Inquiry experience

If you ask your students to do any sort of scientific writing in class (ie. lab reports) I suggest the following constructivist activity that worked well in my class to illustrate both the tone and structure of scientific writing.  It takes 1 to 1.5 class periods. Each student is assigned to  read/skimm a paper from scientific journals.  These are readily available through open access journals (just google search).  If you are covering a particular topic (ie. ecology) you can pick ecology related papers and have the added benefit of covering content.  The goal of the assignment is for students to describe the type of information and tone of each section (introduction,methods, etc).  I used a jigsaw approach.  Each student was given a different paper (all related to H1N1) and a specific section to focus on (ie. Methods).  Then everyone assigned the same section (ie. Methods) got together and compared what was similar and different about the information contained in that section of their articles.  Then different sections were grouped (one from each part of the paper, Abstract, Intro…) and they shared information.  Finally, we went over scientific writing as a class and generated a list of typical information contained in each section of a scientific paper.  This was a very successful assignment.  The kids were engaged and came away with a better understanding of scientific writing.

So, semester one is over and with it my Anatomy class.  We finished the flu projects with mixed emotions from the students.  A few of their final projects were truly spectacular.  I’ll try to post two here.  But honestly, I was worn out by them as were the students.  I thought I had walked students through this project in baby steps (and I still believe I did), but I had a revelation when a student received her final project grade (98).  She was delighted and exclaimed ‘That was the hardest thing I have had to do at Westminster!’  My immediate thought was ‘Really???’  In retrospect, I realize that the students were overwhelmed by the newness of what they were asked to do even more so than the work.  While they attributed feeling overwhelmed to the amount of work, on an objective level I think this was only part of the case.  But, it illustrates that students need time to emotionally/intellectually adapt to an open ended inquiry project.  They may feel like tasks are larger than they are.  I suggest breaking projects down into small manageable chunks.  Though, I thought I had done this.  The only idea I am left with is that, if the same students were asked to do a second project, they wouldn’t be as overwhelmed because the unknown element would be removed.

I’m reading Chapter 10 from ‘Designing Project Based Science’  (Polman).  The author describes difficulties students run into when doing web searches.  While his observations were made during the late ’90s, at least part of this resonates with me.  With many inquiry based assignments, students first venture to the web to learn more about topics, but do not always do so efficiently or effectively.  This has me thinking about ways to improve this skill, rather than just setting them free and assuming they have the skill (a trap I have fallen into before).  I’m curious as to whether the 20th century cohort ha discussed this…

Because I want to take the next two weeks to delve more into the immune system and how it relates to the flu, I have decided that the scientific paper will actually be the final exam.  In order to earn an A on this they will have to look at at least one additional new question (the kids will know this).  So, they could compare the school data to Georgia data, google trends data, or even ask a new question about the school data.

To prepare them for writing this assignment, I have printed 10+ research papers related to the flu.  Instead of telling them what goes into each section of a scientific paper, they are going to figure it out in a jigsaw approach.  Students will be assigned to groups of three.  Each group will be given ONE section to focus on (Abstract, Intro, Methods, Results, Discussion).  Comparing their papers they will come up with a list of general topics that are covered in that particular section.  Students will then be regrouped so that there is one person from each different section together sharing information on what is included in these parts of a research paper.  From doing this, hopefully they will: 1.  learn more about the flu 2.  learn the parts of a research paper 3.  understand why these formats matter or at least see their relevance in the real world.

As Bob pointed out in his comment, it seems important for me to assess the students on what they have learned on the flu wiki and allow them time to reflect, and pull the various ideas together.

My idea is that they will each write a scientific paper (due before Thanksgiving) in which they answer the study question:  Was there a flu epidemic at Westminster this fall?  They don’t all have to have the same answers and could argue the point either way.  But they will have to complete a final data analysis on their own and justify their answers applying their knowledge of epidemics, viruses, the flu. 

They will write this assignment in standard scientific format: Introduction, Methods, Results and Discussion.

So, this blog is much more a reflection of what I can’t figure out rather than what I have actually accomplished.  In some ways I  feel like I need to step back and understand the goal of our (or my) action research.  Then I could actually design a plan.  What is the goal???  To determine whether a specific inquiry based assignment is effective?  To understand how the kids engage with inquiry based activities?  To understand student experiences with inquiry?  To understand my own (the teacher) experience in designing inquiry curriculum???

The first step in research is to have a clearly defined (and answerable) study question.  This is where I am having a serious mental block.  Honestly, I just don’t have that question.  Maybe it will help to hear yours.  I know I want to integrate more inquiry into the classroom and am working to design such curriculum.  BUT, that is an entirely different goal from action research of the curriculum.  Maybe the problem is that I don’t yet have the ‘product’ to test. 

Maybe there are two approaches.  1.  You could ask a question and then design a piece of your curriculum to then use to answer that question. 2. You could design a piece of curriculum and then ask a question about that.

From a scientific standpoint, perhaps I could argue I am in a hypothesis generating stage.  The stage before research… learning, more exploring, but no specific refined questions.

That being said… in an attempt to complete some aspect of the assignment I did ask my students a few questions about the flu wiki we are building.  I haven’t had time to look at the answers in detail.  One question asked whether the kids had read news articles about the flu outside of this assignment.  I was interested in whether this open ended assignment had generated a curiosity to learn  more beyound the classroom.  The responses were mixed.  That being said I have no comparison… in a ‘regular’ biology class do students read related news stories on their own accord?

Within the context of this question is the added difficulty that the seniors seem over burdened with work and college applications, so they claim to have no time to do anything extra (of course I am sure they have time to check facebook).

More later…

I love the concept of a systemic graded approach to inquiry (which is age appropriate) offered by Audet and Jordan on pg. 51.  The problem is what do do with high school kids that have not had the experiences they suggest in grades K-4 and 4-8.  I can imagine a scenario where we could do spectacular inquiry based work in science with kids who had built observational skills in elementary school, and who in middle school delved into the difference between evidence and an explanation.  But, I frequently wonder how to handle all of these concepts in a class of 11th or 12th graders that have not had the benefit of these prior experiences.  It is in some ways starting from scratch.  I can see an approach where I might focus on the base-line skills (even simple observations) at the beginning of the semester and build up to more open ended inquiry at the end of the semester.  In some ways, I do this now, but I need to be much more intentional and structured about it.

I just completed the survey we were given to determine how much inquiry based learning (teaching?) we are using in the classroom.  I am continually struck by the lack of educational jargon that I am familiar with.  I don’t know what formative assessment is.  I don’t know what summative assessment is.  Maybe I use it, but don’t call it that… hmmm… One more thing to read up on.  Anyway, most of my responses are on the high end of inquiry based learning (3′s and 4′s), but it is largely lesson dependent.  For example, sometimes I lecture before student exploration.  Sometimes I lecture after student exploration.  As an example, we do an in depth lab comparing different tissue types in Anatomy.  Last year I ran the lab before lecturing, in theory so that the kids would be more actively engaged in determining the differences between tissues instead of being told the differences.  The kids were frustrated for several reasons.  1.  It is hard to tell the difference between certain tissues 2.  Slides often contain more than one tissue 3. There are often several different ‘variables’ to look for- the shape of the cells, the number of layers… 4.  Real slides don’t always look like the book.  It can make a big difference whether a tissue is sliced longitudinally or cross-sectionally.  And, both might occur on the same slide.  This year I went back to lecturing before doing the lab.  And, I honestly think it is more effecient and effective.  That being said, Audra has designed an inquiry based activity that I think I could adapt as an in-between approach- spending one day to get them to think about general differences (with the most simplistic slides I can find) before I lecture, and before we go on to the different subtypes of tissues.   Thanks Audra!

This week I had a student ask ‘Are you going to lecture soon?’ with a longing look in her eye!  Perhaps I have created a way for students to be excited when I lecture– spend most classes forcing THEM to do the thinking!  Anyway I will be dropping several lectures in over the next week.  This does point to the fact, that while we move to inquiry based classes, it is probably good to keep some familar structure for the kids at least occasionally.

Another innocently, what was the point of the H1N1 wiki.  Would they ultimatel, be responsible for the information that they had posted?  I explained that the H1N1 Wiki more closely mimics the way science is really done, that what they have seen in most of their prior classes… that scientists collect data with an uknown result.  The data is messy, methods may need to be revised allong the way.  Scientists learn background information along the way (even when they have some base knowledge of the subject they are studying).  Scientists create a final product- a journal article.  In our case, the product (for now) is the Wiki.  I think I exhausted her by the time I was done!

In August, the New York Times published a great article entitled ‘For todays graduates one word: Statistics.  The article discusses the importance of statistics in the age of information.  I particularly like the quote “We’re rapidly entering a world where everything can be monitored and measured…  But the big problem is going to be the ability of humans to use, analyze and make sense of the data.”  Understanding data is a fundamental piece of inquiry in science.  Where possible in my curriculum, I am trying to add data that shows the concept we are covering.  For example, in discussing ‘normal’ blood pressure, students can examine actual values from people of various ages, ethnicity and gender and discuss means and variability.  Finding data can prove time consuming, but at least it can be used year after year.