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Boundary Crossing Learning

Theory · All theories
Evidence · 3 claims (3 for) · 3 studies (3 qualitative), q1–q3 · 1 of 3 report an effect size · 3 claims rest on one study

Description

Boundary crossing (Akkerman & Bakker, 2011; Akkerman & Bruining, 2016) explains learning that happens specifically at points of sociocultural discontinuity — where practices, institutions, or roles differ enough that moving between them requires real interpretive work, not just information transfer. It operates through four dialogical mechanisms: identification (articulating how the practices differ and what each one is), coordination (finding enough mutual, working common ground to cooperate despite the differences), reflection (adopting another practice's perspective on one's own), and transformation (hybridizing elements of both practices into something new). These mechanisms can operate at three nested levels: institutional (between organizations, e.g., a school and a research lab), interpersonal (between individuals or groups, e.g., a domain expert and novices), and intrapersonal (within one person inhabiting multiple roles at once, e.g., a teacher who is simultaneously an authority figure and a co-learner).

A related, complementary construct is the boundary object (Star & Griesemer, 1989): an artifact or concept — a document, a specimen, a shared task — that exists recognizably across multiple social domains while remaining locally flexible enough for each domain to use it differently. A boundary object gives boundary-crossing groups something concrete to identify, coordinate, and reflect around; when it is unusually compelling and mobilizes people across otherwise disconnected networks, Engeström (2007) calls it a runaway object.

Temporal sequencing across nested levels. Akkerman & Bruining's (2016) five-year case study of a school-university partnership found the four mechanisms do not proceed in parallel across the institutional, interpersonal, and intrapersonal levels — they unfold in a rough sequence, and different levels can stall at different mechanisms. In their case: coordination emerged first, simultaneously at all three levels (establishing routines, roles, and information flow); identification followed at the interpersonal level once the practices' differences became salient enough to name; reflection and transformation emerged only later, and only at the interpersonal and intrapersonal levels — the institutional level never reached them within the study's five-year window. The paper also documents a broker paradox: the people positioned at the intersection of practices (brokers) are essential for establishing continuity, but their very centrality can crowd out broader involvement from others, since delegating a bridging role feels like relinquishing the thing that makes the crossing work. Brokers can partially resolve this by deliberately circulating their position to a successor (a school leader handing the facilitator role to a teacher, who later hands meeting-chairing duties to students), which the case found increased the successor's sense of ownership. A further finding: when a design tries to bridge three practices at once (in the case: teaching, teacher education, and research), strengthening the connection between two of them can inadvertently weaken the third — continuity in one direction can produce discontinuity in another.

Implications

Context

  • Applies whenever a design deliberately brings together practices, disciplines, or institutions with different norms, tools, or ways of knowing (art/science/nature, school/research-lab, novice/expert)
  • Most useful for designing or analyzing the interpretive work required to move between practices — not just the fact that a crossing happened

Target Learners

  • Learners and facilitators operating across institutional, disciplinary, or role boundaries, especially where one party (a broker) has prior experience translating between the domains

Target Learning Objectives

  • Building the capacity to identify, coordinate between, reflect on, and productively hybridize different practices' norms and ways of knowing
  • Using a shared boundary object to anchor collaborative meaning-making across otherwise disconnected groups

Claims

  • Cultural-Historical Activity Theory — CHAT's boundary object concept is one of the sources boundary crossing draws on; CHAT emphasizes activity-system structure, while boundary crossing foregrounds the interpretive mechanisms (identification/coordination/reflection/transformation) of the crossing itself
  • Ecological Paradigm of Interdisciplinary Learning — boundary crossing gives a fine-grained account of the interpersonal/institutional mechanisms behind that paradigm's content and organization dilemmas
  • Knowledge Objects and Knowledge Practices — a related but distinct object-centered lens: knowledge objects foreground how an object is collaboratively built and evolves, while boundary objects foreground how one object serves multiple practices at once

Examples

Key Sources

  • Liukkonen, P., Vartiainen, H., Pöllänen, S., & Kokko, S. (2023). Interacting with nature in and through boundary crossing learning: A case of bioart-making. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 32(4-5), 534-572. https://doi.org/10.1080/10508406.2023.2263845
  • Papendieck, A., & Clarke, J. A. (2024). Curiosity to Question: Tracing productive engagement in an interdisciplinary course-based research experience. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 33(2), 323-364. https://doi.org/10.1080/10508406.2024.2347597
  • Akkerman, S., & Bruining, T. (2016). Multilevel boundary crossing in a professional development school partnership. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 25(2), 240-284. https://doi.org/10.1080/10508406.2016.1147448
  • Akkerman, S., & Bakker, A. (2011). Boundary crossing and boundary objects. Review of Educational Research, 81(2), 132-169. https://doi.org/10.3102/0034654311404435
  • Star, S. L., & Griesemer, J. R. (1989). Institutional ecology, "translations," and boundary objects. Social Studies of Science, 19(3), 387-420.
  • Engeström, Y. (2007). From communities of practice to mycorrhizae. In J. Hughes, N. Jewson, & L. Unwin (Eds.), Communities of Practice: Critical Perspectives (pp. 41-54). Routledge.
Page metadata
Field Value
type theory
title Boundary Crossing Learning
description Boundary crossing explains learning that occurs when people move between, or bring into contact, sociocultural practices with different norms, tools, and ways of knowing — mediated by four dialogical mechanisms and, often, a shared boundary object.
status review
canonical True
generated by claude/unspecified on 2026-08-29
trust unverified — no one has confirmed this page's content
sources 3 — liukkonen-et-al-2023, papendieck-clarke-2024, akkerman-bruining-2016

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