Robert Lecusay

CV

Website

PhD. Candidate , Department of Communication, University of California, San Diego

M.A. Communication, University of California, San Diego

B.A. Cognitive Science, New College of Florida.

The relationship among communication, culture and human development; communication as cognition; intersubjectivity in instruction; the critical design and implementation of “informal” science learning environments. I am a member of the Laboratory of Comparative Human Cognition were I have collaborated on a variety of projects examining the relationship between symbolic play among adults and children, and it’s relationship to learning and development. I have engaged in this work in a variety of settings (see Playworlds, La Clase Magica, The Fifth Dimension). For my dissertation I am pursuing a case study of the development and implementation of a physics telementoring activity in an after-school learning center. I combine meso and micro level analyses to examine both the inter-institutional work required to instantiate this kind of activity and to study the varieties of interaction that emerge among the participants as they engage in the activity. My analyses are based on transcripts, video recordings of participant interactions from multiple perspectives, my own and participant's field notes, and observations of the products embodying participants’ changing understandings of the physics content. I draw on discourse analysis, distributed and embodied cognition approaches, and cultural-historical activity theory as frameworks for producing, organizing and interpreting these materials. For more information on my work, visit my website.