This presentation shares an overview of the the purpose of the R&D workshop, an introduction to inquiry, an introduction to the STEM Student Research Handbook, and two activities that can be used with students to demonstrate the research method by example (rather than lecture).
Implementing Research and Development in High School Classrooms
1. Implementing Research and Development
into the High School Classroom
Welcome…
As you come in, use the
cardstock to make a name plate
Your name and school
July 8, 2013
Illinois State University
WIP-5 Grant
2. Implementing Research and Development
into the High School Classroom
Dr. Darci J. Harland
djharland@ilstu.edu
Twitter: djSTEMmom (#HSresearch)
www.STEMmom.org
July 8, 2013
Illinois State University
WIP-5 Grant
3. Today
Introduction to each other & the workshop
Allison Hennings (Oak Park River Forest)
DTAM Assessment
Allison Hennings
Intro to the STEM Student Research Handbook
AlkaSeltzer Rocket Challenge
6. The Big Picture
Grant Requirements
Lesson
Design
Independent Research Project
Curriculum
Proposal
NGSS
7. To meet these Goals…
Pedagogy of Inquiry Teaching
Resources and time to develop lessons and units
Expert Teachers
Professional Expertise
8. Your Commitment
80 hours of face time during workshop
Efast formative assessment training
4 Follow-up days this school year
To implement lessons developed in workshop
Various Assessment and other state requriements
Summer 2014 2-week workshop
14. A message from a physicist to parents -
Neil DeGrasse Tyson
15. We’ve Got to Be That Light – A Gift to
America’s Teachers: Dr. Jeff Goldstein
(astrophysicist)
Harland, D.J. (April 2, 2012)
“Astrophysicist Challenges Science
Education.” www.STEMmom.org
16. Poke It & See
What Happens
Sound Scientific
Thinking and Practice
Balance
19. What’s our Goal…really?
Raise up the next generation of STEM
professionals.
To help students become scientifically
literate
To be sure that students know how to
define good questions, and how to go
about finding answers to those worthy
questions.
22. Take Away?
Our responses to kids, matter.
Mistakes are crucial to learning
Is my classroom a safe place to fail?
Am I more concerned about students
getting the “right” answer or in how they
think?
24. Written directly to the
student
Geared to high school &
undergraduate students
“Teacher Cues”
Chapter Questions &
Chapter Applications
Sample rubrics
About The
Handbook
Harland, Darci J. (2011). STEM Student
Research Handbook. Arlington: NSTA Press.
25. Poll
What is your experience in doing
research?
A. I did a science project in grade school
B. I did a science project in middle school
C. I did research in high school
D. I did research in college
E. I’ve done several projects through the years
F. I’ve never done a science project
31. Paper Airplane Activity
Make 2 identical paper airplanes
What do we want to test? How will
we measure success?
Modify ONE of your planes in ONE
way.
37. Things That Vary
Gregory, Jess L. (2012). Paper Airplanes, Flying Through Variables In B. P.
Skott & M. Ward (Eds.), Active Learning Exercises for Research Methods in
Social Sciences (pp. 30-36): SAGE Publications, Inc.
39. Alka-Seltzer Rocket Activity
Use any of the available materials to design a rocket that
will propel the greatest monetary value to an elevation of
at least 1 meter above its start location.
41. How might you have
students use the table on
pages 6-8?
Chapter 1
Getting research topics is
often difficult for students.
What can you do to aide
students in coming up
with good research ideas?
What are the most common
ethical issues (pg. 9-11)
your students may
encounter? How will you
ensure they understand the
importance of ethical and
safety issues?
Announcements
42. E-Journal
Our Wiki
What needs to happen in this workshop,
if you are to believe it was worth your
(summer) time and energy?
http://RandDforHS.wikispaces.com
So you have a feel for the topic this evening, here is an outline of what I’ll be talking about. While the topic is specifically implementing student research, I think you’ll find sound teaching philosophy that will help you in just about everything you do as a teacher.
So you have a feel for the topic this evening, here is an outline of what I’ll be talking about. While the topic is specifically implementing student research, I think you’ll find sound teaching philosophy that will help you in just about everything you do as a teacher.
Grant Requirements: Improve teacher content knowledge and student achievement; provide resources online for other teachers to access.Curriculum Proposal: You will design a curriculum plan for implementing student research in what ever context you find yourself.Lesson Design: Design a full-scale lesson (from the ground up) to support student researchers.IRP: Parklands, experiencing a bit of the scientific process.
Ok. At this point I’m going to assume you’re at least willing to entertain the idea that students should be allowed to do scientific inquiry at the highest levels. So let’s move onto the practical aspect of how you might implement student research. The first is to address the scientific method.
There are many ways to describe the spectrum of inquiry levels. One way is to determine the level of inquiry is: WHO poses the question, who plans the procedure, and who formulates the results? My goal in showing you this table is to help you think about curriculum planning. First of all, Look at the Non-inquiry column. Be critical of what labs you have students do. Students don’t come to you with the skills to perform a student-initiated project, you must model them, and teach them periodically throughout the school year.
We have an assumption that High-need Districts also have high #’s of low achievers. And the next assumption is that low achievers lack motivation. But I’d like to caution you, that high achievers also have motivational issues. I actually prefer lack of motivation, because I can light a fire under those kids! What really surprises me, is the misplaced over-eager grade-seeking motivation by the high achievers. To me, this type of motivation is just as problematic our society as The good news is inquiry works for ALL motivational issues!
Ok. At this point I’m going to assume you’re at least willing to entertain the idea that students should be allowed to do scientific inquiry at the highest levels. So let’s move onto the practical aspect of how you might implement student research. The first is to address the scientific method.
Was asked “How do we get more kids to go into STEM careers?” Let kids break stuff. Dr. Tyson says that kids are natural born scientists…its adults who get in the way! Let them play, let them discover. He sees adults as the problem, not kids. While the video is talking about parents, I believe it is true for science teachers as well.
In this photo, my son and I were out on a nature walk. He’s naturally inquisitive, asking great questions. Why is that fallen log all crumbly? Why don’t we see owls flying during the day? And these are great opportunities for us to talk. But as soon as I brought out the lab notebook, he didn’t see it as fun any more. There’s an important balance we must address regarding our attitude toward lab sciences. One one hand, we can do what Dr. Jeff Goldstien recommends, and poke stuff, and see what happens. But we also must be providing an environment in which students are improving their scientific thinking and practice skills.
The beginning of the school year, “Poke it, and see what happens” should outweigh our worries of whether students have sound scientific thinking and practice. If we try and make sure they REALLY understand “constants” they’ll never actually get to do science! We are often our worst enemy here! Our motives are good, but we execute poorly! We need to encourage students to find ways to test their ideas….and allow them to hone their skills and thinking throughout the year.
By the end of the year, we should have moved students closer to the right side of that inquiry table, where they are asking questions, developing sound research designs, analyzing their own data, and are their own worst critic when it comes to finding limitations in their own research.
Remember this chart? Even with all the tweaking of existing labs, leveling how/when we provide structure for students, providing inquisitive environments…all of this gets us to the second highest level, titled, teacher Initiated. And while this is a wonderful accomplishment, one most teacher never achieve, it still isn’t the highest level of inquiry. The Highest Level is Student-Initiated. This is the level where the student comes up with the topic and the question. But, because most courses have certain content that is “covered,” it just isn’t feasible to allow students to study what ever whim they have. Or is it?
Before we begin the dirty work in figuring out how to implement student research into our coursework, I want you to consider the following expert from the movie, “Meet the Robinsons.” In the first scene, Lewis’ enthusiasm for science and inventing is met with an unwelcome result. The second scene shows how in the right environment, kids can blossom and be free to make mistakes.
Ask audience for any comments regarding the video, then share these.
The STEM Student Research Handbook is written directly to the student.Although there is no teacher edition of this text, everything you need to facilitate research with students is found in this book. I have included what I call “teacher cues” throughout the text. These are phrases like, “Your teacher will either ask you to do this, or that.” That way you can take this as your cue to have this discussion with your students. After each chapter there are questions that align with the chapter objectives. You could use these as homework questions or as discussion starters. The Chapter Applications help students take what they just read and apply it to their own research topic. It reminds them what they should be working on. Sample rubrics are included for a research paper, oral presentations, and posters.
….I mean science research, not educational research.
Let’s play word association…when I say “science fair” what comes to mind? I’m here today to talk to you about implementing longer-term student research projects. Although “science fair” is sort of what I’m talking about, I’ll spend my time talking about how to organize students to do their own research. While some of you may have a positive association with science fair, others of you may have been turned off with some aspect of a science fair experience you had in school. I’m asking that you listen with an open mind tonight, and think about the best way to allow your students to experience science as a real scientist does.
Ok. At this point I’m going to assume you’re at least willing to entertain the idea that students should be allowed to do scientific inquiry at the highest levels. So let’s move onto the practical aspect of how you might implement student research. The first is to address the scientific method.
If your first inclination is to teach the scientific method by using a graphic such as this…I am going to ask you to refrain. Provide students with activities that help them see these phases in action. Students don’t need yet another lecture about the scientific method. They need a way to make it real! DO something!
It’s your turn.
Possible ideas to test: flight time, distance, height, aerodynamics, or loops.
Depending on your purposes, you can level this activity to meet your students where they are. In the beginning, you may want students to PLAY, first, and lead them to a conceptual understanding of the scientific design terms, and introduce them after the lab. Could we choose to measure success of the same thing, in more than one way? Qualitative and Quantitative.
I have found that this is the best way to get kids to understand extraneous variables. Its all that stuff that would make the test “not fair.”
Constants are how we address those “cheaters” or extraneous variables. In scientific terms it what we need to pay attention in order to know whether our IV is what is made the change to the DV.
I like to use this lab to introduce mean/median/mode and range, which is descriptive statistical data. Range in particular, leads into great discussion about the reliability of the data set. If a group of trial has a large range, You can find myversion of this lab on my blog, and a free download
This chapter excerpt has three handouts that walks students through the thinking very meticulously. Using this much guidance may be ok for some students, but I find that the more “stuff” they have to write down, the less fun it becomes. And worse the less conceptual understanding students have.
Here is another activity that will show you how you not TEACH the scientific process, but allow students to experience it. Again, depending on your goals, you may want to encourage students to track their progress, writing down observations, predictions, and questions. Maybe even mention a “data table.” This is another activity that allows for some RICH discussion afterward.
Depending on whether you want students to work together or compete against one another, you may want to use that community chart I showed you yesterday. If you want to encourage collaboration, I would set up a scenario where the students in your class are competing against another class. This way have students working in pairs, but also sharing what they’ve learned with other in the class.
….I mean science research, not educational research.
….I mean science research, not educational research.