developing theory of practice
One of the first collaborative activities that I implemented to engage students in discussion and scientific thinking was a short warm up activity called “Is It a Food?” I used this activity as an introduction to our unit on macromolecules. In this activity, adapted from a worksheet in the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) Press’s 'Uncovering Student Ideas in Science' series of workbooks, students were provided a list of items and asked which they would consider ‘foods’. I used an collaborative instructional strategy known as 'think-pair-share' for this activity: students thought and wrote down ideas individually at first, then discussed their ideas with a partner. Finally, we came back together as a whole class for a larger discussion. Though my classroom mentor and I noted in our post class reflection that some "students expressed 'preferences' rather than 'scientific explanations'" in their discussions, I felt that the class generally came to a somewhat scientific consensus that food is not ‘anything you can eat or consume’ but more specifically a source of nutrients and energy for our bodies. I used student answers and ideas as a jumping off point to explain that all of the foods we eat contain organic macromolecules (carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, nucleic acids), each of which we would discuss in great detail in this unit. I explained that, by the end of the unit, the students would be able to identify which organic macromolecules our bodies use for energy (carbohydrates, lipids) and which organic macromolecules our bodies use as nutrient sources for building the ‘stuff’ that makes up most of our cells (proteins). I wanted students to make the connection between the subject we would be studying in class and students' everyday experiences with food. Though I did not survey the students at the end of this activity, I wonder now how many had thought about and reasoned through this type of question before.
After using this short discussion topic to introduce the new unit, I decided that I would plan at least one discussion topic per unit for the remainder of the school year, as explained in the reflection noted above. Thus, I began the subsequent unit on cells with an activity that I hoped would allow students to engage with biology on a deep rather than superficial level and provide students an opportunity to practice discussing scientific ideas with their peers. To open the unit, students experienced cells from three different viewpoints: a personal perspective on cells from observing Elodea plant cells under the microscope in the classroom, an objective scientific perspective on cells presented by Harvard scientists in a video called Inner Life of the Cell, and a subjective perspective on cells presented by Bill Bryson’s in Chapter 3 of his book “A Short History on Nearly Everything.” As I realized that the conversation about food had somewhat "got away from me" in the "Is it a food activity?" and that students might "need a little more structure to have the type of group, classroom discussions that I am looking to foster," I had students keep track of their thoughts during the cells activity by using a guided worksheet developed by my classroom mentor. Students completed each section of the worksheet independently first; then, in groups of three or four, discussed their ideas.
After using this short discussion topic to introduce the new unit, I decided that I would plan at least one discussion topic per unit for the remainder of the school year, as explained in the reflection noted above. Thus, I began the subsequent unit on cells with an activity that I hoped would allow students to engage with biology on a deep rather than superficial level and provide students an opportunity to practice discussing scientific ideas with their peers. To open the unit, students experienced cells from three different viewpoints: a personal perspective on cells from observing Elodea plant cells under the microscope in the classroom, an objective scientific perspective on cells presented by Harvard scientists in a video called Inner Life of the Cell, and a subjective perspective on cells presented by Bill Bryson’s in Chapter 3 of his book “A Short History on Nearly Everything.” As I realized that the conversation about food had somewhat "got away from me" in the "Is it a food activity?" and that students might "need a little more structure to have the type of group, classroom discussions that I am looking to foster," I had students keep track of their thoughts during the cells activity by using a guided worksheet developed by my classroom mentor. Students completed each section of the worksheet independently first; then, in groups of three or four, discussed their ideas.
Page 3