Epistemic engineering practices regarding the engineering design process for an interdisciplinary discursive community in compulsory schooling

Abstract

This article consists of an epistemological and didactic conceptual reflection on technology education centred on the engineering design process. In order to build a school interdisciplinary discursive community in this field, we invite teachers to teach students six epistemic engineering practices: defining a technical problem, generating and selecting solutions using a systematic and iterative approach, analysing and modelling, experimenting and evaluating, communicating and making decisions. These interdisciplinary discursive practices characterising students’ design thinking are coherent with the sociotechnical practices of reference and play a central role in the development of an authentic technical culture.