Get Real! Science

Notes from Methods:

     This week’s reading material and class focused on the key characteristics of effective learning experiences and our seminar project focused on educational philosophies, that of our CT and thoughts on our own.   The class discussion included the fact that constructivism goes back to Dewey but social constructivism is based in collaboration.   Consider the traditional classroom structure and an inquiry classroom with group work and class construction of knowledge – who has the most centrality of practice?   Reference to

• Lave, J. and Wenger, E.  (1991).    Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation.  New York: Cambridge University.

     We watched a video, Minds of Our Own, which can be viewed online at http://www.learner.org/resources/series26.html  

     From a list of classroom activity examples, gleaned from from our blog posts about field observation experiences, we worked in pairs to evaluate whether our assigned example was strong or weak with respect to Social Constructivism and come up with a way to make it better.

    The Kluger-Bell reading which evaluated school science in relation to true science inquiry launched an interesting discussion of authenticity in Middle School and High School classrooms.

<Science Stars – individual group work on planning>

     Worked in pairs on a lab we brought from our field observation to make it better.

 Announcements from Seminar:

• Chris will be attending teacher event at the Cayuga Nature Center on 10/12.
• Open House for teachers at RMSC on 10/6.
• Join one organization, NSTA, STANYS, or ACS (Chem example) as pre-service teacher.
• Join a listserve – College Board has a good one.
• Important:  Can substitute STANYS field trip or a conference day for one reflection activity for Seminar.

Next Week:   I choose Sean to do the post for next week, because he’ll probably be healthy and the rest of us will be sick.

Last but not least, because we all need a little humor, click here.