Structures and improvisation for inquiry‐based science instruction: A teacher's adaptation of a model of magnetism activity

Abstract

ABSTRACT:One aspect of scientific inquiry that appears to be particularly challenging to learn is how explanatory models are developed and used in science. It is even more challenging to learn to teach through methods that engage young students in building and using explanatory models. In part, this is because to do so requires that teachers make real-time instructional decisions in response to the ideas that students articulate. In this paper I present an example of a teacher who participated in a series of activities during a professional development course that guided her and her colleagues through the process of developing and revising an explanatory model of magnetic phenomenon. She subsequently transformed this series of activities to use with her elementary school students. Contrasting the series of activities in the elementary classroom to the corresponding professional development activities revealed improvisational instructional acts and shed light on aspects of the classroom context that necessitated and facilitated improvisation. In particular, this paper highlights the multiple pedagogical and disciplinary structures that teachers implicitly chose among when improvising.

The role of scientific modeling criteria in advancing students' explanatory ideas of magnetism

“…In particular, more recently ideas of explanation have focused on articulation of hidden mechanisms underlying observed patterns (Craver, ; Harlow, ; Machamer, Darden, & Craver, ; Russ, Scherr, Hammer, & Mikeska, ). Even if one considers scientific laws as explanatory, there are pragmatic reasons to push further toward explication of hidden mechanisms underlying these patterns, as such explanations “cover a wider range of possible contingencies, afford a greater possibility of control over the phenomenon, and so allow one to answer a greater range of questions about how the phenomenon is dependent on various background conditions and underlying conditions” (Craver, , p. 358).…”

Potential teachers' appropriate and inappropriate application of pedagogical resources in a model‐based physics course: A “knowledge in pieces” perspective on teacher learning

“…Two, PET was developed as a semester‐long course (15 weeks, 60 contact hours) while Physics for Teaching was taught during one quarter (11 weeks, 27.5 contact hours). Three, previous research on PET (Harlow, ) pointed to the need to foreground children's ideas of physics phenomena and to make explicit the decisions used in designing the curriculum if teachers were to learn the pedagogical skills of eliciting students' ideas and designing activities to challenge those ideas. Four, while the nature of learning and the nature of science are important and explicit components of PET, PET's primary goal is the learning of physics content.…”

Problem-Based Learning: Instructor Characteristics, Competencies, and Professional Development

“…The scholarly literature addresses the domain knowledge requirements unique to student-centered learning by distinguishing between two types of instructor knowledge: knowledge of the latest developments in the field and knowledge of methods for translating and applying domain knowledge for learning purposes (aka -pedagogical content knowledge‖), both of which are related to teaching success (Borko & Putnam, 1996;Darling-Hammond, Berry, Haselkorn, & Fideler, 1999). Understanding content knowledge from a teaching perspective enables instructors to model how learners understand the domain (Carpenter, Fennema, & Franke, 1996), and to use this knowledge to select educational opportunities (Fennema, Franke, Carpenter, & Carey, 1993) and to improvise when student responses to classroom activity present -te achable moments‖ (Harlow, 2009). Andragogical content knowledge would seem especially important for facilitating Army student learning, given the wealth and diversity of deployment experience that Soldiers bring to the classroom.…”

“…Informal assessment includes observation of ongoing classroom events or actively questioning students about their thinking during the problem-solving process (Papinczak et al, 2009). To determine whether or how to intervene, it is believed that instructors compare their informal assessments against a situated model of how problem-solving should be conducted (Carpenter, Fennema, & Franke, 1996;Costa & Garmston, 1985;Harlow, 2009;Yinger, 1987; though see Fennema, Franke, Carpenter, & Carey, 1993). This comparison is facilitated by advance planning and requires an understanding of the problem subject matter from a learning standpoint-how students understand the material and bring their experiences to processing it (e.g., Quintana et al, 2004).…”

“…Structures and routines may enable instructors facilitating student-centered learning to improvise in response to student progress (Harlow, 2009;Yinger, 1987). However, it can be challenging to strive for a well-managed learning environment without adopting teaching techniques that directly control the classroom (Cornett, 1990;Papinczak et al, 2009).…”