- What
is scientific literacy? Scientific
literacy is the knowledge necessary to negotiate the mangle of
science. Science is complex, and
there are many processes, customs, and terms that govern the “doing” of
science. Once who is scientifically
literate know how and when to apply these many processes, customs, and
terms when investigating a scientific phenomenon.
- What
are the roles of media and representations in scientific literacy? Many scientific advancements
are of interest to the general public.
This can be for many reasons: business, health, consumerism,
etc. Media has the difficult job of
communicating scientific information to others in a clear and informative
way. Different forms of media are
better for different scientific information. Graphs show quantitative data well. Videos
show processes and can animate complex motions. Diagrams show layout and snapshots of
events. All of these different
forms of media are important to scientific literacy. It is not enough to know how to make and
interpret all the different forms of media, one must also know which to
select to communicate optimally. This makes it a difficult task for
educators of scientific literacy because representing science is a very
complex task. Furthermore, scientific
facts can be manipulated by clever representations to trick people, and
understanding media well enough to catch those tricks takes a lot of hard
work.
- What
role will modeling play in your classroom?
Modeling will have a big role
in my classroom. I will be teaching
engineering and physics, so many topics will be ripe for modeling. I intend to use some agent based
modeling program for many of the force and motion concepts. Computer models are a great way for
students to understand the relationship between forces and motion. Computer modeling allows students to
conduct a wide variety of experiments quickly and inexpensively. I really like what the article for this
class said about how the most important thing for modeling is to have
students make connections between the different aspects of a phenomenon
like the graphs, the simulation, and real life. I want to make sure to include those
kind of discussions in my classes next year.
- Questions:
- Can we assemble a list of all
the great modeling online resources / games out there in class? This class’s article mentioned several
of them but are there others we should know about?
- How often should real-world
demonstrations / labs be included to build student trust in the
simulations?
Sunday, April 12, 2015
4/12 Steve: Literacy in the classroom
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I think you mentioned to me the other day that you would be teaching a robotics class at USN next year, right? That seems like a perfect scenario for modeling, too; I don't know to what degree you'll be teaching science curriculum with that (or in another class) but I bet you can do powerful engineering models there as students plan and iterate on different designs.
ReplyDeleteAs for your question on demonstrations/labs and simulations, I think science education should have a mix of both. You don't need to necessarily build "trust" in the simulation, but an awareness for what it allows you to represent, predict, and explain. No model is absolutely perfect to be trusted, but it can be approximate enough to be useful. I think helping your students recognize that should be the aim of including both kinds of activities.
Steve, I also really enjoyed what the article this week had to say about making connections between the different aspects of a phenomena like graphs, the simulation, and real life. As a future physics teacher I think that the SURGE programming tool could be very useful for you. I liked how this approach incorporated kinematics not only in the game itself, but also had students do real world experiments in the classroom and transfer/make revisions to these ideas back in the game.
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