Appropriating scientific vocabulary in chemistry laboratories: a multiple case study of four community college students with diverse ethno-linguistic backgrounds

Abstract

This multiple case study investigated how college students with diverse ethno-linguistic backgrounds used chemistry vocabulary as a way to look at their discursive identities and cultural border crossings during first semester general chemistry laboratories. The data were collected in two major forms: video-taped laboratory observations and audio-recorded interviews. All transcribed data from videos and interviews were analyzed qualitatively, using the constant comparative method. Our results indicate that (1) participants explained the laboratories using vocabulary emphasized in both lecture and the laboratory; (2) participants were able to appropriate the scientific meanings of Dual Meaning Vocabulary (DMV) and Cross Meaning Vocabulary (CMV) into their discursive identities; (3) participants' prior English learning experiences and the classroom culture shaped their appropriation of scientific vocabulary and (4) participants' appropriation of chemistry language was deeply related to how they incorporated scientific culture into their everyday culture. These themes are discussed in depth using the cultural anthropological theoretical framework, the discursive identity lens, and a tiered definition of scientific vocabulary. Implications of this study are also discussed in terms of instruction and future research.

---

Introduction

Many researchers and educators have studied how young students' ethno-linguistic backgrounds shape how they perceive and learn science (Rosebery et al., 1992; Gilbert and Yerrick, 2001; Warren et al., 2001; Fang, 2005, 2006; Brown et al., 2010; Lee and Buxton, 2011; Kang and Bianchini, 2012; Buxton et al., 2013). Multiple instructional methods have been developed in response to this line of research in order to create an environment where young students, regardless of their ethno-linguistic backgrounds, have an equal chance of succeeding in academic science (Barton, 2001; Warren et al., 2001; Lee, 2005; Brown et al., 2010). However, to our knowledge little research has been done on how diverse adult students experience chemistry undergraduate classrooms.

To explore this area of research, we utilized three conceptual frameworks previously presented in the literature. First, this study builds on the cultural anthropological framework (Phelan et al., 1991; Cobern and Aikenhead, 1997; Aikenhead, 2001). In this framework, science is considered a subculture of western civilization because “scientists share a well defined system of meaning and symbols, in terms of which social interactions take place” (Cobern and Aikenhead, 1997, p. 3). Therefore, students who successfully learn science are considered to have crossed cultural borders from their everyday cultures into scientific culture. This framework allows researchers to understand science education by examining the various ways students negotiate cultural border crossings and resolve cultural conflicts (Phelan et al., 1991; Cobern and Aikenhead, 1997; Aikenhead, 2001). Previous studies describe how young students with diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds, including Haitian Creole students (Warren et al., 2001) and rural, lower track students (Gilbert and Yerrick, 2001) negotiated cultural border crossings, but little research exists that applies the cultural anthropological framework to students in undergraduate science courses. In response to this need, our study explored how selected undergraduate students with ethno-linguistically diverse backgrounds negotiate cultural border crossings in a chemistry laboratory.

The second conceptual framework we used is the lens of discursive identity (Brown et al., 2010). This lens is “a theoretical lens that allows us to understand how people use verbal cues to interpret ‘who’ someone is and how people send verbal cues to position themselves as a particular person” (Brown et al., 2010, p. 1472). It is not easy to measure whether ethno-linguistically diverse students cross cultural borders in the science classroom, but observing shifts in their discursive identity enabled us to identify cultural border crossings in this study.

We used a third conceptual framework for identifying scientific vocabulary to further explore students' discursive identity shifts. This framework categorizes words based on tiers of technicality: in order to speak like a scientist, students generally first learn words used in everyday life, then learn words used in academic settings, and finally learn vocabulary associated with the sciences (Snow, 2008). As a student uses more scientific words appropriately we can view this as a shift in their discursive identity and subsequently as a cultural border crossing into scientific culture. In other words, how ethno-linguistically diverse students use scientific vocabulary was considered to be an indicator of their discursive identity, and in turn, their cultural border crossings.

In this study, we observed students' discursive identity via vocabulary usage over the course of one semester. In doing so, we strengthened the support for using the chosen frameworks to examine similar settings. The area of chemistry was selected from the sciences due to the lack of research associated with understanding the role chemistry language plays in chemistry education (Song and Carheden, 2014). First, we discuss in detail the guiding literature associated with the cultural anthropological framework, the discursive identity lens, and the tier view of scientific vocabulary.

Guiding literature

Cultural anthropological framework

The cultural anthropological framework has strong roots in personal, social, and worldview constructivism (Aikenhead, 1996). Constructivist theories of knowledge are based fundamentally on the idea that “knowledge is constructed in the mind of the learner” (Bodner et al., 2001, p. 1108). Individuals construct new knowledge when they assimilate (when preexisting schema is used to interpret new experiences) or accommodate (when preexisting schema is revised to interpret new experiences). The cultural anthropological perspective considers how students make sense of new experiences based on their worldviews, which are “culturally-dependent fundamental organizations of mind” (Aikenhead, 1996, p. 4). A culture shares specialized discourses and practices that reflect the culture's values and common activities, and thus science can be considered a culture because science has “norms, values, beliefs, expectations, and conventional actions that are generally shared in various ways by communities of scientists” (Aikenhead, 1996, p. 9). In essence, students enter the science classroom with previously constructed worldviews and interact with the scientific worldview and culture. Interacting with novel cultures is not unfamiliar to most students: students interact with multiple cultures (or subcultures) throughout their lives, such as the subculture of the middle class, the subculture of church groups or sports teams, the subculture of mass media, etc. and construct and adjust their worldviews based on these cultures (Aikenhead, 1996).

Therefore, the cultural anthropological framework relates how students adjust to a particular academic subject (such as science) as a new culture based on their ethno-linguistic backgrounds (Phelan et al., 1991; Cobern and Aikenhead, 1997; Aikenhead, 2001). This framework first proposes that students who enter the classroom are not blank slates (Carlsen, 2007); instead, they have prior knowledge shaped by their prior cultural and linguistic experiences (Moll et al., 1992; Rosebery et al., 1992; Cobern and Aikenhead, 1997; Lee, 2005; Brown et al., 2010). Regardless of their different experiences, students can use this type of knowledge, called funds of knowledge, in the classroom as an asset for their learning (Moll et al., 1992). That is, this framework avoids looking at students as “deficient” or having “misconceptions” due to their ethno-linguistic backgrounds (Moll et al., 1992; Rosebery et al., 1992; Varelas et al., 2002; Brown et al., 2010; Brown, 2013).

Once in the classroom, students interact with a new academic culture of science and respond to it differently (Phelan et al., 1991; Cobern and Aikenhead, 1997; Aikenhead, 2001). The two extremes of the response spectrum are enculturation or assimilation. If students' worldviews correspond with scientific culture, science instruction will then support the students' worldviews; this is called ‘enculturation’ (Aikenhead, 1996). At the opposite of the spectrum is cultural assimilation, when the students' worldviews collide with science instruction and students are forced to marginalize their worldviews in favor of the scientific worldview (Aikenhead and Jegede, 1999). However, qualitative research in science education describes a broader spectrum of student response to scientific classrooms: students who (1) have self-images and lifestyles that resonate with scientific culture and obtain an in-depth understanding of science, (2) also have self-images and lifestyles that resonate with scientific culture but a barrier(s) prevents obtaining an in-depth understanding of science, (3) accept scientific culture and navigate it as a foreign culture, not fully incorporating parts of it into their everyday lives, (4) find scientific culture difficult to navigate or understand but learn to cope, (5) reject scientific culture, refusing to incorporate any parts into their everyday lives, or (6) cannot navigate cultural border crossings into scientific culture due to discrimination (Aikenhead, 2001). Within the cultural anthropological framework, successful science education shifts students' cultural identities so that the students are able to view the world from a scientific standpoint.

Several studies describe various ways in which cultural border crossings can be difficult for students in science. For example, a group of native English speaking undergraduates retained the everyday meaning of a set of scientific words (e.g., solution, base, salt, compound, etc.) even after instruction (Song and Carheden, 2014). Although the study did not use the cultural anthropological framework, it is implied that the students retained their ingrained everyday cultural understanding of those scientific words and did not integrate the scientific meanings into their everyday lives. Gilbert and Yerrick (2001) found that a group of underrepresented, rural lower-track high school students viewed the acceptance of scientific culture as abandonment or betrayal of their everyday culture. The group of students believed that maintaining their cultural membership “involved sharing experiences of common prejudice, poor academic achievement, and enrollment in lower track classes” (Gilbert and Yerrick, 2001, p. 583) and that academic success indicated betrayal of their everyday culture. These findings and other studies throughout literature (Roth and Lawless, 2002; Gee, 2008; Brown et al., 2010; Brown, 2013) support this framework in that they show how students' ethno-linguistic backgrounds shape their level of acceptance of scientific culture and what parts of scientific culture they are willing to adopt.

Discursive identity

Students' responses to scientific culture are not easily distinguished by quizzes, tests, or surveys but can be observed through their social interactions. While educators and researchers have used multiple lenses to observe a cultural border crossing (Gilbert and Yerrick, 2001; Lemke, 2001; Carlsen, 2007), we selected the discursive identity lens (Brown et al., 2010; Brown, 2013). This lens proposes that people select words to position themselves as a particular type of person and thus communicate their cultural affiliations with their discourse. In other words, how people talk projects how they identify themselves (discursive identity). Therefore, if a student accepts scientific culture, the student will incorporate scientific language into their discourse patterns. On the other hand, if a student has a difficult time navigating cultural border crossings, the student will have a difficult time incorporating scientific language into their discourse patterns.

Still, distinguishing when students incorporate scientific language into their discursive identities is difficult. We used the idea of appropriation to determine if a student shifts in his or her discursive identity and therefore is navigating cultural border crossings. The idea of appropriation has been thoroughly discussed in literature (Ziff and Rao, 1997; Ashley and Plesch, 2002; Rogers, 2006), but very simply put, appropriation means “the taking—from a culture that is not one's own—of intellectual property, cultural expressions or artifacts, history and ways of knowledge” (Ziff and Rao, 1997, p. 1). Bakhtin (1981) defined appropriation of language as follows:

[The word in the language] becomes “one's own” only when the speaker populates it with his own intention, his own accent, when he appropriates the word, adapting it to his own semantic and expressive intention. Prior to this moment of appropriation, the word exists in other people's mouths, in other people's contexts, serving other people's intentions… It is as if they put themselves in quotation marks against the will of the speaker. Language is not a neutral medium that passes freely and easily into the private property of the speaker's intentions; it is populated – overpopulated – with the intentions of others. Expropriating it, forcing it to submit to one's intentions and accents, is a difficult and complicated process (p. 294).

Following Bakhtin's description, in the context of this study, we use appropriation to refer to when students use scientific language meaningfully, in multiple contexts, and without prompt from outsiders.

From a historical standpoint, it is important to note that appropriation has often been detrimental to less dominant cultures; therefore it is not surprising that the term appropriation has developed a negative connotation in some disciplines (Rogers, 2006). We are not promoting this type of imbalanced and detrimental appropriation in which people from a less powerful culture are forced to assimilate into the cultural traditions of a dominant culture or have their own cultural traditions misappropriated into a dominant culture against their will. In science classrooms such as the one described in this study, students are given the freedom to explore and interact with scientific culture and worldviews and they can still pass the course without fully shifting in identity (Cobern and Aikenhead, 1997; Brown et al., 2010). Of course, a wider public understanding of science is generally desired in the science education community (Arons, 1973; Ware, 2001) and thus it is preferable when cultural continuity is achieved between the students' everyday culture and scientific culture (Brown et al., 2010).

Scientific vocabulary

In this study, we specifically monitored how students appropriate scientific vocabulary into their discursive identities. We selected Snow's (2008) categorization of English vocabulary that organizes the English vocabulary into tiers of technicality – Tier I, Tier II, and Tier III (Fig. 1). Tier I includes words used in everyday life by the majority of the English-speaking population, such as grow and plant. These are words that students generally learn at an early age. Tier II vocabulary is the vocabulary used in academic culture, across the disciplines. Usually these words are not taught explicitly in classrooms, yet students start learning them through being exposed to an educational environment (Snow, 2008). Some examples are growth, initial, and accuracy. Finally, the highest level of the tiers of technicality is Tier III: discipline-specific words. Scientific words are considered Tier III words such as deoxyribonucleic acid, burette, or phenolphthalein. Students who pursue a specific discipline learn a corresponding set of Tier III words. Thus, scientific words are defined as words, terms, or phrases specific to the scientific discipline and culture. While the sciences can be further divided into chemistry, biology, etc., Snow's tier system does not reflect this and so we will not further specify vocabularies beyond Tier III. We acknowledge that some of the vocabulary words presented in this study are specific to chemistry only while others overlap with other science disciplines.

Fig. 1 Summary of the tiered vocabulary framework.

Confusingly, some Tier III, scientific words have multiple meanings. For instance, words such as acid, sugar, and mole have technical Tier III meanings in chemistry but have vastly different meanings when used in a Tier I everyday setting. This specific type of vocabulary is called Dual Meaning Vocabulary (DMV) (Song and Carheden, 2014). On the other hand, some words have academic meanings (Tier II) and technical meanings (Tier III). Often, scientists use Tier II words to create specific terms for Tier III concepts (e.g., indicator). At other times, Tier III words become part of academia's general knowledge (e.g., DNA). While the definitions are similar, discussing these words in an academic setting usually implies a different meaning than when discussing them in a technical setting. Snow (2008) referred to these words as “tier-two-and-a-half” words because of the crossover between Tier II and III (p. 75). However, for simplicity's sake, we are referring to them as Cross Meaning Vocabulary (CMV).

In summary, students' successful cultural border crossings into scientific culture are indicated by shifts in their discursive identity. As students identify more with scientific culture and scientific ways of thinking, they start incorporating parts of scientific language into their language. One way to monitor discursive identity shifts is to monitor students' appropriation of scientific vocabulary. Essentially, if students use scientific vocabulary meaningfully, in multiple settings, and without prompt, they shift in discursive identity and are successfully navigating cultural border crossings.

Research questions

Using three frameworks, we used scientific vocabulary appropriation as an indicator of discursive identity shifts and cultural border crossings into scientific culture. While decades of studies have explored the relationship between cultural border crossing in science and young students' ethno-linguistic backgrounds, to our knowledge little research exists for undergraduate science students with diverse backgrounds, especially in chemistry laboratories. Therefore, in order to narrow this research gap, we asked within the context of a first semester general chemistry laboratory:

(1) How do community college students with different ethno-linguistic backgrounds appropriate scientific vocabulary in their discursive identities?

(2) How does their appropriation of scientific vocabulary reflect the ways they cross cultural borders?

We presented patterns and idiosyncrasies found in the cases of four students with diverse ethno-linguistic backgrounds. The following multiple case study (Lichtman, 2006; Baxter and Jack, 2008) describes four unique students and should not be generalized to all undergraduates, but instead describes transferable themes (Merriam, 2009).

Research methods

Research design

A qualitative research design was selected for this study. As qualitative inquiry, this research assumed that reality is constructed by individuals through social interactions, and therefore, is multidimensional and ever changing (Merriam, 2009). Thus, this research presents an interpretation of reality. In other words, the purpose of this research was not to establish “laws” and make generalizations, but rather to establish transferability by providing a rich, dense description of how a person or groups of persons view and understand their reality. In particular, we presented a multiple case study, which is a descriptive intensive analysis of multiple units selected for their typicality or uniqueness and explores differences within and between cases (Lichtman, 2006; Baxter and Jack, 2008; Johnson and Christensen, 2008). The “units” in this study are four participants, who each have a unique ethno-linguistic background. This study aimed to be systematic, detailed, and rigorous, as opposed to anecdotal and impressionistic (Watson-Gegeo, 1988).

Research setting

The study took place at a community college located in the Rocky Mountain region of the United States during the fall semester of 2013. We selected the community college due to its diverse student population. In the 2009–2010 academic year, the demographics for this community college student population were 46.0% White, 25.6% Hispanic, 16.5% Black, 5.3% Asian, 1.7% Native American/Alaskan, and 4.9% non-resident alien.† In this study, the course observed was General College Chemistry I, denoted as CHE 111, a five-credit course that is generally taken by science and engineering students. The section chosen had a four-hour lecture immediately followed by a two-hour laboratory. While the instructor controlled how and when the content was introduced, the department controlled the experiment selections and manual for the laboratory.

The students were first exposed to the content in the lecture and then performed an experiment to verify the concept at hand. For example, students were taught about concentration during the lecture portion of the course and soon thereafter they performed a titration experiment to calculate the molarity of a solution. Immediately before each experiment, the instructor gave a short lecture that directly related to the experimental concepts, calculations, safety practices, and equipment used. The students completed the experiments in groups of two or three.

We selected three experiments to observe based on the instructor's recommendations and our familiarity with the experiments (see Table 1). These experiments were at the relative beginning, middle, and end of the semester. The first experiment, Vitamin C lab, was a two-week experiment (L1-A and L1-B). In this experiment, students titrated to find the molarity of a sodium hydroxide solution. Then they made ascorbic acid solutions from Vitamin C tablets and used their calculated sodium hydroxide molarity to find the mass of ascorbic acid in the Vitamin C tablets. The second experiment, Enthalpy lab, (L2) involved finding the enthalpy of solvation for various salts using calorimeters. In the third experiment, Unknown Metal lab, (L3), students generated hydrogen gas by reacting a metal with hydrochloric acid. Using the Ideal Gas Law, they calculated the moles of hydrogen gas generated and then using stoichiometry calculated the molar mass of the reacted metal. All graded assignments varied in types of questions asked and format (i.e., short answer versus formal laboratory reports).

Table 1 Timeline of data collection throughout semester

Event	Data collection method	Description
Initial interview (II)	Audio-recordings of interviews	Background discussions
Vitamin C lab Part I/II (L1-A, L1-B)	Video-recordings of classroom observations	2-week titration experiment
Interview I (I1)	Audio-recordings of interviews	Laboratory and cartoon discussions
Enthalpy lab (L2)	Video-recordings of classroom observations	Calorimeter experiment with solvation of salt
Interview II (I2)	Audio-recordings of interviews	Laboratory and cartoon discussions
Unknown Metal lab (L3)	Video-recordings of classroom observations	Generation of hydrogen gas from metal and hydrochloric acid
Interview III (I3)	Audio-recordings of interviews	Laboratory and cartoon discussions
Final interview (FI)	Audio-recordings of interviews	General experiences and cartoon discussions

---

Participants selection and backgrounds

A unique-sampling method (Merriam, 2009) was selected in that students with diverse ethno-linguistic backgrounds were sought. The participants were initially selected based on their answers on a background survey about their ethno-linguistic backgrounds, prior academic experiences in chemistry, and willingness to speak with the interviewer. The majority of the students in the classroom signed consent forms and eight students (including two monolingual English speakers) participated to some extent in this study. However, only four students participated fully and thus their data were used for this multiple case study. Table 2 describes their ethno-linguistic and chemistry backgrounds. The students are described with pseudonyms to protect their confidentiality. Note that it was a coincidence that all four participants pursued a medical or scientific field – our selection process did not include or exclude possible participants based on their career goals.

Table 2 Summary of participants' ethno-linguistic and chemistry backgrounds

	Maria^a	Azita^a	Hakim^a	Yoseph^a
a Pseudonyms. b English language learners. c Courses did not include laboratories; courses were taught in English.
Age	Early 20's	Mid 20's	Mid 20's	Late 20's
Years since emigration	N/A	5 years	2 years	3 years
Country of origin	United States (second-generation Hispanic)	Afghanistan	Ethiopia	Ethiopia
Linguistic status	Bilingual	Hepta-lingual	Trilingual	Trilingual
Fluency in English	Fluent	Fluent	ELL^b transitioning to fluent	ELL^b
Chemistry background	H.S. chemistry in U.S.	H.S. chemistry in Canada	Undergraduate course in Ethiopia^c	Undergraduate course in Ethiopia^c
Career goal	Medical professional	Dentist	Pharmacist	Scientist

---

Data collection procedures

In this multiple case study, careful attention was paid to capturing participants' discourse verbatim and giving participants multiple opportunities to use scientific vocabulary. For this analysis, data were collected in two primary ways: audio-recorded interviews (interviews) and laboratory video-observations (videos).

Each participant was interviewed five times: once initially (II), then three times during the semester (I1, I2, I3), and once at the end of the semester (FI) (see Table 1). During these interviews, participants were asked open-ended questions about their experiences in the laboratory and given multiple opportunities to use scientific vocabulary. In order to provide the participants with another setting in which to use scientific vocabulary, laboratory-related scientific cartoons were used (Song et al., 2008). These laboratory-related cartoons were taken from the Internet or drawn by the researchers; the cartoons placed laboratory-related humor in an alternative setting. In addition to these interviews, each laboratory group (with the permission of all the students in the group) was video-recorded with multiple video cameras during the three experiments (L1-A, L1-B, L2, and L3). The researchers also observed participants' verbal interactions during the experiments and took field notes when needed. The instructor was interviewed at the beginning and end of the semester, as well as informally throughout the semester. Audio- and video-recordings were transcribed verbatim. Throughout the transcriptions, we inserted clarifications for any ambiguous terms in parentheses. A researcher journal, informal interviews, artifact collection of experiment procedures, and a background survey served as supporting data sources. The use of multiple data sources and multiple interviews with the instructor and participants provided triangulation across the data, helping reduce the subjectivity of the researchers (Patton, 1990). In addition, the data were also peer debriefed and the instructor reviewed a final draft of this article (Merriam, 2009).

Data analysis procedures

In order to answer the research questions fully, the data analysis is mainly discussed in terms of scientific vocabulary. Initially, the data were coded according to whether participants' discourse related to the experiments (coded as laboratory related), to the cartoons used during the interviews (coded as cartoon related), or to any other topics such as chitchat or reflections (coded as non-laboratory related).

Coding the scientific vocabulary had three phases: A, B, and C (Fig. 2). In Phase A, every scientifically related word used by participants in the entire laboratory- and cartoon-related data was put into a list (called the master list). In total, the master list contained 118 scientifically related words. These words were then identified as Tier II or Tier III and as DMV or CMV; these classifications were agreed upon by the researchers and with working professionals with non-scientific backgrounds. Next, scientific words were also coded as laboratory or overlap vocabulary according to the setting in which the students were initially exposed to the words. The laboratory code designated words which were explicit to the laboratory lecture, manual, chemicals, or equipment (e.g., burette, titration, flask, hydrate, and hydrate salt names). The overlap code designated words that the instructor or students stated being modeled in both the lecture and the laboratory settings (e.g., calorimeter, molarity, acid, and simple compound names).

Fig. 2 Analysis of scientific vocabulary.

In Phase B, each participant's data were analyzed using the master list generated in Phase A. The total number of times each student used each Tier III word was identified. For this phase, only Tier III words were examined because only words specific to science and especially chemistry were relevant to our research questions. When the participants used these words was also tabulated for each experiment or interview. Subsequently, we created a table for each student based on how many times the student used each Tier III word (if at all) and when he or she used each word from the master list.

In Phase C, the Phase B tables were used to determine which Tier III words each participant appropriated. The criteria for appropriation were based on Bakhtin's (1981) definition of appropriation: participants needed to use the word meaningfully, without prompt, and in multiple settings. Given that the Phase B tables showed when and where each student used each word from the master list, we were able to identify which words each participant appropriated with ease. If the tables created at the Phase B indicated that the participant used a Tier III word more than once, each instance of use was collected in context from the transcription. By reading each context for Tier III words used multiple times, we were able to identify whether or not the participants appropriated the words based on Bakhtin's criteria.

In addition to scientific vocabulary, each participant's non-laboratory related data, especially their reflections on the overall experiences or views about scientific culture, were analyzed individually. Although the participants' use of science vocabulary indicates their cultural border crossing, we paid attention to each participant's significant statements that revealed how the participants dealt with cultural border crossings (Cobern and Aikenhead, 1997; Aikenhead, 2001). The results of this part of analysis were used to support our themes.

Once each participant's discourse was coded, the four cases were cross-analyzed for commonalities and idiosyncrasies to find themes and patterns by utilizing a constant comparative method (Merriam, 2009). In order to accurately present the participants' interpretations of their experiences (establish credibility and dependability), our peers and colleagues cross-examined the data to comment on the plausibility of our findings. We compared approximately 10% of the data for inter-reliability and discussed any discrepancies until consensus was reached. The instructor reviewed a final draft of this paper and provided feedback on the credibility of the data presented based on his experiences with the participants.

Research findings

The results are presented and discussed here under three themes based on patterns and idiosyncrasies seen throughout the data. Table 3 describes in detail what and how many times the participants used and appropriated various types of Tier III words during the study. Overall, the ethno-linguistically diverse participants were able to appropriate many scientific vocabulary words and types and their selection of appropriation scientific vocabulary reflected the resources they used to navigate cultural border crossings.

Table 3 List of appropriated Tier III words. Every Tier III word appropriated by at least one participant is listed and identified as either overlap-use or laboratory-use and DMV or CMV (if fitting). The number of times each participant appropriated each Tier III word is then listed

Appropriated words	Use	DMV/CMV	Maria	Azita	Hakim	Yoseph
a 36 is the total number of the words appropriated by all participants. b 16 is the total number of DMV or CMV appropriated by all participants. c Total number of the words appropriated by each participant. d Total number of times participants used words towards appropriation.
Acid	Overlap	DMV	5	4	15	3
Ammonium chloride	Overlap		—	4	—	—
Aqueous	Overlap		—	2	—	—
Ascorbic acid	Laboratory		—	—	—	5
Base	Overlap	DMV	—	2	8	2
Calorimeter	Overlap		5	—	—	3
Concentration	Overlap	DMV	—	4	—	5
Condition	Laboratory	DMV	—	7	—	—
Endpoint	Laboratory		—	—	—	2
Energy	Overlap	DMV	—	—	3	—
Equivalence point	Laboratory	CMV	—	—	2	—
Exothermic	Overlap		—	—	—	2
Flask	Laboratory	DMV	4	7	—	—
Heat	Overlap	DMV	5	5	3	—
Hydrochloric acid	Overlap		4	—	—	—
Hydrogen (gas)	Overlap		—	—	—	9
Indicator	Laboratory	CMV	—	—	—	2
Magnesium	Overlap		—	—	5	—
Mass	Overlap	DMV	—	3	7	5
Metal	Overlap	DMV	5	7	—	4
Molar mass	Overlap		—	—	—	3
Molarity	Overlap		2	5	4	5
Mole	Overlap	DMV	—	—	7	11
NaOH	Overlap		6	—	—	—
Neutralization	Overlap		—	—	2	2
Oxygen	Overlap		—	—	—	3
Phenolphthalein	Laboratory		6	3	—	—
React	Overlap	DMV	2	3	6	4
Reactant	Overlap	CMV	—	—	2	—
Reaction	Overlap	DMV	2	6	3	17
Salt	Overlap	DMV	2	2	6	7
Sodium hydroxide	Overlap		—	6	4	11
Sulfuric acid	Overlap		—	—	—	4
Titrate/titration	Laboratory		4	7	6	5
Weak acid	Overlap		—	—	2	—
Zinc	Overlap		—	—	15	—
Column count	36^a	16^b	13^c	17^c	18^c	22^c
Column total	—	—	52^d	77^d	100^d	114^d

---

Scientific vocabulary pattern 1: appropriation of overlap vocabulary

Overlap vocabulary words are words that the students were exposed to in both the laboratory and lecture. The four participants appropriated a large number of overlap vocabulary compared to the number of laboratory vocabulary (words used in only the laboratory setting) into their discursive identities. As seen in Table 3, the participants appropriated a total numbers of 28 overlap vocabulary words compared to 8 laboratory vocabulary. On average, participants appropriated 14 overlap vocabulary words and three laboratory vocabulary words (Table 4).

Table 4 Count of appropriated laboratory versus overlap words by each participant

Code	Maria	Azita	Hakim	Yoseph	Average
Laboratory	3	4	2	4	3
Overlap	10	13	16	18	14

---

The participants tended to describe their laboratory experiences by using the overlap words instead of using words that were presented exclusively in the laboratory lecture or manual. For example, during the interview after the Unknown Metal lab (L3), Maria considered where the hydrogen gas originated and relied on her overlap words to explain her thoughts:

R: In the reaction, where does the hydrogen gas come from?

Maria: It comes from the hydrochloric acid, how it was… I would say, the electrons and the hydrogen gas that is being uh, it was a single displacement (reaction), I think. [I3]

Instead of directly referring to laboratory words associated with her experiences, Maria used hydrochloric acid, hydrogen gas, and single displacement (reaction) to describe her thoughts on where the hydrogen gas originated in the reaction. Yoseph answered the same question in a similar manner, stating, “Yeah we have metal and hydrogenation. We are displacing the hydrogen” (I3). If the participants had answered this question by using laboratory vocabulary, their discourse could have included the names of equipment used to collect the hydrogen gas (e.g., burette) or other macro-based laboratory observation words.

At times, participants selected overlap vocabulary at the expense of laboratory vocabulary. An excerpt from Azita's interview following the Vitamin C laboratory (L1) exemplifies this:

R: So what did you do in the Vitamin C lab?

Azita: We did titration to figure out how much volume and molarity come together. So we can have equal concentration. That's my understanding. [I1]

Azita used molarity and concentration to explain the concept of equivalence point (the point in a reaction at which stoichiometrically equivalent quantities of reactants have been mixed). Azita could have selected to describe what laboratory equipment she used or could have stated that she was finding an “equivalence point” or “stoichiometric point” (which were both taught in the laboratory lecture and discussed in the manual). Instead, Azita selected to use scientific vocabulary taught in lecture to explain her laboratory experience for that day.

The participants discussed two major reasons why they preferred using overlap vocabulary. Foremost, they saw the experiments as a way to reinforce words learned from the lectures. The study was conducted in a traditional laboratory setting in which students typically verified the chemistry concepts previously learned. Maria's initial interview clearly indicated this finding when she described the purpose of the laboratory component of the course:

One thing is so you can get the full understanding of what you're learning in the lecture. Cuz I know it (the experiment) helps me a lot because it helps me grasp what we're doing and see what we're doing. Because you could write the definitions and the equations in class… try hoping the students memorize it. But when you actually see what's going on and you can see what's everything is, it makes it so much easier to remember. And to get the understanding. [II]

Maria described the laboratory's purpose as a means to help her understanding of what is taught in lecture. Moreover, the instructor reported that he emphasized and modeled to the students how to interpret macro-based experimental observations using words and concepts discussed in lecture. His emphasis likely created a classroom culture where overlap words were encouraged over laboratory words when describing the laboratory experiments. Previous literature has described how an instructor's discourse influences student discourse (Moje, 1995).

Second, the participants had prior experiences with some of the overlap words as all the participants had taken previous undergraduate and/or high school courses in chemistry in English. For instance, both Hakim and Yoseph had chemistry courses in English while they were undergraduates in Ethiopia but these courses were taught without any laboratory component. In the interview following the Enthalpy lab (L2), Hakim contrasted his experiences in the laboratory to his experiences in the lecture:

R: Did you understand it (the concept of enthalpy) before the lab?

Hakim: Yes I did. As I said before, the lab is kind of a new thing for me. I have never done lab before. But I understand like almost all in class, as you know. But when it comes to (the lab), I don't know, especially the enthalpy one. I'm sure I got the right answer but I don't know how to be honest. [I2]

Hakim remarked that he felt he understood the lectures but at time struggled to understand the laboratory. Hakim and Yoseph both were able to use their previous experiences in undergraduate chemistry as a resource to appropriate overlap words into their discursive identities, but because they did not have experience with the laboratory words, they struggled to appropriate these words. Likewise, Maria and Azita reported they were unfamiliar with many of the experiments taught in CHE 111, which indicates that they did not have prior experience with many laboratory words either.

Despite the participants' successful appropriation of many overlap vocabulary words, the language of science still acted as an obstacle to their cultural border crossings. For example, in the interview following the Vitamin C lab (L1), Hakim shared his reasoning behind his resistance to pursuing a career in chemistry, saying:

I was talking to [his lab partner] “I don't want to be a chemist.” And he was like “why!?” I mean, they have this own kind of language that I don't even know. That makes me help them but that doesn't make me want to be scientist, you know? I mean they know a lot (of scientific words in English) that I want to know. [I1]

Hakim shared that while he was interested in chemistry knowledge, he viewed the language of chemistry as a deterrent to pursuing chemistry. More specifically, Azita pointed out language as a possible source that could inhibit her cultural border crossing in the laboratory. She struggled to understand the terms and phrases used in the chemistry laboratory and stated:

Azita: I don't know the terminology, how to connect terms… If there's a question in plain language I try to understand it, like I was doing my lab report. I don't know what you call those… weight. The ones that you weigh. For example, you weigh something.

R: Take the mass?

Azita: Yeah! For example that! You weigh something. I have to learn that. [I1]

Azita perceived the language of science as a barrier in the laboratories but recognized that she needed to use the proper terminology and move away from using “plain language” in order to be successful in the science laboratory. That is, she navigated this cultural border crossing by recognizing it and managing it.

In summary, the ethno-linguistically diverse participants were able to appropriate many scientific words into their discursive identities but favored using overlap words over laboratory words. This was likely because the overlap words were emphasized by the classroom culture and because the participants had opportunities to appropriate overlap words prior to taking CHE 111. Regardless, it was evident that cultural border crossings in the chemistry laboratory were challenging for the ethno-linguistically diverse participants due to the language of science.

Scientific vocabulary pattern 2: appropriation of dual meaning vocabulary (DMV)

A previous study showed that a group of native English speaking, non-science majors had difficulty understanding and using the scientific meanings of DMV in an undergraduate biochemistry course because DMV has both everyday and scientific meanings (Song and Carheden, 2014). In our analysis, we did not find this tendency for these ethno-linguistically diverse participants. All four students appropriated the scientific meanings of multiple DMV. Their appropriated DMV actually accounted for a third or more of their total appropriated Tier III words. Table 3 details that in total the participants appropriated the scientific meanings of 13 DMV (acid, base, concentration, condition, energy, flask, heat, metal, mole, react, reactant, reaction, and salt). Table 5 shows the summation for each participant; on average participants appropriated 9 DMV.

Table 5 Count of appropriated DMV and CMV words by each participant

Code	Maria	Azita	Hakim	Yoseph	Average
DMV	7	11	9	9	9
CMV	0	0	2	1	<1
Rest of Tier III	6	6	7	12	8

---

Interestingly, during the final interview, Maria even forgot the everyday definition of salt (i.e., table salt) and expressed frustration at a cartoon. After seeing the cartoon in Fig. 3, she said, “They're trying to be all scientific by saying ammonium chloride. No it's, just say salt! Come on!” [FI]. She thought of only the Tier III scientific meaning of salt (ionic compounds resulting from the neutralization reaction of an acid and a base) and ignored the Tier I everyday meaning entirely, not concerning herself with the fact that people outside the sciences do not know that ammonium chloride is considered a salt.

Fig. 3 Cartoon that is a “play on words” (a salt can be read as assault). Participants were expected to recognize that ammonium chloride that is a salt they used during the Enthalpy laboratory, was a salt. They were also expected to explain how they recognized this as a salt. (Note: Cartoon was drawn by the first author.)

One likely contributing factor to why these ethno-linguistically diverse students appropriated the scientific meaning of DMV is that the participants had multiple opportunities to use DMV in the laboratory settings (as opposed to simply memorizing a vocabulary list or the like). In other words, the laboratory setting gave participants opportunities to practice DMV words in a scientifically meaningful context, promoting the participants' appropriation of the Tier III scientific meanings of DMV. For example, Azita had more experience with the conditioning technique than the other participants and correspondingly was the only participant to appropriate the scientific meaning of DMV word condition (a technique to prime glassware in order to avoid altering the concentration of sample solution). In the Vitamin C lab (L1-A/B), Maria, Azita, and Yoseph worked together: Maria organized the equipment (e.g., the flasks), Yoseph gathered the chemicals, and Azita conditioned the burette. Thus, when Azita discussed the experiment in the interview after the Vitamin C lab (L1-A/B), she discussed conditioning the burette:

R: Would you walk me through the procedure?

Azita: Yes. So what we first did is… measure the acid. Exactly. And put in the flask. We had three trials. Exactly when we put it. I took sodium hydroxide. I conditioned the burette (her responsibility). Then we took for the flask, each of them, we put two drops of phenolphthalein. And … the distilled water in… dissolve it… (She continued to describe the whole experiment.) [I1]

Not surprisingly, after conditioning the burette multiple times, Azita appropriated the scientific meaning of condition into her discursive identity because she had experience and familiarity with the Tier III scientific meaning of condition.

Moreover, the everyday meaning of DMV may not be ingrained into the participants' discursive identities. For the English-speaking students in the previous study, one of the reasons for their difficulty with appropriating the scientific meaning of DMV was that they first learned the everyday meaning. These meanings were deeply rooted in their discursive identities, before learning the scientific meaning (Song and Carheden, 2014). The ethno-linguistically diverse participants in our study did not speak English as their first language, so they may not have appropriated the Tier I everyday meanings of many DMV. The laboratory experiences with the Tier III scientific definition may have even outweighed their experiences with the Tier I definition of the DMV words. As a result, they may have actually appropriated the Tier III scientific meaning of DMV into their discursive identity first. Hakim's experience with learning English is an excellent example. In Hakim's initial interview, he described his experience learning English by stating, “In my time after grade seven, everything is in English, other than our language… Everything like science is in English. So there we are learning English to understand concepts” (II). Hakim's initial goal for learning English was to understand concepts and only later on in his life did he learn conversational English. Thus, Hakim did not have the everyday meaning of DMV ingrained deeply into his discursive identity, allowing for an accessible Tier III appropriation of the DMV.

The participants' appropriation of DMV illustrates that they were able to at least successfully navigate cultural border crossings and begin to incorporate some scientific culture into their personal worlds. While each participant had individual degrees of acceptance of scientific culture, all participants self-reported A's or B's in the course and intended to continue on a scientifically-related career path. These cultural border crossings were evident in the participants' increasingly scientific explanations of the cartoons presented in the interviews. For example, Azita responded to the cartoon in Fig. 3 by contrasting her previous perspective on ammonium chloride to her new understanding of the word salt, stating, “The ammonium. Yeah, Okay. It's the same. So frightened and it's just like, ‘Oh that's salt. That's okay.’… Because the name is like, ‘Oh it's ammonium chloride!’ But if you don't really know the compound, what it's made of, it's kind of scary” [FI]. She described the salt, ammonium chloride, in the cartoon from both an everyday perspective (e.g. frightening, scary) and a scientific perspective (e.g. okay). In addition, in her final interview (FI), Maria remarked on this difference between her explanations of cartoons at the beginning of the semester and at the end, stating, “It's funny, because when I think about it when at the very beginning, I wouldn't have known those different terms” [FI]. Maria recognized that she was increasingly using scientific vocabulary to explain her world. From these examples and others, it is evident that the participants (to varying degrees) were incorporating parts of scientific culture into their everyday worlds.

In summary, the participants were able to appropriate the scientific meanings of DMV into their discursive identities because they likely did not strongly incorporate the Tier I definitions of the DMV before. Their appropriation of the Tier III scientific definitions of DMV was further promoted by giving the students multiple opportunities to practice them. Their appropriation of DMV and interview examples indicates that the participants were able to navigate some cultural border crossings and to varying degrees incorporated parts of scientific culture into their personal worlds.

Scientific vocabulary idiosyncrasy: appropriation of cross meaning vocabulary (CMV)

Snow (2008) hypothesized that young English Language Learners (ELLs) would have a difficult time appropriating CMV (words that have a Tier II and Tier III meaning) or “tier-two-and-a-half” words (p. 75) because understanding the differences in two meanings, purposes, and contexts of usage is challenging due to their limited experiences with English Tier II words. Interestingly, that appeared to be the case for Maria and Azita but not for Hakim and Yoseph. As shown in Table 3 and 5, Azita and Maria both appropriated no CMV, but Hakim appropriated equivalence point and reactant and Yoseph appropriated indicator.

The CMV word indicator can be used in many different subjects (e.g., an indicator of economic change, an indicator of ecosystem health, etc.) to describe something that reveals a property of system. A chemical indicator has a similar function by changing its color based on the pH (or other properties) of a solution. However, this same word is used in wholly different contexts. During Part I of the Vitamin C lab (L1-A), Yoseph selected to use the word indicator in the following video excerpt:

Azita: What's next (what's the next step)?

Yoseph: Indicator. Bring the indicator. [L1-A]

While other students were using other words (e.g., that, pink stuff, phenolphthalein), Yoseph picked the CMV word indicator to describe what was needed next in their experiment.

Hakim and Yoseph's appropriation of some CMV words, albeit not many, may have resulted from their extensive experience in academic Tier II English in their early school years. The tier classification system is based on how English-speaking people generally learn English vocabulary (i.e., first everyday English, then academic English, and then perhaps some technical English). However, Hakim and Yoseph were both immersed in academic English when they first learned English during high school. In Yoseph's initial interview, he stated, “In Ethiopia we have high school in English. College sort of English” (II). As previously mentioned, Hakim also was educated in a similar setting where he was expected to speak English in a purely academic setting. They also reported feeling more comfortable communicating with the professor (who tended to use academic language and scientific language) than with their peers (who oftentimes speak colloquial English even in an academic setting). Consequently, their familiarity with the meanings of Tier II words served as a resource in their understanding of CMV. As shown in the example of Yoseph above, previous experience with the Tier II academic meaning of indicator served as a resource for appropriating the Tier III scientific meaning of indicator into his discursive identity.

Hakim and Yoseph's appropriation of CMV paralleled their transition to more fully incorporating scientific culture into their personal worlds, as reflected in the interviews. When asked if the laboratories related to their everyday lives in the final interview, Yoseph responded, “Well yes” [FI] and then listed multiple examples of ways the chemistry laboratories related to his everyday life. Hakim's response to the same question is as follows:

Yeah, I mean like after I did the enthalpy pre-lab, I went home and took ice. I hold it like this and my finger gets cold and cold, you know? And the ice kept melting, melting, you know? So I mean, even though I'm not sure, I thought the heat going from my, transferring from my finger to the cold. That's why the cold (ice) is turning to water, or like melting. [FI]

Hakim initially reported a negative view of the enthalpy laboratory but continued to explore scientific culture by incorporating it into his everyday life, such as observing ice melt. In fact, Hakim reported starting the course with a large visible cultural barrier: a negative view of science. In his final interview, Hakim discussed this shift in his perceptions about science, stating:

I used to watch a lot of movies and read a lot of theories about labs and stuff like that. You know, someone did this experiment and it say this for the theory or something like that. Hm. I mean I liked science but I don't think chemistry and science are true, you know. I say they lie, mostly because they say this is supposed to be something like this, right? That's what I thought. But when I get the exact value, I know that I did experiment myself and I found the exact thing. Then I started believing in it (science) in experiment. [FI]

His original negative view could have hindered his cultural border crossings in the chemistry laboratory, which in turn may have hindered his appropriation of scientific vocabulary in his discursive identity. However, as he performed the experiments, he changed his view of the nature of science and accepted scientific culture, which was reflected in his appropriation of CMV and other scientific vocabulary.

On the other hand, the cases of Maria and Azita, who were not able to appropriate CMV, indicated they continued to manage their cultural border crossings without fully incorporating scientific culture into their personal worlds. Unlike Hakim and Yoseph, Maria did not see any connection between science and her life and stated: “I never really thought of that (connection) to be honest… I would say, with what I would like to do, I can kind of see connections, but nothing as far as my life right now” [FI]. Although she mentioned the possibility of accepting scientific culture in the future as a medical professional, Maria seemed to perceive science as a foreign culture at the time of this study. Interestingly, both Maria and Azita's interview responses indicated that they felt that academic language was a barrier to their cultural border crossings. They expressed frustration with the language used by laboratory manual and at times the instructor. During Maria's interview after the Vitamin C laboratory [L1], she commented on how she felt in the laboratory: “I feel like a scientist but a more dumbed down version of one. Like keep it simple. It's (the laboratory manual) like you have to do this and this. Why is it worded this way?” [I1]. Here, Maria (who appropriated Tier III vocabulary and the scientific meanings of DMV words but no CMV) specifically cites the language in the laboratory manual uses as a barrier to feeling like a scientist.

In summary, the participants' level of cultural border crossings paralleled the idiosyncrasy in the appropriation of CMV words in our study. When able, participants used their Tier II definitions as a resource for appropriation of CMV and for their cultural border crossings. The ethno-linguistically diverse participants' English learning experiences seemed to shape their ability to appropriate CMV into their discursive identities, as is the case in DMV.

Discussion and conclusions

Understanding how students' ethno-linguistic backgrounds shape their experiences in undergraduate chemistry courses is inherently important for science educators and researchers especially for those interacting with diverse classes. In this study, we examined one aspect of this complicated topic by discussing how our participants' ethno-linguistic backgrounds shaped their appropriation of scientific vocabulary and how they crossed cultural borders in a chemistry laboratory. In this section, we address each research question specifically by presenting overall themes and implications of the findings, then consider overall conclusions of the study, and finally suggest future studies in this area of research.

The first research question asked how scientific vocabulary appropriation occurs at the college level for participants with diverse ethno-linguistic backgrounds. Relating to this research question, two main themes in the patterns were apparent. The first theme is that the participants' ethno-linguistic backgrounds shaped what vocabulary words they appropriated into their discursive identities. The four participants' English learning experiences shaped their ability to appropriate CMV into their discursive identities: extensive exposure to Tier II academic English when learning English appears to serve as a resource for learning the scientific meaning of CMV. Meanwhile, students with monolingual English-speaking backgrounds may have the Tier I, vernacular meaning of DMV deeply rooted in their thinking (Song and Carheden, 2014); however, as shown here, students who speak English as a second language may appropriate the scientific meaning of a variety of DMV into their discursive identities due to a less ingrained Tier I definition. This aspect of educating a diverse classroom is not unique to undergraduate students: scholars of science education have described how young students' ethno-linguistic backgrounds shape their language practices in science classrooms (Moje, 1995; Stoddart et al., 2002; Lee et al., 2005). Hence, undergraduate science educators should be aware that students who speak English as a second language can have diverse English learning experiences and bring equally diverse linguistic resources into the classroom. Also, in response to these findings, science educators and researchers should note that Snow's tiers of technicality for words may not be reflective of how all adult students learn English (i.e., Tier II and Tier I may be somewhat reversed as in the cases of Hakim and Yoseph).

The second theme seen in this study relating to the first research question is that the classroom culture and norms also shaped which scientific vocabulary words the participants appropriated into their discursive identities. Specifically, the students' perceived emphasis of overlap words framed what scientific vocabulary words they appropriated into their discursive identities. While they appropriated few laboratory words, the laboratory words they did appropriate were the laboratory words with which they had extensive experience in a meaningful context (e.g., Azita's experience with condition) (Arons, 1973, 1983). For example, all participants appropriated titration; this was likely due to their extensive experience with titrations as they completed titration experiments four times throughout the semester. While we specify that the classroom culture shaped participants' discursive identities, identifying what factors created the classroom culture seen in this study was beyond the scope of our research questions. However, other researchers have studied what factors shape classroom cultures. For example, Moje (1995) illustrated how a high school chemistry teacher's language shaped how her students used scientific language in chemistry and honors chemistry courses. Lemke (1990, 1998, 2001) has done considerable work on this subject for science classrooms, describing how multi-media, written text, and specialized language all shaped young learners' experiences with science curriculum. These works and works of others (Arons, 1983; Moll et al., 1992; Halliday, 1993; Gee, 2008) present a need for instructional strategies in science classrooms that create meaningful learning environments for students.

Furthermore, chemical education researchers interested in the undergraduate setting echoed this trend towards a meaningful learning environment, specifying that “the hands-on experiences in the lab are an ideal setting to develop meaningful conceptual understanding of chemistry, to access understanding about the nature of science and to engage in doing science” (Sandi-Urena et al., 2011, p. 434). Our analysis shows that the laboratory component of an undergraduate chemistry course certainly can be a critical component for students' successful transition to scientific culture in that experiments have the potential to create meaningful learning situations where students actively practice scientific language and culture. In this study, the laboratory component was a key experience for Hakim: he reported high grades in high school and undergraduate chemistry courses (which did not have any laboratory components), but stated that he had a negative view of science at the beginning of the course. In his final interview, Hakim specifically stated that the laboratory was the crux of his shift in beliefs about scientific culture. From our interviews and observations with Hakim, we believe that the classroom culture he experienced created an environment where he was able to use his prior academic experiences, linguistic experiences with academic language, and flexibility with everyday definitions of DMV to successfully navigate cultural border crossings in the chemistry laboratory. Without Hakim's positive experiences in the laboratory, it is likely he would have continued to retain his negative view of scientific culture given that his prior experiences with chemistry lectures were not enough to encourage cultural border crossings. However, Hakim's case is not representative of all participants in this study because Azita and Maria struggled at times to navigate cultural border crossings. Indeed researchers (Hofstein and Lunetta, 1982; Sandi-Urena et al., 2011) expressed concern that traditionally structured laboratories (such as the one described in this study) do not generally produce significant outcomes towards science literacy for general chemistry undergraduate students.

In this study, our second research question asked how the participants' appropriation of scientific vocabulary reflected the ways they cross cultural borders. One overarching theme is readily apparent: the participants' appropriation of scientific vocabulary reflected the resources they used to navigate cultural border crossings. The participants used their prior academic experiences with chemistry language to appropriate overlap scientific vocabulary. They also used the laboratory itself as a resource to appropriate words they learned in lecture by emphasizing overlap words over laboratory words when explaining their experiences. In addition, participants who had extensive experience in academic English used that experience as a resource to appropriate CMV. Thus, this study indicates that the participants' shifts in discursive identities were strongly shaped by the funds of knowledge they were able to use in the laboratory to cross cultural borders.

Therefore, we strongly believe that instructional methods should be developed that encourage students with ethno-linguistically diverse backgrounds to use maximum funds of knowledge in undergraduate chemistry classrooms because this will promote cultural border crossings represented by shifts in their discursive identities. While little research exists on instructional strategies that promote border crossings in undergraduate chemistry classrooms, many science education researchers have explored culturally congruent science instructional methods for young students with diverse ethno-linguistic backgrounds (Lee and Fradd, 1998; Hanes, 2004; Carlsen, 2007; Brown et al., 2010). For instance, Brown et al. (2010) developed the Disaggregate Instruction model with the goal of encouraging students to explore science within their own everyday cultures and language before transitioning to scientific culture and language. In this instructional strategy, the instructor first pre-assesses the class's collective knowledge of the topic, next uses activities and instruction to construct scientific ideas using the students' funds of knowledge, then introduces scientific language by translating from the students' everyday language, and finally provides scaffolding opportunities to further bridge gaps between students' everyday culture and scientific culture. Further research is needed to determine if and how undergraduate students from ethno-linguistically diverse backgrounds respond to instructional strategies that promote discursive identity shifts.

Furthermore, we hypothesize that undergraduate students who cannot utilize their funds of knowledge in the classroom will struggle with crossing cultural borders and consequently may not appropriate many (if any) scientific vocabulary words into their discursive identities. Students who struggle to utilize their funds of knowledge to navigate cultural border crossings will likely retain their personal worlds (Arons, 1983), and in doing so are likely to retain their discursive identities even in a scientific setting, such as a laboratory (Cobern and Aikenhead, 1997; Brown et al., 2010). In this study, we observed a monolingual, English-speaking participant, who worked with Hakim and another student in the laboratory, used Tier I words, such as “stuff,” “thing,” “big ass pill” (Vitamin C tablet), and “peacock” (in place of stopcock) to describe his observations of the experiments (which confused Hakim who was not familiar with colloquial English terms). It was likely that this participant was struggling to cross cultural borders in the chemistry laboratory; however, there was not enough data to confirm this because he withdrew from the course and did not complete any interviews afterwards. More research is needed to determine how, if at all, students who struggle with cultural border crossings appropriate Tier III vocabulary into their discursive identities. In addition, studying how undergraduate students' first language accents and ways of talking influence their appropriation of scientific vocabulary would expand understanding of linguistic funds of knowledge. Moreover, more research is needed to explore if culturally congruent instructional strategies like Disaggregate Instruction promote cultural border crossings for students like the one described above.

Overall, this study details how the participants' ethno-linguistic backgrounds shaped what scientific words they appropriated into their discursive identities and that their shifts in discursive identities reflected the resources they used to navigate cultural border crossings. More research is needed on this topic, specifically how and why undergraduate students from diverse ethno-linguistic backgrounds accept or reject scientific culture. We believe that the lens of discursive identity and our continued understanding of scientific language will advance as useful tools for identifying how students navigate cultural border crossings. Equally important to ongoing studies with students from diverse ethno-linguistic backgrounds, similar studies with students from monolingual English backgrounds would strengthen the argument for this theoretical lens and findings. Furthermore, we believe that developing a better understanding of how students understand and learn scientific language at the undergraduate level will enhance science educators' abilities to create a more meaningful learning environment for general chemistry courses.

Acknowledgements

We thank the Chemistry Education Research Group at the University of Northern Colorado for many helpful discussions. We would like to acknowledge the reviewers for their constructive comments which improved the manuscript. Finally, we are grateful to the participants involved in this study.

References

1. Aikenhead G. S., (1996), Science education: border crossing into the subculture of science, Stud. Sci. Educ., 27, 1–52.
2. Aikenhead G., (2001), Students' ease in crossing cultural borders into school science, Sci. Educ., 85(2), 180–188.
3. Aikenhead G. S. and Jegede O. J., (1999), Cross-cultural science education: a cognitive explanation of a cultural phenomenon, J. Res. Sci. Teach., 36(3), 269–287.
4. Arons A., (1973), Toward wider public understanding of science, Am. J. Phys., 41, 769–782.
5. Arons A., (1983), Achieving wider scientific literacy, J. Am. Acad. Arts Sci., 112(2), 91–122.
6. Ashley K. and Plesch V., (2002), The cultural processes of ‘appropriation’, J. Mediev. Early Mod. S., 32(1), 1–15.
7. Bakhtin M., (1981), The dialogic imagination: four essays, Austin: University of Texas Press.
8. Barton A. C., (2001), Science education in urban settings: seeking new ways of praxis through critical ethnography, J. Res. Sci. Teach., 38(8), 899–917.
9. Baxter P. and Jack S., (2008), Qualitative case study methodology: study design and implementation for novice researchers, Qual. Rep., 13(4), 544–559.
10. Bodner G., Klobuchar M. and Geelan D., (2001), The many forms of constructivism, J. Chem. Educ., 78, 1107.
11. Brown B. A., (2013), The language-identity dilemma: an examination of language, cognition, identity, and their associated implications for learning, in Bianchini J. A., Akerson V. L., Barton A. C., Lee O. and Rodriguez A. J. (ed.), Moving the equity agenda forward: equity research, practice, and policy in science education, cultural studies of science education 5, Springer, pp. 223–239.
12. Brown B. A., Ryoo K. and Rodriguez J., (2010), Pathway towards fluency: using ‘disaggregate instruction’ to promote science literacy, Int. J. Sci. Educ., 32(11), 1465–1493.
13. Buxton C. A., Rivera C. and Allexsaht-Snider M., (2013), Science, language, and families: constructing a model of steps to college through language-rich science inquiry, in Bianchini J. A., Akerson V. L., Barton A. C., Lee O. and Rodriguez A. J. (ed.), Moving the equity agenda forward: equity research, practice, and policy in science education, cultural studies of science education 5, Springer, pp. 241–259.
14. Carlsen W. S., (2007), Language and science learning, Handbook of Research in Science Education, Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc., pp. 57–74.
15. Cobern W. W. and Aikenhead G. S., (1997), Cultural aspects of learning science.
16. Fang Z., (2005), Scientific literacy: a systemic functional linguistics perspective, Sci. Educ., 89, 335–347.
17. Fang Z., (2006), The language demands of science reading in middle school, Int. J. Sci. Educ., 28(5), 491–520.
18. Gee J., (2008), What is academic language?, in Rosebery A. S. and Warren B. (ed.), Teaching science to English language learners: building on students' strengths, Arlington, VA: National Science Teachers Association press, pp. 57–69.
19. Gilbert A. and Yerrick R., (2001), Same school, separate worlds: a sociocultural study of identity, resistance, and negotiation in a rural, lower track science classroom, J. Res. Sci. Teach., 38, 574–598.
20. Halliday M. A. K., (1993), Towards a language-based theory of learning, Linguist. Educ., 5(2), 93–116.
21. Hanes C., (2004), Chemistry as a second language, Sci. Teach., 71(2), 42.
22. Hofstein A. and Lunetta V. N., (1982), The role of the laboratory in science teaching: neglected aspects of research, Rev. Educ. Res., 52(2), 201–217.
23. Johnson B. and Christensen L., (2008), Educational research: quantitative, qualitative, and mixed approaches, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
24. Kang E. and Bianchini J. A., (2012), Relationships among science language, concepts, and processes: a study of English learners in junior high school science classrooms, Talking about science: an interpretation of the effects of teacher talk in a high school science classroom, Netherlands: Springer, pp. 261–282.
25. Lee O., (2005), Science education with English language learners: synthesis and research agenda, Rev. Educ. Res., 75(4), 491–530.
26. Lee O. and Buxton C. A., (2011), Engaging culturally and linguistically diverse students in learning science, Theory Pract., 50(4), 277–284.
27. Lee O. and Fradd S., (1998), Science for all, including students from non-English-language backgrounds, Educ. Res., 27(4), 12–21.
28. Lee O., Deaktor R. A., Hart J. E., Cuevas P. and Enders C. (2005), An instructional intervention's impact on the science and literacy achievement of culturally and linguistically diverse elementary students, J. Res. Sci. Teach., 42(8), 857–887.
29. Lemke J. L., (1990), Talking Science: language, learning, and values, Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
30. Lemke J. L., (1998), Multimedia literacy demands of the scientific curriculum, Linguist. Educ., 10(3), 247–271.
31. Lemke J. L., (2001), Articulating communities: sociocultural perspectives on science education, J. Res. Sci. Teach., 38(3), 296–316.
32. Lichtman M., (2006), Qualitative research in education: a user's guide, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
33. Merriam S. B., (2009), Qualitative Research: A Guide to Design and Implementation, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers.
34. Moje E. B., (1995), Talking about science: an interpretation of the effects of teacher talk in a high school science classroom, J. Res. Sci. Teach., 32(4), 349–371.
35. Moll L. C., Amanti C., Neff D. and Gonzalez N., (1992), Funds of knowledge for teaching: using a qualitative approach to connect homes and classrooms, Theory Pract., 31(2), 132–141.
36. Patton M. Q., (1990), Qualitative evaluation and research methods, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
37. Phelan P., Davidson A. L. and Cao H. T., (1991), Students' multiple worlds: negotiating the boundaries of family, peer, and school cultures, Anthropol. Educ. Quart., 22(3), 224–250.
38. Rogers R. A., (2006), From cultural exchange to transculturation: a review and reconceptualization of cultural appropriation, Commun. Theor., 16(4), 474–503.
39. Rosebery A. S., Warren B. and Conant F. R., (1992), Appropriating scientific discourse; findings from language minority classrooms, J. Learn. Sci., 21, 61–94.
40. Roth W.-M. and Lawless, D, (2002), Science, culture, and the emergence of language, Sci. Educ., 86(3), 368–385.
41. Sandi-Urena S., Cooper M. M., Gatlin T. A. and Bhattacharyya G., (2011), Students' experience in a general chemistry cooperative problem based laboratory, Chem. Educ. Res. Pract., 12(4), 434–442.
42. Snow C., (2008), What is the vocabulary of science?, in Rosebery A. S. and Warren B. (ed.), Teaching science to English language learners: building on students' strengths, Arlington, VA: National Science Teachers Association, pp. 71–83.
43. Song Y. and Carheden S., (2014), Dual meaning vocabulary (DMV) words in learning chemistry, Chem. Educ. Res. Pract., 15(2), 128–141.
44. Song Y., Heo M., Krumenaker L., and Tippins D., (2008), Cartoons – an alternative learning assessment, Sci. Scope, 31(5), 16.
45. Stoddart T., Pinal A., Latzke M. and Canaday D., (2002), Integrating inquiry science and language development for English language learners, J. Res. Sci. Teach., 39(8), 664–687.
46. Varelas M., Becker J., Luster B. and Wenzel S., (2002), When genres meet: inquiry into a sixth grade urban science class, J. Res. Sci. Teach., 39(7), 579–605.
47. Ware S. A., (2001), Teaching chemistry from a societal perspective, Pure Appl. Chem., 73(7), 1209–1214.
48. Warren B., Ballenger C., Ogonowski M., Rosebery A. and Hudicourt-Barnes J., (2001), Rethinking diversity in learning science: the logic of everyday sense-making, J. Res. Sci. Teach., 38, 529–552.
49. Watson-Gegeo K. A., (1988), Ethnography in ESL: defining the essentials, Tesol Quart., 22(4), 575–592.
50. Ziff B. H. and Rao P. V. (ed.), (1997), Borrowed Power.

---

Footnote

† Data was obtained from a document on the community college's website. Direct citation cannot be disclosed to protect participants' anonymity as an ethical consideration.

---