Week 18 - Seeing the ‘Nature of Science’
Students develop knowledge of the vocabulary, numeric and symbol systems, and conventions of science, and use this knowledge to communicate about their own and others’ ideas.
Using the four lens to reflect on the implications of this - how are representations used to communicate their work? Why is this important?
The Communicating in Science Strand
Reflection:
Cultural lens - Use of technical language can be doubly challenging for learners where 'jargon' can be seen as colonial/ foreign and does not feel like it has any cultural connections for them. This means lessons need sufficient context, scaffolding and support for students to fully engage with.
Classroom teaching lens - The ability to analyse media and recognise when it is suspect is ever more important in a world where there is a daily increase in the amount and apparent validity of dis/mis-information and outright fabrications on the internet. The increasing believability of AI generated text and images makes this even more challenging, and hence important for students to develop these skills.
Light Detectives – a case study
Reflection:
Classroom teaching lens - A brilliant practical model to explore the ideas behind one method of exoplanet identification. And a great way to expand a module on light and move beyond a 'stale textbook/ lecture' style and 'the same old light experiments'. Students obviously covered some very high curriculum-level ideas, but the use of practical modelling made high level ideas far more accessible. It is interesting to see that Science Capabilities were highlighted, although from the article it still feels like Matt was more focused on the curriculum knowledge than the capabilities - it would be interesting to see how explicitly he covered them in his classroom. Also interesting that the article talks quite a bit about student engagement, but does not directly reference 'Engage with Science' as one of the Science Capabilities. My final thought is that the use of a Online Citizen Science websites is great, but also shows students the reality that often you can 'do science' (like planet hunting) for weeks, months or years without getting any positive results - sometimes it can be a real grind, and many people lose interest before achieving successful outcomes.
Leading Science Development - I am in the process of developing a number of teaching resources at University of Canterbury for visiting schools to use in the new UC Rock Garden. Working with staff in the Geology Department, we are planning to offer these to Science Learning Hub,. It is nice to see an example of a previous STLP participant teacher who has 'ploughed that furrow' that can give me a few ideas for formatting!
Indigenous knowledge has value
Reflection:
Reflection:
Classroom teaching lens - a really good analysis of what scientists mean when they refer to models, how they are developed, why they are used and how they can be tested.
Reflection:
Personal learning - interesting to think about how ideas have moved on in the 12 years since the video was made. I think the majority of people are far more aware today of the need for good sleep. Important to stay aware of 'the changing nature of scientific knowledge over time'. Also good to be reminded of the importance of sleep to health and learning (also implications for stuent wellbeing and my Classroom Teaching)
Leading Science Development - the presenter is clearly enthusiastic, highly animated, and uses emotive and engaging language, plus makes use of humour and good visual/ physical supports to his presentation
Reflection:
Visual representations & sense-making of science - link broken
Reflection:
An oldie but a goodie – John Oliver . . . Climate Change
Reflection:
Classroom teaching lens - students are constantly exposed to media 'both-sides' approach - including around the idea that 'the science is settled' or 'scientists are unsure/ debating'. This is one of the reasons that it is important that they understand the 'changing nature of science ideas over time' and also the processes that scientists use to develop, check, modify and recheck their ideas. There is an inherent risk in teaching students to accept what they are taught in class 'because the teacher says so'. This deference to authority is highly susceptible to a new authority figure with 'alternative facts' (or a prime-minister that confidently says he can pay for some other scientists to give him different analysis that he likes). Engaging with the science and critical analysis is therefore key to making good descisions.
Reflection:
Personal learning - I am familiar with some of the very basic aspects of kowhaiwhai, but there was a lot in the video that was new information to me. The 'contextual nature' of their meaning is a further challenge to understanding them.
Cultural lens - Kowhaiwhai are a lot more than 'pretty patterns'! A great deal of meaning can be imbedded in the patterns (and I still have a LOT to learn in this area). There are regional/ hapu/ iwi differences in kowhaiwhai. Even within the video, there are multiple examples of this 'could mean... or ... or ...' - context is key to decoding kowhaiwhai (much like te reo).
Kākahu Pekepeke - Explore all the resources
Reflection:
Thinking about this through the Four Lenses, what are the implications for a participant teacher in the STLP?
Cultural Responsiveness
• What te Ao Māori connections / practices have you seen?
Observations/ implications: te Ao Māori is overflowing with imagery, representations, allegories and parables. The art and imagery used through to the mātauranga and reo are all highly contextual and place based - the reductive nature of English/ New Zealand world views is really unhelpful in trying to treat Māori as a monolithic block, rather than a group of whanau, hapu and iwi with a diverse range of different pūrākau, local mātauranga and reo.
• How might you whakamana (give prestige to / empower) te Ao Māori in this substrand?
Observations/ implications: Pūrākau are a possible 'entry-point' for te Ao/ mātauranga Māori
Personal Learning
• What have you learned so far or been surprised by these clips, readings, resources?
Observations/ implications: I am still growing my knowledge of te reo and mātauranga Māori and different representations that are used. Several clips had some new learning for me.
• What do you need to think or learn more about?
Observations/ implications: I (along with most of New Zealand) am still a fairly short way along the path of learning te reo, but am getting better and growing in confidence. I am familiar with a few pūrākau and examples of mātauranga, but am always keen to learn more, and to find meaningful ways to add them to my teaching.
Classroom Teaching
• What might interpreting representations feel like for students in your classroom when they are unsure of what they are looking at?
Observations/ implications: Easy to feel lost/ overwhelmed - there is a need to both use familiar language and contexts/ models to support their learning AND to develop resilience/ growth-mindset that is open to new representations/ ways of viewing things, so that students do not just 'give up' when presented with representations that they do not instantly recognise or comprehend completely.
• What ideas do you have for explicitly teaching the skills necessary to assess (critique) the meaning and value of science representations?
Observations/ implications: Discussion is a great way to analyse and critique representations and ideas. This is also a great time to 'think out-loud' and role model the process.
Leading Science Development
• What help might your staff need to discover more about the place and importance of
interpreting representations?
Observations/ implications: This is something that secondary Science deals with quite a lot, and so generally staff are pretty mindful of it. We can all benefit from regular reminders however, as it is easy to get caught up in content and the perceived imperative to cover large quantities of material in limited teaching time.
• What help might your staff need to consider more about how to teach interpreting representations in a way that students will be able to transfer to other contexts?
Observations/ implications: The 'holy grail' - transferability... Much of the time in secondary Science we are drawn into racing through 'content' to make sure that students 'know what they need for the assessment'. There has also been an increasing focus on Place Based/ contextual learning. One of the hazards with this approach is that skills that are taught as part of the process may be so integrated with the content/ context/ place that students might not generalise their skills and see how/ when they may be used in other settings. This might be addressed through explicit teaching of specific Science Capabilities - focusing on the how, not the what, and also through sometimes covering skills in a decontextualised manner
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