#350: Domain-Inherent Metaphors in Educational Practice: A Single Case Study

Scientists as well as students make sense of new information by relating it to prior experiences. For imperceptible concepts, doing so often involves constructing metaphors. As a result, disciplinary discourse contains a wide range of domain-inherent metaphors that date back to their initial discovery. Therefore, students need to learn these domain-inherent metaphors on their way to becoming scientists. However, it is unclear what characterizes these domain-inherent metaphors when teachers use them during instruction. Using chemistry as an example, we offer a detailed analysis of the domain-inherent metaphors that a high school teacher employed during his lessons both in speech and gesture. To guide future research, we theorize on potential positive or negative effects on students’ learning.