As we have seen each week in our readings, there are many views, positions, and studies on how learning takes place. I have discovered that researchers in this field seemingly align with one of three overarching theories: behaviorism, cognitive development and sociocultural. However, some of the views within each framework overlap as well as, crosscut. With that said, this week’s articles brought together the larger pieces of the frameworks and filled in some of the smaller spaces on how they apply to strategies, goals, and activities in the classroom. Extracting these strategies and their applicability to teaching is helping me to formulate ideas about teaching physics to high school students. I will highlight the information from each article that stood out to me and which I believe will shape my strategies, goals, and activities in my classroom.
First from Constructing Scientific Knowledge in the Classroom, the excerpt of the teacher’s interaction with students really resonated with me. Here, there are examples of scaffolding and teacher support that illustrate ways in which the students attach personal meanings in the social context of the classroom. Interestingly, one of the experiences unfolding for the students was about air pressure. This example was very much similar to my first lesson at PFMS which involved similar concepts. Unlike the expert in the article’s scenario, I was myself, a new comer to engaging students. “The teacher had carefully engaged students in activities and discourse to support them in constructing the science view, and yet we see students experiencing real difficulties in making those science models meaningful and appropriating them for themselves” (Driver, pp. 11). As a novice, I do not think I was able to engage students in discourse enough for them to gain an understanding of the experience. I do believe however, that these real-life teaching lessons are helping me to better understand my role as the teacher, which is essential if my students are going “adopt scientific ways of knowing” (Driver, pp. 11).
Secondly, I see teaching as learning process for both me and for the students. In the article Distributed expertise in the classroom, two forms of collaborative learning are discussed: reciprocal teaching and the jigsaw method. I believe that reciprocal teaching brings together several other research ideas that we have discussed and as such, I found it to be information helpful in shaping my teaching. “Reciprocal teaching was deliberately designed to evoke zones of proximal development within which novices could take on increasing responsibility for more expert roles” (Brown, pp. 196). Further, the authenticity of the task is maintained and remains the same allowing for consistency of the goal and desired outcome. “There is little room for confusion about the point of the activity” (Brown, pp. 196). Next is the jigsaw method, which is a collaborative learning structure I plan on incorporating into my next lesson at PFMS. This uses small groups in which research on a part of a classroom topic is done by the students, and then they teach it to others. “All children in a learning group are experts on one part of the material, teach it to others, and prepare questions for the test that all will take on the complete unit” (Brown, pp. 197).
The third article Beyond Cold Conceptual Change: The Role of Motivational Beliefs and Classroom Contextual Factors in the Process of Conceptual Change introduced me to the ideas of motivational constructs and how the characteristics of the classroom context can influence both student motivation and cognition. The authors believe that students’ motivational beliefs specific to choosing to do a task and then the ability to perform the task are key components within the context of the classroom. Their information more detailed, outlined the following beliefs and process of conceptual change: interest and value, self-efficacy, and control. Unlike the other concerns and proposed remedies of the article, motivational orientations were a factor in learning I had not considered in my teaching. To this end, I believe we are using AST and other strategies to restructure the classroom and ideally schools to “foster the development of a community of intentional, motivated, and thoughtful learners” (Pintrich, pp. 193).