Teknik i de tidiga skolåren – om vad det innebär att kunna konstruera en länkmekanismTechnical knowing in the early school years – A learning study of the meaning of knowing how to construct a linkage mechanism

Abstract

This study within primary technology education aims at exploring the capability to construct a specific linkage mechanism. The study reported was integrated in a Learning study, a kind of design experiment inspired by the Japanese Lesson Study, and was carried out in collaboration with two primary school teachers and their two classes, a preschool class and a grade one class. The study reports on the analysis of the video-recorded pre- and post-test. The tests were analysed phenomenographically resulting in four categories describing qualitatively different ways of experiencing the object of learning. The categories were then analysed in terms of critical aspects, describing aspects necessary to discern for this group of students in order to learn how to construct a linkage mechanism. The result indicates the importance of discerning the two joints and their different characteristics in terms of a fixed and a moving joint as well as the placement of the moving joint in relation to the resulting movement.