Action Experiments: Are Students Learning Physical Science? ~

Chapter 14

Action Experiments: Are Students Learning Physical Science? Penny J. Gilmer and Paulette Alii

Rationale There is a greal nalional need 10 improve science educalion in the United Stales. as evidenced by how American srudenlS are nOl prepared for the worlcplace in our increasingly lechnological age. The recenl Third Inlemalional Mathemalics and Science Srudy (TIMSS) repon indicales thai eighth grade srudenlS in the Uniled Siaies are ranked in the middle of eighth graders from 41 countries in the sludy (Peak. 1996; Schmidl el al., 1997). while fow1h grade srudenlS in the Uniled Stales rank second of 26 panicipaling countries, only behind Korea (NSTA, 1997). These resulls suggest that we need 10 continue our effons at improving science education countrywide, if we are to achieve number one starus in the world by the year 2000, a goal sel by then President Bush of the Uniled States of America (National Education Goals Panel, 1991).

.

~

.,

Objectives An imponanl approach to reaching this goal is to teach science to leachers. both practicing teachers and prospective teachers who are still in training. There is an amplification effect, when one leaches teachers, as each teacher will interact with 30-150 srudents per day. depending on whether they are leaching in elementary schools, middle schools, or high schools. It is critical 10 leach science in an active way thai is consislent with how people learn, if we are to have an impact on the teaching and learning of our K ·12 srudents. This paper set describes action experiments that are utiliud to leach graduale level physical science 10 practicing elementary scbool teachers.' The idea behind these action experimenlS is 10 gel the teachers in the graduale level class to be srudenlS. asking questions. gathering data. making inferences, and building understandings about !he narural world. If teachers experience learning in this way they can encourage their srudenlS 10 do likewise. Hereafter in this study. the practicing leachers will be called teacher-srudenlS. because they are both teachers of children and graduale studenlS in !heir physical science classroom.

/99

~r.t1nn

"

a P J. Gilmer and P. Alii Action experiments are experiments in which the participants must act or 'move to action'. TIle teachers must become active learners of science. I organized the teacher-students into cooperative groups, and asked them to select action experiments from a series of possible ..periments suggested to them. TIle experiments call upon their experiences from living in the physical world. To learn the concepts of physical science, fancy equipment is not needed. Most experiments utilized supplies that are readily available in their homes. By using materials with which they are familiar, teachers wilJ start to see physical science all around them. It will empower them to use such everyday supplies to teach science to the children in their elementary school classrooms. This paper examines the discourse among teacher-students and between the instructor and the teacher-students, for improving the learning of physical science. This discourse occurs in the classroom, on the worldwide web, through field experiences, and in their writing.

Theoretical underpinnings TIle teacher-students work in collaborative groups (Johnson et aI., 1991), to learn the science content, using the language and discourse of science (Lemke, 1995). TIlere are no lectures given, so the teacher-students must construct their understandings based on their prior lrnowledge and their experiences in the physical science classroom, in their reading of the textbook (Hewitt et aI., 1994), with their web-based learning, and during their field experiences. Constructivism is the primary theoretical underpinning (Glasersfeld, 1989; Tobin, et aI., 1990; Marzano, 1992; Tobin, 1993; Tobin and Tippins, 1993; Brooks and Brooks, 1993; Appleton, 1997).

Methods Data sources include audiotapes and videotapes from the physical science class, dialog journal poslings on the web, postings of action experiments on the web, and visits to teacher-studenl classrooms. I utilized fourth generation evaluation methods in this research study (Guba and Lincoln, 1989). Electricity, magnetism, sound, light, and chemistry were some of the topics included in this course. Simple experiments are selected from several books of basic experiments in physical science (e.g. Churchill et al., 1997; Challoner, 1995; Feldman, 1995). For instance, for the unit on sound, experiments from Churchill et al. (1997) included 'Noisy paper', 'The screamer', TIle tapping finger', 'The listening yardstick', 'TIle strange vibrating bowl', 'Can you tune a fork?', 'Tuning a glass', 'Tune more glasses', and 'Seeing sound waves'. After being alerted to the materials that would be needed in the experiments by the instructor on the website, teacher-students brought their own equipment from home to the class. This encouraged teacher-students to take ownership to their experiments and ideas. For instance, in the unit on sound a group of four teacher-students each brought country-type

200

Action &pen-illS JIIus ical instruments (e.g. wash tub with string anached to make a stringed inslJuJPC"t) to class. and played a song. After singing and playing a song about our c1 .... . they showed how to create different pitches on different types of'instJuments'_ Each day after performing action experiments the cooperative groups shared their learning with the inslJuctor and the other groups in the class. Each group /Cpo!1ed orally on their understandings and learning in the experiments of their choice. Everyone had a chance to contribute to the dialogue and learning. Some\itDCS debates about interpretations of data occurred. There was a five-week field experience after the first three weeks of intensive cJassrOOm experience. This was followed by one additional week of intensive classes, in addition to a teacher-as-researcher week-long conference in the evenings. During the field experience each teacher-student wrote their favorite action experiment 011 the website for all teacher-students to read TIle website postings served as a reminder of what we had done in class and what we Ieamed. This serves as a device to get the teacher-students to use the language of science (Lemke. 1995) to describe their favorite experiment. and to reHeet on the experiments that their fellow teacherstudents have chosen to share with the others. All teacher-students needed to utilize the language of science and share their under.;tandings of the physical world Most of the teacher-students taught summer school during this field experience. so they bad opportunities to test their new understandings and ways to teach physical science with the children in their classrooms. One of the advantages of teaching I group of teacher-students is that you gel feedback very quickly on the quality of the leaming. on what worked and what did not, in the physical science cour.;e designed for the elementary school teachers. Some teacher-students created experiments that went beyond the ones offered to them. One teacher-student demonstrated the Doppler shift in which the frequency of sound is shifted through the motion of the object making the sound or the receiver of the sound. A numher of physical science concepts (i.e. especially frequency and motion) must be understood to explain the Doppler shift. FITS\., a teacher-student learns that sound is a longitudinal wave with compressions and rarefactions with an amplitude and a frequency. TIle teacher-students observe that a wave of compression (i.e. the vibration) moves from one end to the other end of the slinky when a lateral impulse is given to one end of the slinky while the other end is held stationary.

Findings Teacher-students with experience in elementary school teaching. in general. bad linle background in the topic of sound. except for a few wbo have played musical instruments. TIle instructor encouraged the teacher-students to seleet several experiments to do. utilizing their textbook and their prior knowledge to see if they could make sense of sound. Some teacher-students tried an experiment at home. and then brought the materials from home into the classroom to share with their collaborative group. For

201

PJ. Gilmer and P. Alii example. one srudenl. Sabrina (a pseudonym). decided 10 research sound. and learn aboul the Doppler effecl. by recording for berself what a hom sounds like when il approaches a stalionary tape recorder and as it moves away from Ihe tape recorder. Therefore. she did the experiment on her own. and broughl the tape recording to class. It was an impressive recording. Sabrina learned science conlent by preparing this lape. trying 10 make sense of her data. and sharing her results with the olber teacher-students in the class. By Sabrina using the language of science. the instructor could help her with some misconceptions. The instructor could tell that even the teaching assistant, Bruno (a pseudonym). did not have a full understanding of all the concepts on sound and asked him to prepare a similar tape and explain the concept of the Doppler effecl to the second section of graduate level physical science class. The instructor did not help Bruno when he collecled the dala. as he tried 10 make sense of the recording. Below is a transcript from class. There are many misconceptions. embedded within his dialogue: Bruno So. think

about, so think about the slinky, and think aboot you'", standing bcte in the middle of.he slinky. OK. Now. And, and i. sounds .• . OK? So wha.', going.o hit you, first? I mean, just, just, just say, you're going to get hit by two things. What are you going gel hi. by? Compression and then .. and then? Teacher-students [in unison] A rarefaction . . .

'0

Bruno OK. So then you're going to be hit by a compression and a rarefraction [sic1. All

righ., so, when you are hi. by a compression and you're hi. by a rarefractioo [sicl, all right, and you listen to sound. It's very easy, I want to do it, I want to leU you so bad, bUi I know the concept I want to teU you. but I want you to constrUCt it in your mind.

Bruno [continuing] OK, now, say, when I started honking the hom, and it was rea/loud, and then it goes down. and then i~ as i. passes me, i. goes back up. OK. aD righ~ so think about the wave, think about the whole wave. All right, now. think about I'm in the middle of a wave. OK, when iI's loud, do a lot of waves hit me? As opposed EO when the sound, when iI's, iI's down, the pitch is low? Teacher-student

Yeah. Bruno Which way would a lot of waves hit me? Teacher-student When it's up. When it's a compression. Bruno Wen, when will a lot of waves . .. I'm talking about waves now, and the Dwnbe:r of waves? Teacher-student When it's a compression. Bruno OK, so, wen, how is it going to sound? Here [ am, standing. louder, or . ..

202

Action Experimentl T..