Epistemic agency, Indigenous knowledge, and the school science curriculum: reflections from Aotearoa New Zealand

ABSTRACT

In this article, we take up ongoing questions about relationships between epistemic agency, Indigenous knowledge, and the school science curriculum. We were brought together as curriculum advisors to provide guidance in the form of a conceptual framing for teams working on updates to Aotearoa New Zealand’s national curriculum and assessment frameworks. We contribute, therefore, to this critically important discussion from within the context of an ethical and political imperative that is currently driving curriculum reform in our context: he mana ōrite mō te mātauranga Māori (equal status for Māori knowledge). It is from this context that we share how we have arrived at a ‘multiple knowledge systems’ approach to science curriculum reform. We argue that a science curriculum for the Anthropocene must afford teachers the creative space to bring together multiple knowledge systems in the form of a local curriculum, supporting students’ inventiveness, empathy, and epistemic agency.

KEYWORDS:

• Indigenous knowledge
• science education
• epistemic agency
• multiple knowledge systems
• curriculum

Introduction

This article contributes to ongoing critical conversations about the relationship between Indigenous knowledge(s) and the school science curriculum (McKinley & Stewart, 2012). We also note that recent STEM scholarship has increasingly advocated for opening up new thinking beyond the bounds of traditional science disciplines, to ask what we really need and want from science curricula, and how to support students’ political and epistemic agency in science education (Hodson, 2008; Tolbert et al., 2024; Wallace et al., 2022; Weinstein et al., 2023). Furthermore, we acknowledge that children and youth, at least in Aotearoa New Zealand, are asking for a curriculum across all disciplines that supports both their individual and collective identities and wellbeing.¹ With these aims in mind, we begin with a macro-level overview of arguments for curriculum change in general and then explore the contribution that inclusion of Indigenous knowledges might make if these challenges are taken seriously, in the science curriculum in particular. Moving to the meso-level, we briefly outline salient features of the New Zealand curriculum context, including recent initiatives that have sought to include Māori knowledge (mātauranga Māori) in the national curriculum of Aotearoa New Zealand. On this foundation, we revisit the case for adopting a ‘knowledge systems’ approach to curriculum-making and consider the potential fit between this in principle idea and the macro-level curriculum challenges that frame the paper.

The need for substantive curriculum changes

The case for making substantive changes to school curriculum in general, and science curriculum in particular, reflects wider societal concerns and changes that are growing in urgency the longer they are ignored or set aside as too hard to tackle (Gilbert, 2023; White et al., 2023). In this brief overview we sketch five areas of critical concern. In each case we present the problem and the opportunity as two sides of the same coin.

First, we draw attention to the gathering crisis of what and whose knowledge and expertise can count. We hardly need to document the role of social media in the creation of and spread of mis - and dis-information, with the associated erosion of trust in authorities in general, and science in particular. In response, there has been recent advocacy for modification of science curricula to place greater emphasis on specific aspects of the nature of science (NOS) such as the role of peer review, and to build each student’s agency to actively determine the knowledge ecosystem in which a specific piece of information is embedded (Osborne & Pimentel, 2023). This is arguably a useful step but falls short of its goals because it retains an ‘internalist’ focus on making individual truth judgements, using the traditional epistemological tools of science (Feinstein & Waddington, 2020). The ‘something else’ needed, according to Feinstein and Waddington, is a focus on collective sense-making: ‘for science to be an important part of civic discourse, civic discourse-including its more pluralistic, creative and chaotic forms-must become an important part of science education’ (p. 161). They go on to note that other viewpoints, including Indigenous viewpoints, ‘often guide practical action better than science does’ (p. 162). Adopting a pragmatist theoretical framing, they argue that paying attention to the consequences of actions is more important than trying to establish unequivocal truths in complex social contexts such as climate change.

The multiple intersecting environmental crises of the Anthropocene constitute the second type of concern (Fazio, 2022a, 2023; Wallace et al., 2022; Tolbert et al., 2024). In the face of accelerating impacts of climate change, Jane Gilbert (2023) argues that science education requires a substantial reset. She highlights that science education ‘should build the intellectual capacities needed to create the futures we collectively want’ (p. 19, emphasis in original). Again, there are calls for a greater focus on students’ individual and collective agency – in this case so that they can act effectively and ethically to address both local and global issues. A recent OECD working paper (White et al., 2023) draws strongly from research and praxis in environmental education: the different ways of thinking about nature and land, and about human relations with the more-than-human world are implicated in this type of advocacy for change. The complexity of the environmental crises also points to a need for greater transdisciplinarity, both between science disciplines themselves, and between sciences and other disciplines (Newton & Zeidler, 2020). Recent STEM research captures the onto-epistemic challenges implied by this shift towards transdisciplinarity, adding another facet to the knowledge crisis with which we began this section (Fazio, 2022b).

Increasing levels of concern about the mental health and wellbeing of today’s young people, and across society as a whole, constitute our third rationale for curriculum change. There are several strands to this concern. Eco-scientism is a term used to describe pedagogy that positions science as the only knowledge on which personal commitments to living sustainably should be made. This type of pedagogy has been linked to ‘latent environmental depression’ in students (Zeyer, 2023, p. 3). Zeyer argues that so long as science education continues to position science knowledge on the epistemic high ground, in the process discounting the life knowledge and values held by many students, alienated students will protect their personal autonomy by resisting science learning and refusing the authority of science knowledge (Zeyer, 2023). As already alluded to, an increasing number of science education scholars are advocating for a shift in emphasis to frame science learning in wider contexts of societal challenges and science for the wider good (Zipin, 2020; Newton & Zeidler, 2020). However, it is important to do so in ways that open up space for dialogue about different ways of knowing and being – underpinned by explicit onto-epistemic approaches to curriculum and pedagogy (Warren et al., 2020).

Our fourth context sets science education in political contexts that now include vigorous forms of science denialism in situations such as the Covid 19 pandemic. These challenges circle back to the knowledge crisis with which we began this section. Zeyer (2023) characterises such situations as a crisis of the epistemization of politics – a move beyond claiming science as the only trusted authority to positioning political edicts based on rational science expertise as the only possible courses of action. As already noted, resistance and alienation are one type of response and again the call is to make different onto-epistemic framings visible and open them up for discussion. From another perspective, recent advocacy for significant change in ways we humans govern our affairs includes a call to build a greater sense of community and collective action, in direct opposition to neoliberal positioning of the self (or human) as the most important social actor (Monbiot, 2017). This too is seen as one way to address a growing sense of alienation and accompanying mental health crises in young people, and increasingly in the wider population.

Finally, building from the previous four points, we echo the increasing calls for supporting the development of students’ epistemic agency in our argument for curriculum change. As others have reported, the curriculum and standards frameworks themselves have posed obstacles to these efforts (Miller et al., 2018). Seemingly progressive standards and curriculum reform, such as the Next Generation Science Standards in the United States, encourage students on the one hand to participate in knowledge-building practices, yet on the other hand, limit the knowledge-building contexts to historically privileged canonical scientific ideas (Miller et al., 2018). We argue that a multiple knowledge systems approach to the design of science curriculum (or standards) documents actually embeds contexts required for epistemic agency. Drawing from multiple knowledge systems to make sense of the world around us requires the negotiation of divergent perspectives. Drawing from multiple knowledge systems as a form of epistemic agency aligns with recent shifts toward more transdisciplinary science educational approaches, through which students resist marginalising structures in school science and co-create new knowledge and practice (e.g. Chappell, 2024; Kotler et al., 2024; Tomin & Collis, 2023; Weinstein et al., 2023).

All five contexts outlined above arguably shift away from focusing change efforts on making traditional science more accessible to a wider range of students. Beginning from a person-centred perspective, they invite would-be reformers to ‘dare to imagine’ the problems that will matter most to students and their communities, and then to find ways to bring traditional disciplinary knowledge and life knowledge about these things that matter into mutually enriching interaction (Zipin, 2020, p. 111). The increasing attention being given to Indigenous worldviews is, we argue, a key strand in a complex, multi-faceted response to this challenge. All the shifts signalled point to questions about what can be known, by whom, and in what contexts. Having more than one onto-epistemic perspective on which to draw is an important affordance when addressing such questions:

 …  opening ourselves to the possibility of plural ontological realities can reveal difference in how phenomena and societal issues are perceived and how they might be more justly acted upon, especially in relation to the different axiological commitments they bring to bear in supporting students to relate in the world. (Running-Hawk Johnson et al., 2023, p. 584)

Our argument thus continues a trajectory of change in science education that began with initiatives such as ‘Science for All’ and ‘Culturally Responsive Science’. These initiatives variously attempted to make science learning more inclusive and equitable. They aimed to demonstrate relevance and increase engagement for disenfranchised learners in general, and Indigenous students in particular. Where science rubbed up against other ways of knowing, ‘border crossing’ strategies could be employed (Aikenhead, 1996), arguably protecting traditional science learning on its existing terms. Stewart (2021) warned against a tendency to conflate inclusion of Indigenous knowledge in the curriculum with culturally responsive pedagogy. She noted that such a move amounts to ‘smoke and mirrors’ because it absolves policy-makers from responsibility for addressing systemic inequalities, placing the onus on individual teachers and schools to improve engagement and achievement in science (p. 42). Furthermore, as we have argued above, it is not enough to augment or embellish the traditional science curriculum. Feinstein and Waddington (2020) call this an ‘internalist’ response and say it is likely to have the opposite type of consequences to those intended, given the post-truth era we are navigating. The science curriculum must change and adapt in rapidly changing times. How to position Indigenous knowledge in school science in a way that unsettles traditional assumptions about science curriculum and learning is the challenge this paper takes up.

Our context

The work we outline in this paper is set in the context of the national education system of Aotearoa New Zealand, and historic developments in that context. We now briefly outline critical developments in our shifting social and political landscape that have opened up space for new types of curriculum conversations, along with new initiatives to address historic injustices related to colonisation.

Amid Māori-led activism to highlight concerns about the need to stem the decline of the Indigenous language (te reo Māori), the Waitangi Tribunal was established in 1985 and began hearing claims of breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi. This ultimately led to the Maori Language Act, 1987. This act of parliament made te reo Māori an official language of New Zealand and established Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Māori (the Māori Language Commission) to promote the Māori language. In 1989, an Education Amendment Act recognised and promoted schools and tertiary institutions where te reo is the language of instruction and Maori ways of being are the norm. Both these legislative moves were responses to, and helped consolidate, efforts by local tribal groups (iwi and hapū) to revitalise te reo Māori through full immersion preschools (Kohanga reo, literally language nests) and subsequently Kura Kaupapa Māori (Māori-medium primary schools) Wharekura (Māori-medium secondary schools), and most recently Wananga (tertiary level learning institutions) throughout Aotearoa New Zealand.

Curriculum developments in the 1990s aimed to match these legislative developments with appropriate learning and teaching frameworks and materials. In 1993, an outcomes-based science curriculum was published for English medium schools (Ministry of Education, 1993). Work then began on a Maori-medium science curriculum, to be called Pūtaiao. Within the limited scope available, the Māori-led team reorganised the content of Pūtaiao to better reflect Māori ontologies and epistemologies. As one of the lead writers has subsequently noted, moving between science and pūtaiao requires ongoing effort, made more complex by relationships between home, school, and discipline specific considerations (McKinley & Keegan, 2008). More recently, curriculum writers in the early childhood sector have taken another leap in this developmental trajectory. Te Whāriki, the early childhood curriculum first released in 1996, was revised and updated in 2017. The updated version aims to emphasise ‘our bicultural foundation, our multicultural present and the shared future we are creating’ (Ministry of Education, 2017, p. 2). Most recently, publication of a new Aotearoa New Zealand Histories curriculum² has sent a clear message that all students should expand their knowledge of our unique onto-epistemic context, not just Māori students.

Building on these foundations, a recent review of NCEA (our senior secondary qualifications framework) and an ongoing Curriculum Refresh process have introduced the concept of ‘He mana ōrite mō te mātauranga Māori – Equal status for mātauranga Māori.’³ While well intentioned, several concerns have been expressed about this initiative. Past experience suggests that, in the absence of suitable professional learning and appropriate resources, there is a strong likelihood of superficial application of ‘Māori contexts’ to otherwise unchanged science learning (McKinley & Stewart, 2012). Second, early attempts to enact mana ōrite exposed the risk of recolonisation when deeply held concepts from te ao Māori (the Māori world) are substituted for science concepts in ways that narrow or alter their true meaning, or that are ontologically at odds with the concept to which they are being applied. For example, one early attempt, quickly corrected, equated the concept of mauri (a deep idea about life force) with energy in the context of particle theory. Neither the science community nor Māori scholars agreed with this interpretation, albeit for quite different reasons. It follows that building strong teacher knowledge, in active partnership with Indigenous science education scholars, and with scientists who are already drawing from multiple knowledge systems, increases the likelihood of successfully adopting a knowledge systems approach to transforming the science curriculum.

Our recent work sought to respond to these challenges in ways that the paper now outlines. Our endeavours have led us to agree with the argument that it is best to hold different knowledge systems in tension rather than try and build a more integrated curriculum, because doing so enhances epistemic agency in science classrooms while upholding the status of Māori knowledge (McKinley & Stewart, 2012; Stewart, 2022). As we have already noted, on the one hand, there are those who argue that science is universal and therefore not culturally specific. In other words, science is an endeavour to which multiple cultures have contributed, and, therefore, specific localised knowledge systems, like mātauranga Māori, since they are not universal, cannot be recognised as science (but rather, at best, as having made contributions to science) (Dawkins, 2023).⁴ On the other hand, Indigenous science scholars, including Māori philosophers and Māori scientists, have argued that since some Indigenous knowledge is in fact generated in ways consistent with scientific knowledge production, aspects of Indigenous knowledge production can and should be considered scientific (Hikuroa, 2017; see also Black & Tylianakis, 2024). However, as Georgina Stewart (2023) has stated, the question of whether or not Indigenous knowledge, or Indigenous science, is ‘science’ is complex, and is ‘more of a provocation than a research question to be answered’ (n.p.). We share Stewart’s (2023) position that mātauranga Māori and science are perhaps more productively understood as ‘incommensurable forms of knowledge that can’t be measured or compared by the same standard’ (n.p.).

In our role as curriculum advisors in Aotearoa New Zealand, therefore, we have worked to avoid unproductive comparisons between science and mātauranga Māori, but rather view their incommensurability as a ‘source of inventiveness’ (Durie, 2004, p. 1140) and an opportunity for creative and agentic knowledge work. We have done this by positioning mātauranga Māori and science as valuable knowledge systems in their own right. In a report commissioned by the New Zealand Ministry of Education (Hipkins et al., 2022), we outlined four enduring competencies that all students should be able to take away from school as ‘lifeworthy’ outcomes (Perkins, 2014) from their science learning experiences. The first of these enduring competencies is titled ‘Drawing on different knowledge systems’. Table 1 briefly outlines the four facets we developed for this competency. Our current argument predominantly addresses facets 1 and 3. We hope to turn our attention to the other facets in future work.

Table 1. Four facets of ‘Drawing on different knowledge systems’.

Facet 1: Science as a knowledge system	This facet builds on and extends current curriculum thinking about the nature of science, potentially opening up a more expansive and inviting space of thinking, valuing and doing science.
Facet 2; Science as a knowledge system, is historically and socioculturally embedded	This facet acknowledges that knowledge evolves and this evolution is situated within particular societal, technological, and environmental contexts, with their entangled power relations. These insights open up space for consideration of Indigenous and local systems of knowledge
Facet 3: Māturanga Māori as a knowledge system	Māturanga Māori IS a knowledge system, with its own unique features but also all the qualities of knowledge systems in general (see next section) and therefore is deserving of consideration and respect.
Facet 4: Relationship between knowledge systems, worldviews and identity	This facet acknowledges that the ideas we think with influence the way we see the world, and consequently how we see ourselves and our role in the world in relation to these ideas/this knowledge system now and into the future.

We argued that a lifeworthy outcome for science education in the Anthropocene should entail that all young people [in our case, in Aotearoa New Zealand] ‘will know how and when to draw on the contributions and strengths of science, mātauranga Māori, and other cultural-historical ways of knowing nature, to live and ethically and responsibly as possible’ (Hipkins et al., 2022, p. 4). How a ‘knowledge systems’ approach might desettle expectations in school science (Bang et al., 2013) while also providing a practical curriculum solution is the focus of the rest of the paper.

Shifting toward a knowledge systems approach

While the Enduring Competencies paper proposed that a ‘knowledge systems’ approach might help with ongoing development of the science curriculum, early feedback suggested that the very idea of ‘knowledge as a system’ would be unfamiliar to most teachers and was in need of careful definition and explanation. A recent meta-analysis suggested that framing any aspect of the science curriculum in systems terms could help build interdisciplinary competence and enhance understanding of the nature of science (Budak & Ceyhan, 2024). However, the authors also acknowledged that teacher support will likely be needed because many of the concepts and thinking skills involved are unfamiliar. Our hope is that thinking about knowledge as a system can also support deeper understandings of the problematic ‘nature of science’ aspects of the current Aotearoa New Zealand science curriculum (Ministry of Education, 2007), as well as appropriately honouring the mana ōrite imperative.

In their systematic review of research that mentions knowledge systems, Varghese and Crawford (2021) reported that just 3.8% of papers they found were set in the context of education. They also found that ‘Unfortunately, anyone seeking scholarly insight on ‘knowledge systems’ is confronted by a bewildering mass of publications crossing disciplines, theoretical foundations and cultures’ (ibid, p. 1). Nevertheless, their review distilled three main types of knowledge systems deployed in research across the range of disciplines: formal, Indigenous, and local knowledge systems. One of the few education papers mentioned by Varghese and Crawford also proposes three main types of knowledge systems (Aikenhead & Ogawa, 2007). Aikenhead and Ogawa call these ‘Indigenous ways of living in nature … neo-indigenous ways of knowing nature … and Eurocentric sciences’ (ibid, p. 540). Notice that all three are expressed as plurals (i.e. they each encompass multiple knowledge systems, not one unified system) and all three indicate a somewhat different way of understanding and living in the natural world.

Formal knowledge systems, such as science, are ‘made up of agents, practices and institutions that organise the production, transfer and use of knowledge’ (Cornell et al., 2013, p. 61). Hence, they are associated with ‘universities, research institutes, non-government and government organisations. These systems produce knowledge and technology developed through the sciences, social sciences, humanities, the arts, industry and commerce’ (Fazey et al., 2020, p. 5). The knowledge selected for traditional school curricula is typically a product of these types of formal knowledge systems.

Indigenous and local knowledge systems are often conflated in research and governance/policy contexts. The following is a typical definition:

Indigenous and local knowledge systems are understood to be dynamic bodies of integrated, holistic, social and ecological understandings, know-hows, practices and beliefs pertaining to the relationship of living beings, including people, with one another and with their environment. Indigenous and local knowledge is grounded in territory, is highly diverse and is continuously evolving through the interaction of experiences, skills, innovations and different types of wisdom expressed in multiple ways (written, oral, visual, tacit, practical and scientific). (IPBES, n.d.)

Note that wisdom about how to act appropriately in the world is a defining feature of Indigenous knowledge systems that is absent from the sciences (Fazey et al., 2020; Aikenhead & Ogawa, 2007). Indigenous knowledge systems are a way of life: enactment of knowledge is integral to the overall system (Henri et al., 2021). A potential objection to the use of the term system is that it implies a noun in Western thought whereas Indigenous knowledge systems are ‘verb-based’ (Aikenhead & Ogawa, 2007, p. 554). Varghese and Crawford specifically identify mātauranga Māori as ‘one cohesive Indigenous worldview that includes knowledge system structure and function associated with the Indigenous Nations of Aotearoa-New Zealand’ (p. 4, italics in the original). They also note that mātauranga Māori scholarship exemplifies the evolutionary nature of Indigenous knowledge systems, as outlined in the definition above. This is an important point to emphasise. We do not view Indigenous knowledge as a static and neutral body of knowledge, just as we are not viewing science as static and neutral. The idea that mātauranga Māori is entrenched in the past is yet another relic of colonisation that would position it as a ‘pre-contact’ knowledge system. We agree with Stewart (2023) that it is more a philosophy, with a past, a present, and a future.

We found it difficult to pin down what was meant by a ‘local knowledge system’ without getting entangled in definitions of both formal and Indigenous systems, since both of these also have local elements. The distinction made by Aikenhead and Ogawa between living in nature (Indigenous), knowing nature (neo-indigenous), and knowing about nature (science) came closest to a specifically elaborated distinction. Although they do not use the term ‘local knowledge system’, the sense of ‘knowing nature’ in a distinct local way seems to come closest to what other researchers are describing. For example Mustonen et al. (2022) define local knowledge as ‘the understandings and skills developed by individuals and populations, specific to the places where they live’ (p. In 2715). There are ‘almost unaccountable’ numbers of variants of local knowledge because it can exist anywhere, including in ‘metropolises, cities, towns, and rural aggregations of non-Indigenous (European colonial and subsequent immigrant) people’ (Varghese & Crawford, 2021, p. 2).

After considerable debate we arrived at the insight that ‘knowledge as system’ is a metaphor that is typically applied at macro-levels, i.e. to formal and Indigenous knowledge systems that demonstrate variants of a shared range of epistemological processes (Aikenhead and Ogawa list empiricism, rationality, dynamic evolution), albeit with distinct ontologies. However the metaphor can also be applied at meso- and micro-levels. At these levels local knowledge becomes more visible, including within both Indigenous knowledge systems and science. Yunkaporta and McGinty (2009), in their place-based theoretical model for reclaiming Aboriginal knowledge in mainstream curricula, illustrate how traditional local knowledges, contemporary local knowledges, and non-local knowledges (science, for example) can come together as a dynamic interface of knowledge systems (see also Durie, 2004). Within the overall mātauranga Māori knowledge system, making meso-level distinctions helps to account for the challenge that ‘local’ can be understood in two quite distinct senses. Most obviously, it can refer to where one lives. Less obviously, Māori iwi and hapu [names for extended families and larger local collectives] value those local variants of knowledge that originated in the place they ‘whakapapa’ to. Whakapapa is itself a transcendent concept because it is understood and applied in very similar ways across the whole body of knowledge known as mātauranga Māori. Whakapapa represents a deeply relational onto-epistemological (and spiritual-metaphysical) stance that is characteristic of other Indigenous knowledge systems. As Durie (2004) pointed out:

According to Vine Deloria, ‘Most tribes were reluctant to surrender their homelands to the whites because they knew that their ancestors were still spiritually alive on the land.’ His comments underlie the link between the physical and social environments but also emphasize the significance of resources as collective and intergenerational, and the importance of land for wellbeing. Similarly the basis for knowledge creation is the dynamic relationships that arise from the interaction of people with the environment, generations with each other, and social and physical relationships. (p. 1139)

At the micro level, each of us has a personal science, which may draw from more than one knowledge system without the holder necessarily being aware of this (Ogawa, 1995) and is likely to include values, beliefs and explanations held in common with other members of our family group.

Returning for the moment to local elements within the sciences, Cornell et al. (2013) assert that ‘local actors, institutions and networks’ play significant roles (p. 61). They note that science in society researchers focus on these extended networks of actors, and that relationships between them ‘shape the flows of knowledge, credibility and power within those systems’ (p. 61). Along similar lines, Turnbull (2008) notes that the concept of local knowledge has become increasingly visible in studies that explore the sociology of science knowledge, and that a consistent finding in this field is that the authority of new science knowledge claims is underpinned by local negotiations and judgements made in particular contexts. Turnbull further suggests that an awareness of this localness is a necessary precondition for making cross-cultural comparisons of knowledge systems.

A study on knowledge systems by Fazey et al. (2020) represents the cumulative wisdom that emerged from an extensive, highly diverse and collaborative yet formally framed research process. They proposed that all knowledge systems ‘include the practices, routines, structures, mindsets, values and cultures affecting what and how knowledge is produced and used, and by whom’ (Fazey et al., 2020, p. 5). The final model, developed by 300 + participants, argues that we need to rapidly evolve an emergent knowledge system that generates new types of narratives for people to draw on as they adjust to the challenges posed by the Anthropocene. The shifts required would include: from knowledge-focused to wisdom-focused; from science-for-science to science-for-all; from fragmented and disconnected to interconnected and inter-related; from globalised knowledge to both globalised and local knowledge. These are just four of fourteen shifts outlined in the paper by Fazey and collaborators. We chose them for their immediate relevance to shifts in thinking needed in science education, pointing as they do to the important contribution that mātauranga Māori could make to a reconceived curriculum subject that includes both Indigenous knowledge and science knowledge, each on their own terms. We now turn to the role a multiple knowledge systems approach to science curriculum can play in the development of children and young people’s epistemic agency.

Multiple knowledge systems and epistemic agency

We imagine that the idea of a multiple knowledge systems approach appears to echo earlier calls for multicultural science education, and there are certainly some points of resonance here. In the 1990s and early 2000s, it was argued that culturally responsive science pedagogies such as border crossing could build bridges between Indigenous students’ worldviews, or lifeworlds, and school science (Aikenhead, 1996; Snively & Corsiglia, 2001). We acknowledge that the concept of border crossing was a vivid metaphor, and one that was likely quite useful for science teachers at the time. A problem, however, that we and others over the years have identified over the years with such metaphors is that they can position ‘cultural’ identities as fixed, and as such carry with them the danger of reifying that which they intend to destabilise. As Lyn Carter (2006) has argued, there is a persistent Eurocentrism inherent in comparisons and multiculturalisms which are grounded in ‘stable and unitary ideas of nation, culture, identity … and difference’ (pp. 680–681). Furthermore, our argument is rooted in theories of epistemic, rather than cultural, diversity. Like Andreotti and colleagues (2011), rather than crossing cultural borders, we support an epistemological pluralism that ‘emphasises the provisional, propositional, equivocal, and tentative nature of knowledge production, which enables the possibility of the emergence of different forms of dialogue’ (p. 44). How epistemic pluralism in the science curriculum can support the ‘emergence of different forms of dialogue’ is what we turn to next.

Epistemic agency, broadly conceptualised as how students take ‘responsibility for shaping the knowledge and practice’ within science classrooms (Stroupe, 2014, p. 488), has become an increasing focus of science education scholarship over the past decade. Stroupe (2014) argued that recent reform toward ‘science-as-practice’ (e.g. Next Generation Science Standards [NGSS] in the United States) requires students to ‘take on a new role as epistemic agents’ in science classrooms (p. 488). However, an ongoing challenge remains in terms of how and the extent to which these reforms actually support epistemic agency. Miller and colleagues (2018), for example, raise important questions regarding whose ideas and contributions determine and shape the parameters of knowledge and knowledge building activities in science classrooms. They point out that curriculum and standards reforms such as NGSS still have the potential to position students as ‘receivers’ of knowledge, even while students perceive themselves as epistemic agents in practice-oriented classrooms. Ko and Krist (2019) similarly highlight tensions between epistemic agency and the limitations of standards/ curriculum ‘that have been developed with specific learning targets in mind’ (p. 980). Gilbert (2023) points out that science education which focuses

‘on the epistemic aspects of science – that is, its products and/or the way scientists work together as scientists – is useful if our purpose is to reproduce these aspects of science, to enculturate or discipline students into the discipline as it is now’ (p. 15, emphasis in original).

She argues that if our goal for science education in the Anthropocene, however, ‘is to build the capacity for change and/or more complex thinking, then fostering meta-understanding, ideally of multiple contexts, seems to me to be a productive strategy’ (p. 15). Epistemic agency requires creative and critical knowledge work as well as empathy, and must become the focus of science education, particularly in today’s hyperconnected world (Zhang et al., 2022).

Though the nomenclature of epistemic agency has emerged more recently in science education literature, the concepts behind it have been the subject of science education research for several decades, but not always referenced as such (Rodríguez, 2008). For example, Calabrese Barton (1998) reported how homeless children de-centered and re-created science through their lived experiences, as they re-directed the focus of inquiries (e.g. co-constructing a unit on pollution in their neighbourhood; or, experimenting with food making) put to them during informal learning activities at the shelter where they lived: ‘The knowledge the children at the shelter constructed about science was not linked only to science but also to other areas of their lives,’ such as ‘food, hunger, play and relationships’ (p. 389). Seiler (2001) pointed out that, despite the ‘science for all’ rhetoric of the 1990s, curriculum and standards reform often re-inscribed persistent inequities: ‘That all students must have access to science has been interpreted by many educators to mean that students must be enculturated into the ways of being of mainstream science and learn the dominant discourse and rules of participation’ (Seiler, 2001, pp. 1003–1004). The current shift to practice-oriented science education – in the absence of a multiple knowledge systems framing – echoes these discourses of enculturation. Seiler, at the time a high school science teacher, organised a science lunch group in order to transcend the limitations of the dominant science standards and curriculum. During the lunch group, eight African American male students met weekly ‘to eat lunch, talk about their lives, and talk about and do science-related activities’ (p. 1006). In this space, the students were positioned as experts who participated in science emerging from their lived experiences and collaboratively constructed knowledge that mattered to them. Seiler concluded that ‘student-emergent science may be a potent way to challenge norms and practices in science education’ (p. 1012).

In Aotearoa New Zealand, there have also been multiple initiatives over the recent past designed to facilitate student- and community-emergent science in a ‘dynamic interface’ (Durie, 2004) with professional and university-based scientists (Bolstad et al., 2013). In a multiple case study of five such initiatives across the country, Bolstad et al. (2013) pointed to how each project supported opportunities for knowledge exchange, access to resources, and identity development across these diverse sectors (schools, communities, universities, iwi). The collaborative initiatives also supported deeper changes, including multiple interactions with other knowledge domains, and curricular changes that allowed

learners, teachers and scientists [to] engage together in science-related learning and activities that [were] of immediate relevance and important to the local community or wider society – for example, addressing issues related to community health, local environments, local or nationally relevant sustainability issues, or other twenty-first century ‘wicked problems’ (p. 26, emphasis in original).

For example, one of the case studies, Science Wānanga, emerged from community concerns on the East Coast of the North Island about coastal oil exploration by private oil companies. The Science Wānanga program was organised around these and other student- and community-initiated concerns, ‘bringing together science and mātauranga Māori in ways that acknowledge[d] the knowledge, understanding, and skills of all of the individuals involved’ (Bolstad et al., 2013, p. 76). The wānanga, which were held on local marae, brought together Māori students and their teachers with scientists and graduate science students who had expertise and resources to address the science-related aspects of student- and community-identified topics and concerns. Students who participated commented that, in comparison to other, less fluid, science learning experiences based on unit standards, the Science Wānanga program allowed participants to ask and explore ‘big questions’ of interest, and draw from multiple knowledge resources – including of their families, their ancestors, and their own.

These international and local examples resonate with more recent work demonstrating how drawing from multiple cultural-historical and local knowledges has the potential to desettle science classrooms and support students’ epistemic agency through multilogical, multiperspectival sensemaking (Warren et al., 2020).

Science education research in the area of epistemic agency has been predominantly focused on how teachers can enhance opportunities for students to enact epistemic agency in science classrooms, often despite the limitations of standards/curriculum frameworks. We are interested in how the curriculum framework itself might be designed as an opportunity – or at least, an enabling constraint – for enhancing teachers’ and students’ epistemic agency in science education. Fortunately, in Aotearoa New Zealand (for now, at least), the national curriculum framework is intentionally ‘loose,’ and designed to allow teachers the flexibility and autonomy needed for the development of a local curriculum, in collaboration with their school and local communities. We see great value in that approach, and its provision for teacher agency and professionalism. At the same time, we are conscious that only some science teachers take up the agency that is potentially available to them. And, the science learning area of the New Zealand Curriculum in its current form (Ministry of Education, 2007) is still largely organised around canonical science ideas and practices. In this context, many teachers continue to enact a traditional curriculum that leaves little or no room for students’ epistemic agency. A multiple knowledge systems approach could be a critical next step for curriculum reform, particularly in the context of the current refresh of the national curriculum framework, because it would require teachers who have yet to begin a transformative curriculum journey to now do so.

Conclusion

For us, a knowledge systems approach emerges in response to (1) the multidimensional challenges of the Anthropocene which require a radical reset for science education (as we have laid out in the introduction), and (2) the multiple Māori-led initiatives that have been guiding Aotearoa New Zealand toward more decolonial futures through education (as we have also described in earlier sections of this article). Many knowledge interfaces already exist in science education, such as between virtual and physical dimensions of learning, local knowledges and non-local knowledges, contemporary and historical knowledge contexts, personal/family experience and school science experience, and so on (Kim, 2023). However, as Durie (2004) explained,

Systems of knowledge that do not subscribe to scientific principles are afforded lesser status and, if given any recognition at all, run the risk of being rationalized according to scientific principles. While not totally discounted as irrelevant, the non-science knowledge base may be scientifically unbundled and manipulated to coincide with science, even if it is thereby rendered meaningless because it is out of context with other components of the parent knowledge system. (p. 1140)

A multiple knowledge systems approach to science curriculum reform renders valuable and visible non-dominant knowledge systems and meaning-making practices (Bang et al., 2013).

We recognise that while we have primarily focused our discussion on epistemology, there are important axiological and ontological dimensions of the conversation yet to be addressed. We have at times used the term onto-epistemic to represent the deeply entangled nature of ‘knowing’ and ‘being,’ particularly from within Indigenous knowledge systems like mātauranga Māori. Yet, a more extensive and nuanced engagement with the interconnected nature of knowing/being/feeling is in order (Chesky & Wolfmeyer, 2015; Krishnamoorthy & Tolbert, 2022; McDaid-Barry et al., 2023). We also want to acknowledge here that there has been extensive theoretical work in the area of epistemological pluralism, particularly within decolonial, postcolonial, and feminist science scholarship. On these particular issues, we view the space within which we are working and writing as a liminal space between the deep theoretical work and the practical work – we are strongly connected to both, and in our role as curriculum advisors we see ourselves as translators of new ideas into a form in which they can be taken up by others in active curriculum making. Teachers and schools need a certain level of freedom, and epistemic agency, to build a local curriculum that is responsive to these multiple local and non-local knowledges. Both curriculum and assessment structures are implicated in this precondition. Curriculum and assessment frameworks and policies must afford teachers the creative space to build a local curriculum that brings together multiple knowledge systems, supporting the inventiveness, empathy, and (onto)epistemic agency that is necessary for grappling with socioscientific phenomena in the Anthropocene.

We note that, as individuals over the past several years, and more recently through our process of ‘collective reflection,’ our ideas continue to change, grow, and evolve. Together, we are also thinking and reflecting in a dynamic interface, as Māori and non-Māori science educators, bringing to bear our own unique experiences, relationships, histories, and knowledges to the challenge of conceptualising, and maintaining, a dynamic open and epistemologically diverse position. This is an ongoing project for ourselves, for curriculum developers, and for the teaching profession. We recognise that school science/science education can be a last bastion of positivism (Aikenhead & Ogawa, 2007) – and we have come to understand the interface as an area where multiple knowledge systems, always alive and evolving, are in an ongoing process of dialogue, and desettling.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Vision for Young People on Vimeo – Ministry of Education.

2 https://aotearoahistories.education.govt.nz/

3 https://ncea.education.govt.nz/toolkit-1-te-tuapapa-o-te-mana-orite-foundations-equal-status

4 See also https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2023/03/02/richard-dawkins-touts-science-above-Indigenous-ways-of-knowing-in-new-zealand/#