Sociomaterial movements of students' engagement in a school's makerspace

This study investigates the sociomaterial movements of student engagement in a school's makerspace. Here, we understand sociomaterial movements as emergent and relational, comprising complex dynamics of agency across students, teachers and materials in situated, culturally framed activities. Our study draws on data comprising 85 hours of video recordings of 9-12-year-old students' (N = 94) engagement in a technology-rich makerspace in a Finnish elementary school. The video data were transcribed and analyzed qualitatively using a multimodal interaction analysis. The sociomaterial movements were found to be displayed across a tension-laden continuum between (1) procedural activity-analysis and reflection; (2) individual activity-collaboration; (3) "doing school"-empowerment; and d) alienation-identification. Together, the study offers a potential approach for investigating and understanding the often overlooked workings of sociomateriality that constitutes students' emergent engagement and learning opportunities in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEAM) learning contexts.