Monthly Archives: September 2013

Discovery Space

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Discovery Space is an amazing little museum! I visited yesterday for an hour or so, and I was thoroughly impressed. My three favorite exhibits were the Dig It paleontology exhibit, the wind tunnel, and the meteorologist station.

I think I was most attracted to Dig It because I have always LOVED dinosaurs. I actually wanted to be a paleontologist when I grew up throughout elementary school. The station offered little clipboards with a list of things to find in a large basin. The basin was full of fossils and pieces of dinosaur bone, which one would find and then identify using a poster next to the tub. I think the clipboards are a great idea for children because let’s be honest, who doesn’t feel important holding a clipboard?

Next, the wind tunnel station provided various materials with which one would create a little structure and then place it in the wind tunnel to see if it would fly out the top. This station impressed me because it encourages a lot of creativity and then allows children to see immediately the results of their structure. If the model is too heavy, children can revise it and try again until it works.

Last, I loved the idea of the meteorologist exhibit. Children there stand in front of a green screen and make a video clip of them explaining weather as if they were actually on TV. I loved this exhibit because it is so different from many others. Although schools or motivated parents can buy their children science kits, these usually include some sort of chemical reaction or magnets. A meteorology station is entirely different and I doubt children have ever seen the likes of it before. I was excited about the station, and I know elementary-school-me would have been beside herself.

Unfortunately, when I went to Discovery Space there were no children there. I was looking forward to seeing how they interacted with all of the exhibits, but it was just me and my friend playing with the vikings v knights blocks and trying the sit and reach. We enjoyed the airplane simulator and walking around the bat cave a lot. I kept stopping to read all of the scientific explanations behind the exhibit because I think they did a great job at providing a thorough, but not overwhelming description of the science. It was perfect for the purpose of introducing children to science concepts.

Museums and other out-of-school science experiences have the privilege of being in the category of fun. Unlike in school, where children have to go and where they have to learn about a subject, museums are where children go as a treat. When children go to a science museum like Discovery Space, they regard it in the light of a fun thing to do. Hopefully, this allows them to think of science in a fun way, and thus nurture their interest in science. In addition, museums like Discovery Space allow children to learn more about science topics that interest them specifically. If they do not find paleontology interesting, they can simply go to the next station over and learn about trajectories.

Overall, I was extremely impressed with the variety and quality of exhibits at Discovery Space. I envy the children who get to grow up there because I know it would have been one of my favorite places as a child.

What’s Your Evidence? (Chapter 2)

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Chapter two is about the essential components of science learning, and how we, as teachers, can bring that to students. The four key parts of science learning are: claim, evidence, reasoning, and rebuttal.

I think the text does a very good job at explaining the difference among these four ideas. A claim is an answer to the question that sparked the investigation. For example, the question could be: “Why does glass shatter when dropped but a bouncy ball does not?” The claim would be something along the lines of: “Glass shatters when dropped and bouncy balls do not because they are made of different materials.”

Evidence is “scientific data that supports the claim.” Data are observations of the natural world. So, to return to my previous example, one example of evidence for the claim would be that the same amount of the bouncy ball and glass weigh different amounts.

The next piece of science learning is the one I believe to be the glue for all of it. Reasoning provides the underlying logic to the entire investigation and its conclusions. The reasoning for my example would be that the same amount two substances cannot be the same if they weigh differently. This relies on scientific truths, and provides the missing connection between the evidence and the claim.

The last part of science learning is the rebuttal: providing counterexamples and disproving them. The text mentions several times that rebuttals can come across as very confusing for students until they are older. I believe this is because counterexamples are like “anti-logic.” It is demonstrating why something does not make sense (revealing missing logic) rather than explaining why it does make sense (highlighting the connection). A rebuttal for my example would be a student stating: “Some people may think that bouncy balls and glass are made of the same materials because they are similar in size, but size does not indicate any other similarity, so this is false.”

The section on “Increasing the Complexity of the Framework Over Time” I found very useful. So far in this course, we have placed a lot of emphasis on introducing science to students at a young age. After all, TESLA stands for “Teaching Elementary Science Leadership Academy.” This section clarifies exactly how we can introduce science in a non-intimidating way at first and then work up to a more extensive knowledge of the scientific process over time.

We can apply Chapter 2 to our magnetism experiment. (***I was absent from class when we did the experiment, so I am connecting the reading to what I believe the investigation would be like.***) Since we are all college students and our education has exposed us to science for many years, we are probably all in the Variation 4 range. This means we will have a claim, multiple pieces of evidence, reasoning to connect the evidence with the claim, and a rebuttal. Our claim will answer the questions: “Do magnets have to touch each other to interact?” and “How does the orientation of two magnets affect how they interact?” The section on our papers that reads “Observations and Patterns” is where we are collecting data that we will later use as evidence to support our claim. After we collect our data and state our evidence and claim, we will most likely explain our reasoning (connection) between the evidence and claim. Afterwards, a rebuttal will refute any counterarguments against our claim. 

Children’s Own Ideas

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Harlen begins and ends chapter five with an overview of why, as educators, we should take children’s ideas seriously. One reason he cites is that children’s ideas are “the product of reasoning, and so make sense to the children.” This reminds me of a psychological concept I came across last year in my AP Psychology course. The term is ‘schema:’ “a cognitive framework or concept that helps organize and interpret information” (Cherry, Kendra). Children develop many schema in their early years. For example, a child could have a schema that all animals have four legs. The child draws on what he or she has experienced (perhaps a pet dog or cat) and reasons that the characteristic of having four legs applies to all animals. There is a follow-up to schema called ‘accommodation.’ This is where true learning occurs. Let’s say the child goes to the zoo for the first time and sees a snake. This is an animal, but it does not have four legs. The child must accommodate the new information and create another schema. Hopefully, someone would explain to the child why snakes do not have four legs like other animals, and the child will build upon his knowledge base.

Why is this relevant? Because schema are fundamental to childhood learning. I agree with Harlen that children’s ideas are just as valid as ours. They need to be developed, not replaced. Children have “necessarily limited experience” because of their age, but they work with what they know. They accommodate new information into their worldview. We know how learning occurs in children; now we must base our teaching styles according to that. Instead of simply presenting information and expecting memorization, we should work from the bottom, up. Memorization results in learners only recalling facts, rather than actually understanding the information. If we build on the ideas that children already possess, then they will develop a deeper understanding.

This is especially important in science education, because science follows a similar process. Scientists begin with observation and then build up to inferences and hypotheses. If we teach children from a young age how to observe and then infer and accommodate, we are better equipping them to think scientifically. It is important to pay attention to children’s ideas because they are every bit as real as our own. If we force children to blindly accept facts they do not understand, we cannot expect learning.

Autobiography as a Science Learner

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I grew up in a family where learning was a core component of everyday life. My childhood was a series of museums, art exhibits, and camp programs. My family spent a lot of time going to the Benjamin Franklin Museum in Philadelphia. There, children can explore the inside of a giant human heart, learn how a tornado forms, or discover the physics involved in the solar system. Thanks to the Ben Franklin museum and other institutions like it, I developed an early fascination with science. In elementary school, my brother and I participated in a program called “Science Explorers” in which first through fifth graders could come after school one or two times a week and learn about various topics in science. The instructor was a dynamic and engaging teacher; she made science fun! I remember loving the dissection program I did where we saw the inside of a cow heart. (Now, the same program would probably make me squeamish…)

Unfortunately, somewhere along the way, my love of science waned. I think I can trace it back to my sophomore year of high school. I took Honors Chemistry with a teacher who has a Ph.D. in chemistry. He is very passionate about chemistry, but less enthusiastic about teaching it to people. Chemistry and I did not get along. I worked very hard at it, but overall it was a discouraging experience. After that year, I did not care much about science. It became just a subject that I had to keep taking so colleges would approve of my transcript.

Although I do not consider science my favorite subject, certain topics (such as paleontology and physical science) continue to capture my interest. I know that deep down I still appreciate it. Hopefully, through TESLA, my love of science will reemerge. 🙂