conceptual]
[Material]
[Social]
[Cognitive/Conceptual]
[Self-Body]
[Social]

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Constructing actionable concepts by
grounding
Jill: You could have a jigsaw kind of thing happening. (…) Where you
take, so if you’ve got groups, you’ve got everyone in their
individual groups and then you switch it around so that you share
it with the other people that were not in your group.
(….)
Jill: It could get messy, I know, I know, but just as theoretical – it
sounds like it could work, but I don’t know in practice.
(….)
Jill: Yeah, but kids, I don’t think there’s gonna be that much
discussion, I just think that’s gonna be more “show me your
thing” and then ((shows writing gesture)) copy, copy, copy ((all
laugh)). You know how it is.
(….)
Nat: But maybe … [4 seconds] (…) ‘cause I remember with – when
we did jigsaw – like the kids ‘d actually test, like we were tested
like when we did it in a tutorial, we were tested on it, so it wasn’t
just procrastination. They must have actually done something.
From pre-service teachers conversation: “Jigsaw”
[Formal]
[Functional]
[Formal]
[Functional]
[Functional]
[Situated]
[Functional]
[Situated]
[Functional]
[Situated]
[Functional]

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Main insights
1. Social, material and embodied are essential features of
actionable concepts
2. Professional learning is not so much about abandoning and
replacing one’s “naive” experiential knowledge and ways of
knowing, but about capacity to integrate and coordinate
productively formal, functional and experiential knowledge and
ways of knowing

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Final notes

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Sideway
s
Forward
UpDownIn
Epistemic fluency (re)defined
Epistemic fluency as a
capacity…
1. to integrate different kinds of
knowledge
2. to coordinate different ways of
knowing
3. to assemble epistemic
environment
4. to construct consci(enci)ous
self
Learning as growing…
... as consci(enci)ous
inhabiting

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If you are interested...
Follow our website:
https://epistemicfluency.com
Email:
Lina.Marakauskaite@sydney.edu.au
eBook link