Graph-related practices are central to scientific endeavors, and graphing has long been hailed as one of the core "general process skills" that set scientists apart. We use two case studies from a large study among scientists to exemplify our findings that graphing is not a context-independent skill. Rather, scientists' competencies with respect to graph interpretation are highly contextual and are a function of their familiarity with the phenomena to which the graph pertains. If graphing practices are not general but are tied to embodied understandings and familiarity with representation practices, then there are implications for teaching graphing in school mathematics and science settings.
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Our research shows that competent readings are related to understanding of both the phenomena signified and the structure of the signifying domain, familiarity with the conventions relating the two domains, and familiarity with translating between the two domains. Graphs are not significant (signifying!) signs on their own.
Finally, only through the continuous movement between the experiential and expressive domains do we expect students to begin to dissociate the features of the two, which lead, without familiarity in translating, to iconic errors.
To deal with all these issues will require much more than traditional instruction in graphing has allowed for. To read a graph competently, one needs more than instruction on the mechanical aspects of producing graphs. One's extensive interaction with phenomena and representational means seems to be prerequisite for competent graphing practices.