Curriculum philosophy & implications for science teaching & learning

Dewey, John (1951). Experience and Education. New York: The Macmillian Co. Chapters 1-4, 7-8.

Curriculum philosophy & implications for science teaching & learning

Bruner, Jerome (1960). The Process of Education. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.  Read Preface, CHAPTERS 1-4, 6

Continue discussing last week's Dewey.

Writing assignment (less than 1 page single spaced):  You are John Dewey, still alive, and you've written a lengthy book review of Bruner's book.

On your blog, you're posting shorter analysis/commentary about each chapter of Bruner.  Write your blog entry about either chapter 3 or chapter 4 (not both).  Since you're Dewey, you'll give a fair-minded quick summary of the chapter but also your analysis of the ways in which it does and does not reflect/build upon your ideas from Education and Experience.

What is scientific inquiry…

Schwab, J.J. What Do Scientists Do? In Schwab, J.J. (1978). Science, curriculum & liberal

education. Selected Essays.

NRC (2007). Taking Science to School: Learning and Teaching Science in Grades K-8.

National Academies Press: Washington, DC.

Writing assignment:  Schwab makes many fine-grained distinctions about different flavors of "enquiry" that the NRC chapter doesn't make.  Summarize one (or a small set) of those distinctions that are *potentially* relevant to your favorite grade level and science discipline. Then, offer an argument about whether those fine-grained distinctions actually matter for curriculum and instruction.  If you argue that those fine-grained distinctions *do* sometimes play into well-designed instruction, give an example (which need not be an actual lesson you've taught, though it can be).  If you argue that those fine-grained distinctions do *not* sometimes play into well-designed instruction, explain why not.

This is a more complex assignment than previous ones; please let me know if it's not clear.  And remember, you can always propose your own individualized assignment, if something strikes a nerve.

Please let me know if you're interested in leading discussion about these or future readings.

…and how is this often articulated in the classroom?

Given our discussion in class, I think these articles will be a natural follow-on.  I recommend reading the articles in this order:

Rudolph, J. (2005). Epistemology for the Masses: The origins of the “scientific method” in

American Schools. History of Education Quarterly, 45(3), 341-376.

Windschitl, M. (2004). Caught in the cycle of reproducing folk theories of “Inquiry”: How preservice

teachers continue the discourse and practices of an atheoretical scientific

method. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 41(5), 481-512.

Hammer, D. Russ, R., Mikeska, J. Scherr, R. (2008). Identifying inquiry and conceptualizing students’ abilities. With response by Sandoval. In R. Duschl & R. Grandy (Eds). Establishing a Consensus Agenda for K-12 Science Inquiry. Rotterdam, NL: Sense Publishers.

Writing assignment.  Consider this statement from a hypothetical teacher who has read this week's readings:

"OK, OK, I get it, the 'scientific method' doesn't capture all the nuances of how scientists really work and it's highly artificial in some ways.  But I have such limited time to do 'science process' in my classroom that it's simply impossible for me to engage my students in all the nuances of science; and the scientific method is something well-defined that even young students can engage in -- and it is *part* of science, after all.  So, I think the scientific method should still have a central place in the 'science processes' part of my science instruction."

How would you respond?  Using readings from this (and maybe previous) weeks, write an argument for or against the hypothetical teacher's position.  If you argue against the hypothetical teacher's position, be sure to address the valid concerns and constraints the teacher brought up.  If you argue for the teacher's position, be sure to discuss and respond to the most compelling counterarguments that might be offered by the authors of this week's (and/or previous week's) readings.  Of course, you may argue for a "compromise" position; but whatever you do, support your argument partly with ideas from the readings.

Tensions between inquiry goals and other goals

These two articles provide rich descriptions of classroom "inquiry" episodes in which the teacher felt tension between different goals while deciding what to do next.  Please read them in this order:

Ball, D. (1993). With an eye on the Mathematical Horizon: Dilemmas of Teaching Elementary

School Mathematics. The Elementary School Journal, 93(4), 373-397.

Hammer, D. (1997). Discovery Teaching, Discovery Learning. Cognition and Instruction 15(4),

485-529.

WRITING ASSIGNMENT:  Many people have strong reactions to one or both of these articles, so I'd like to encourage you to choose your own writing assignment if you feel you have something you want to say about either one.  Just let me know.  

   If nothing grabs you, here's what you could write about:  Dewey, Bruner, NRC2007,and Windschitl have all presented visions (not fully fleshed out, admittedly) about what science instruction should look like. Pick one of those four authors and summarize their vision of science instruction; then discuss in what ways Hammer's or Ball's classroom episodes are consistent and/or inconsistent with that vision.  For instance, what would Bruner say about Hammer's electrostatics lessons?  What would Dewey say about Ball's "Sean numbers" discussions?  Pick any pairing like that.

Curriculum (in the usual sense of "curriculum") that supports inquiry

Sandoval, W. & Reiser, B.J. (2004). Explanation-Driven Inquiry: Integrating Conceptual and

Epistemic Scaffolds for Scientific Inquiry. Science Education. 88:345 – 372.

Barab, S, Zuiker, S., Warren, S., Hickey, D, Ingram-Goble, A, Kwon, E.J., Kouper, I., Herring,

S.C. (2007). Situationally Embodied Curriculum: Relating Formalism and Context.

Science Education 91:750 – 782.

WRITING ASSIGNMENT:  As always, you can make up your own, but here are two options.  Answer JUST ONE of these, not both.

Option #1:  Both sets of authors say they use "design-based research" principles to iteratively refine their curricula over multiple cycles. But the two articles advance slightly different versions of "design-based research."  First, briefly summarize the similarities and differences between the two versions of design-based research the two articles discuss.  Then, discuss whether those differences are consequential or "just words," using example(s) from the articles to support your argument.

Option #2:  The curricula discussed in both articles incorporate scaffolding to support the students' inquiry, and they discuss their reasons for designing those scaffolds in certain specific ways.  Do these discussions about the scaffolds and the reasons behind them "speak to" people developing non-computer-based curricula, or is this discussion useful mostly for people developing prompts to incorporate into virtual learning environments?

Inquiry and student epistemology

Smith, C.L., Maclin, D., Houghton, C., Hennessey, M.G. (2008). Sixth-Grade Students'

Epistemologies of Science: the Impact of School Science Experiences on Epistemological

Development. Cognition and Instruction, 18(3) 349-422.

Perkins, K., Adams, W., Pollock, S., Finkelstein, N., Wieman, C. (2005).  Correlating student beliefs with student learning using the Colorado Learning Attitudes about Science Survey. In Proceedings of the 2004 Physics Education Research Conference.

WRITING ASSIGNMENT:  The Smith et al. article makes a case that students taught in certain ways can develop much more sophisticated views about the nature of knowledge and knowing in science.  But the article doesn't discuss what scientific concepts the students did or did not learn; and in other articles, Hennessey says that they covered less material than is typically covered in elementary-school science. Using readings from this and prior weeks and your own knowledge from other sources, make a good argument that Hennessey's students will be at a disadvantage when they take high school or college science.  Then make a good argument that Hennessey's students will be at an advantage. Are the arguments reconcilable?

Studying discourse in the Science Classroom

To keep the reading manageable, I'm assigning just one chapter from Lemke's classic book.  Let me summarize a few highlights from chapter 1, so that chapter 2 (assigned) will make sense.  "Triadic Dialogue" (sometimes called "IRE" for Initiation, Response, Evaluation) is a standard discourse pattern in which (i) the teacher asks a Question and students make a Bid to Answer (raising hands, etc.); (ii) A student provides a Response; and (iii) the teacher provides a Evaluation of that response.  Throughout the chapter, Capitalized Nouns usually refer to two kind of things.  One is discourse patterns (activity structures), such as Triadic Dialogue, Student Questioning (student asks question, teacher answers, and student evaluates whether the answer is satisfactory), and Student-Teacher-Debate.  The other is elements of those activity strucures, i.e., Teacher Question as the step 1 of a Triadic Dialogue, Student Challenge as an attempt to initiate a Student-Teacher-Debate, and a Teacher Response  to a Student Challenge or Student Objection.  (There's some subtle difference between a Student Challenge and a Student Objection, but I don't get it, and you don't need to either to understand the point of Lemke's chapter.)  The broader point Lemke is making in the book is how careful analysis of classroom discourse can provide insights into how students are learning science.

Lemke, J. (1991). Talking Science: Language, Learning and Values. NJ: Ablex. Chapter 2: A

Lot of Heat and Not Much Light (pp.28-43).

Kelly, GJ, Chen, C. (2007). The Sound of Music: Constructing Science As Sociocultural

Practices through Oral and Written Discourse. Science Education, 91:750 – 782.

 Writing assignment:  Here are two possibilities.

 Option 1:  Both Lemke and Kelly & Chen lament that features of the classrooms they studied may have hindered students' learning to participate in sophisticated science talk (discourse).  Do Lemke and Kelly agree or disagree about WHY this is the case and HOW teachers/schools could help remedy the problem?  As part of your answer, be sure to say what the two authors would "count" as sophisticated science discourse.

  Option 2:  Most of Lemke's chapter focuses on fine-grained analysis of the moment-to-moment details of a few minutes of discourse in a particular science classroom.  But then, in the final few sections, he starts making broad arguments about power inequities, the fact that science is not "value neutral," discrimination, and so on.  Are these broader arguments separate from his classroom discourse analysis (perhaps to remind readers of the big picture), or are these broader arguments part of the same analysis/argument he's making about the discourse?

Diversity and discourse

A chronological tracing of some developments in this field of study...

Rosebery, A.S., Warren, B., & Conant, F. R. (1992). Appropriating Scientific Discourse: Findings from Language Minority Classrooms. Journal of the Learning Sciences, 2(1), 61-94.

Lee C.D. (1995). A Culturally Based Cognitive Apprenticeship: Teaching African American

High School Students Skills in Literary Interpretation. Reading Research Quarterly,

30(4), 608-631...

Warren, B., Ballenger, C., Ogonowski, M., Rosebery, A.S., Hudicourt-Barnes, J. (2001).

Rethinking diversity in learning science: The logic of everyday sense-making. The

Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 38 (5): 529-552.

No writing assignment this week; work on your partial lit reviews. :)

Diversity in science education, part II

Folks, we're continuing our look at diversity and discourse in science education.

Seiler, G. (2001). Reversing the "standard" direction: Science emerging from the lives of African American students. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 38(9), 1000-1014.

Lee, O., Maerten-Rivera, J., Penfield, R., LeRoy, K, & Secada, W. (2008).  Science achievement of english language learners in urban elementary schools: Results of a first-year professional development intervention.  Journal of Research in Science teaching 45(1), pp. 31-52.

McDermott, R. & Varenne, H. (1995).  Culture "as" Disability.  Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 26(3), pp. 324-348

NO WRITING ASSIGNMENT because I know this is a crazy time of the semester, assignment-wise.  But here are some questions to think about.

1.  Warren et al. distinguished between schools of thought about diverse learners in science: (i) seeing them as having deficits that a  responsible teacher should try to help deal with, vs. (ii) seeing them as having (sometimes culturally- or linguistically-specific) intellectual resources that can be built upon. Where do Seiler and Okhee Lee fit into this scheme?  Or do we need new categories?

2.  Do you think "special education" status helps some students? Explain why, reconciling your ideas with McDermott's.

Assessment

Black, P. J. & Wiliam, B. (1998). Inside the Black Box: Raising Standards Through Classroom Assessment. Phi Delta Kappan, 80(2), 139-147.

Duschl, R.D. & Gitomer, D.H. (1997). Strategies and Challenges to Changing the Focus of Assessment and Instruction in Science Classrooms. Educational Assessment, 4(1), 37-73.

NO ONE-PAGE WRITING ASSIGNMENTS FOR REST OF SEMESTER; please use your writing time on the term paper, the first draft of which is due Dec. 2. 

Teacher Education

OPTIONAL READING ASSIGNMENT

Windschitl, M. (2005). The future of science teacher preparation in America : Where is the

evidence to inform program design and guide responsible policy decisions? Science

Education, 89 (4), 525-534.

In class, we'll mostly work in small groups to give each other feedback on each others' term papers in progress.

Presentations