Summer School - Science teaching

Margaret Meijers’ website is a wealth of practical information and resources about software (mostly freely available) that supports student learning through higher order thinking. It is at www.mindtools.tased.edu.au

Three that are particularly relevant to my 2008 context are

Scratch is a great little program that let’s you apply animation and other functions to an image. Students get immediate feedback on the impact of the parameters that they set. Lots of powerful mathematical understandings are developed in the process of doing this.

Bamzooki http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/bamzooki/ - a bit like a digital version of the old Crazy Critters children’s game but with powerful control available. One of the really neat things about this (and some of the other tools) is the way the modular scripting components lock together like a jigsaw puzzle. This means that students cannot put together illogical sequences (though there is different learning in doing that of course). By building Bamzooki critters, students are learning heaps of maths, science and logical thinking without necessarily being explicitly taught the material.

StarLogoTNG - http://www.mindtools.tased.edu.au/starlogo_tng/default.htm  - this is a neat scripting language.

I am wondering if I could teach a whole Year 7 and/or 8 Mathematics course using these tools. As long as there are plenty of just in time opportunities for specific skill development, and rich visual stimuli around the room, I think it might be do-able. I’d like to test this theory!

I don’t think there was a teacher present who did not have glowing comments to make about the value of the day of ICT workshops provided yesterday. “We’d like more time to play” was the comment heard repeatedly at break time.

The sessions offered were:

• Interactive and Visual Learning with Interactive Whiteboards
• Digital Content what’s available from The Le@rning Federation?
• Simulations and modelling
• Data Handling using Digital Loggers
• Integrated Science with Lego Robotics
• Digital Recording using Handheld Devices (iPod, Podcasting and Video)
• Enhanced Learning with Scientific Software
• Connected Science:Using Social Book Marking, Wikispaces and Google Docs
• Science on Your Phone and Your iPod

For me these sessions offered rich overviews of areas that were either new or not well known. Learning this in the company of a diverse group of other teachers provided an enormous level of added value compared to any other way of coming up to speed in these areas. Whilst my ICT experience, knowledge and skills are extensive, the science context is not as I have only recently returned to science teaching. The immersive nature of the summer school model is very powerful in this respect. 

This morning’s keynote was by Dr Christine Redman from the University of Melbourne and is titled Innovative Integration of Technologies into Meaningful Science Learning Experiences”. Technologies in this context are ICT. She used rich visuals and stories (Pooh Bear, Goldilocks) to convey the issues ie using the familiar but with a twist.

She punctuated her presentation with lots of snippets of actual examples to use in teaching. These are all on the presentation slides which will be on the Summer School website in due course.

Critical Readings/Journal Articles

Holbrook, J. & Rannikmae, M. (2007). The Nature of Science Education for Enhancing Scientific Literacy. International Journal of Science Education, 29 (11), 1347-1362.

Murcia, K. (2006). An evidenced based framework for developing scientific literacy. Proceedings Western Australian Institute for Educational Research Forum 2006.
http://www.waier.org.au/forums/2006/murcia.html

Redman, C. (2006). Harry Potter works magic into science education. Journal of the Royal Australian Chemistry Institute, Jan/Feb, p 14 – 16
http://www.raci.org.au/chemaust/docs/pdf/2006/CiAJan-Feb06p14.pdf

Accepting and Coping with Change (Margaret Meijers)

A reality of using ICT is the constant change and this can be daunting for teachers. It’s actually about change, we are all going to have to change and we need to accept that and get used to it. Although this is a challenge, ICT is also helps us cope - once material is digitised, it is readily re-used and/or modified

Just being digital is not the solution or an end in itself

Just because it’s on a computer, does not make it interesting

How do we inspire others and encourage reluctant teachers

• commonly shared concern
• best to invest energy in the ones who are willing to get involved
• encourage people to take baby steps eg learn one new skill per month in an area of interest
• not about changing your whole way of thinking but changing one bit at a time - otherwise it is too overwhelming
• need to apply adult learning principles by working alongside others and not talking down to them - take time to talk to them and find out their needs
• leverage off any opportunities to fund teacher professional development time
• one of the most powerful forms of professional learning is seeing something in action in the classroom - leaders can invite others in to observe
• important to respect teachers by providing time, space and appropriate goals to learn
• an idea is to make use of the digital natives in the role of tutor

Issue of replacing wet labs with ICT simulations etc

• an international issue
• ICT can help reduce danger and cost
• ICT cannot replace the kinaesthetic and visual experience

Closing comments - Margaret Meijers

• anyone thinking of replacing labs with ICT may not have fully looked into ICT costs
• really exciting times ahead
• only just getting to the stage of there being enough ICT in schools to make a difference
• ICT not a replacement but offers additional and alternative ways in science teaching

Closing comments - Brenda Frisk

• does not have to happen overnight - little steps
• involve students in developing curriculum - when students develop digital artefacts they tend to learn deeply

[Keynote Kirsten is Executive Director at the Challenger Learning Center of Southeastern Connecticut (CLCSECT), USA]

These centres developed out of the Challenger disaster. The families decided to set these up in honor of and dedicated to the  astronauts who lost their lives.

“We believe it all begins with a question - eg How big is big?”

Mission is to inspire the spirit of science, mathematics and exploration - sounds wonderful! From the website,

“The internationally acclaimed Challenger Learning Center Network currently consists of state-of-the-art, innovative educational simulators located in 46 sites across 29 states, Canada, and the United Kingdom.”

http://www.challengersect.org/

Kirsten Hoyt, Executive Director at the Challenger Learning Center of Southeastern Connecticut (CLCSECT), USA

(the plan was to use Adobe Connect but due to technical glitches, Skype is being used for audio from the keynote, with feedback our end being conveyed by text chat)

The introduction went over the  2001 Prensky view of DIgital native/digital immigrant.

Web 2.0 tools to support Multiple Intelligences

Kirsten is mapping Web 2.O and other ICT tools to Multiple Intelligences eg social networking tools for interpersonal intelligence.

References directly relevant to this presentation

Various “twinning” schemes have been mentioned in discussions this week ie matching up scientists with teachers so that scientists can be available either in person or virtually to add real life contexts to student learning. South Australia has its own scientist twinning scheme developed as the brainchild of then “thinker in residence” Dr Susan Greenfield.

 There is also the Australian Government Scientists in Schools  initiative. Jim Peacock, Australia’s chief scientist, highly recommended this scheme when he addressed the group on Wednesday evening. He also said that a register of available scientists and their field of expertise, is in the process of development.

 Some teachers at the summer school have been involved in these schemes and there is a great deal of variation in the specific details of how they operate - in one case the scientist is able to demonstrate experiments that the teacher has described and in another the scientist has worked with the teacher to develop curriculum. The possibilities are endless but the benefits are common:

• students get to see real scientists at work
• an up to date modern context is provided for student learning

This blog has been created for my reflections on the Summer School for Science teachers that I am lucky enough to be attending at Flinders University in South Australia. The Summer School is funded by the Australian Government as one of 5 similar summer schools. It is being attended by 200 science teachers from every state and territory in Australia and from all education systems. My intention is to link this blog to my main blog which focusses on ICT and learning and school leadership.