Examining the Affordances of Engineering and Curricular Supports for Learning Among Emerging Bilingual Elementary Afterschool Students

ABSTRACT Engineering design provides students with unique opportunities to engage with disciplinary knowledge and practices by engaging with technologies and each other through the design process. In this paper, we identify how the co‐construction of an engineering afterschool club culture supported students’ engagement in epistemic practices of engineering. This study draws from educational ethnography and discourse analysis to examine the interactional accomplishment of engineering by upper elementary (age 10–12), bilingual students in Puerto Rico as they designed and tested rescue shuttle technologies. Findings describe the emergence of a culture that values bilingualism and caring for others as central to the engineering practices, which were supported by key discourse moves. Collectively, the components of the engineering club provided opportunities to open up engineering in ways that valued students’ agency and identities as they engaged with epistemic practices of engineering. The local, academic culture valuing language diversity, kindness, and learning worked against epistemic injustices often found in educational settings.