Initial Focus on Promoting Scientific Literacy (continued)
Scientific literacy has long-term, real world applications. I approached the investigation of this initial inquiry focus, building scientific literacy as an enduring understanding, through various assignments. For each assignment I focused on building students’ content and procedural knowledge (OECD, 2012). I did this with the use of grade reflections, summaries of news articles, and projects. The first data I will analyze are news articles and guided readings to support students’ development of scientific literacy skills. These assignments focused primarily on building students’ reading skills and the ability to summarize main ideas in their own words from a text.
All news articles and guided readings were specifically designed to reinforce the content that I was currently teaching. The reading level and scaffolding I provided differed between my advanced pre-IB chemistry and ESOL biology classes. In both classes I provided guided readings with pre-reading, guided note taking, and post-reading questions. I also modeled for students how to summarize news articles and how to use guided reading worksheets. I provided time for students to work in class with peers. In addition, during this class time I was available to answer any questions and support their learning. For my chemistry class I assigned guided readings that required them to complete pre-reading, post-reading questions, and a summarization directly from the textbook. The Chapter 9: Section 1 reading guide and Chapter 9: Section 2 reading guide are specific examples of this. The first news article summary I assigned my chemistry students had a guiding question to help focus their summary. This article received additional support with videos and homework assignments that focused on the content. The second news article summary I assigned required students to highlight a specific amount of key sentences and write one paragraph long summary. For my biology students the news articles and guided readings were edited to remove any unnecessary vocabulary, key words in were bold face, definitions for words I anticipated would be difficult for students were provided, and I used very structured post-reading questions to accentuate the key points.
In each of these assignments nearly all students had difficulty summarizing information concisely and in their own words. Even with the use of structured questioning, underlining techniques, and graphic organizers to help guide students to make summaries it was clear that the majority of students struggled with this task. Summaries from my chemistry students in the second news article assignment, contained incomplete sentences and failed to meet the minimum required answer length indicated in the prompt. Few students used their own words. Instead most students constructed disjointed summaries that were only comprised of direct quotes from the article. Another important finding was the difficulty my chemistry students had summarizing key points from the first new article readings on summative assessments. It was clear at this point that students needed additional scaffolding to become proficient at reading and summarizing texts. The above data coupled with the diversity of English proficiency levels in my biology class, made me realize that I was trying to encompass too many factors in my inquiry question. The type of support the majority of my biology students needed was vastly different than my chemistry students. This supported my decision to focus my inquiry specifically on my advanced pre-IB chemistry students. Throughout the rest of this analysis when I mention ‘my students’ or ‘students’, I am referring to my chemistry students, unless otherwise specified.
The next approach I took to building scientific literacy was using projects. This project required students to collect information, analyze and interpret the information, and then present it concisely to their peers. This would incorporate both content and procedural knowledge of scientific literacy (OECD, 2012). The first project students completed was the Element Project. Students were expected to display, in a format of their choosing, specific information about the element they selected and present this information according to the presentation rubric. The project handout and class discussion laid out the very specific expectations for this project for students. The majority of student work for this assignment met all the project requirements. Although my students needed more practice with presenting, overall the majority of students meet nearly all the requirements for the presentation rubric. As I assessed students’ performance I realized there was a need to adjust my expectations for projects to make them more robust learning experiences and means of facilitating the development students’ skills of scientific literacy. These changes are reflected in the next project students were assigned.
The Chemical Reaction Project was the next project my students completed. This was assigned at the beginning of the unit 6. This project was broken into two sections; individual written report and partner presentation. The explicit questions in the project directions handout (Document 1) for the individual section of the project provided students with a structure for collecting concise information, build understanding about their specific reaction, and the implications of this understanding in real world. The rubric (Document 2) provided students with expectations for this assignment. Although I still provided explicit expectations, students were given the freedom to choose what information they wanted to include in their presentation portion of the project. This adjustment to the presentation portion of the assignment served multiple purposes pertaining developing scientific literacy. The ability to select what to include or exclude from information one collects, in order to explain a concept to others in a restricted amount of time, is a skill of being scientific literate. In addition, the collaboration aspect of this project is another skill essential to being a scientifically literate adult. Students needed to work together to discuss, revise, and express information they gathered in an accurate and easy to follow manner. In the everyday world, regardless of education or job experience, the ability to collaborate and express succinct information is valuable. Although each of these skills are critical to developing scientifically literate adults there was still too broad of a focus for my inquiry question. I was overwhelmed trying to develop students’ abilities as researchers, information analyzers, writers, and presenters. Only after I consulted my University supervisor and multiple sources of literature I was able to pinpoint specifically how I would promote student success within and beyond my class in the time I had to work with these students.
All news articles and guided readings were specifically designed to reinforce the content that I was currently teaching. The reading level and scaffolding I provided differed between my advanced pre-IB chemistry and ESOL biology classes. In both classes I provided guided readings with pre-reading, guided note taking, and post-reading questions. I also modeled for students how to summarize news articles and how to use guided reading worksheets. I provided time for students to work in class with peers. In addition, during this class time I was available to answer any questions and support their learning. For my chemistry class I assigned guided readings that required them to complete pre-reading, post-reading questions, and a summarization directly from the textbook. The Chapter 9: Section 1 reading guide and Chapter 9: Section 2 reading guide are specific examples of this. The first news article summary I assigned my chemistry students had a guiding question to help focus their summary. This article received additional support with videos and homework assignments that focused on the content. The second news article summary I assigned required students to highlight a specific amount of key sentences and write one paragraph long summary. For my biology students the news articles and guided readings were edited to remove any unnecessary vocabulary, key words in were bold face, definitions for words I anticipated would be difficult for students were provided, and I used very structured post-reading questions to accentuate the key points.
In each of these assignments nearly all students had difficulty summarizing information concisely and in their own words. Even with the use of structured questioning, underlining techniques, and graphic organizers to help guide students to make summaries it was clear that the majority of students struggled with this task. Summaries from my chemistry students in the second news article assignment, contained incomplete sentences and failed to meet the minimum required answer length indicated in the prompt. Few students used their own words. Instead most students constructed disjointed summaries that were only comprised of direct quotes from the article. Another important finding was the difficulty my chemistry students had summarizing key points from the first new article readings on summative assessments. It was clear at this point that students needed additional scaffolding to become proficient at reading and summarizing texts. The above data coupled with the diversity of English proficiency levels in my biology class, made me realize that I was trying to encompass too many factors in my inquiry question. The type of support the majority of my biology students needed was vastly different than my chemistry students. This supported my decision to focus my inquiry specifically on my advanced pre-IB chemistry students. Throughout the rest of this analysis when I mention ‘my students’ or ‘students’, I am referring to my chemistry students, unless otherwise specified.
The next approach I took to building scientific literacy was using projects. This project required students to collect information, analyze and interpret the information, and then present it concisely to their peers. This would incorporate both content and procedural knowledge of scientific literacy (OECD, 2012). The first project students completed was the Element Project. Students were expected to display, in a format of their choosing, specific information about the element they selected and present this information according to the presentation rubric. The project handout and class discussion laid out the very specific expectations for this project for students. The majority of student work for this assignment met all the project requirements. Although my students needed more practice with presenting, overall the majority of students meet nearly all the requirements for the presentation rubric. As I assessed students’ performance I realized there was a need to adjust my expectations for projects to make them more robust learning experiences and means of facilitating the development students’ skills of scientific literacy. These changes are reflected in the next project students were assigned.
The Chemical Reaction Project was the next project my students completed. This was assigned at the beginning of the unit 6. This project was broken into two sections; individual written report and partner presentation. The explicit questions in the project directions handout (Document 1) for the individual section of the project provided students with a structure for collecting concise information, build understanding about their specific reaction, and the implications of this understanding in real world. The rubric (Document 2) provided students with expectations for this assignment. Although I still provided explicit expectations, students were given the freedom to choose what information they wanted to include in their presentation portion of the project. This adjustment to the presentation portion of the assignment served multiple purposes pertaining developing scientific literacy. The ability to select what to include or exclude from information one collects, in order to explain a concept to others in a restricted amount of time, is a skill of being scientific literate. In addition, the collaboration aspect of this project is another skill essential to being a scientifically literate adult. Students needed to work together to discuss, revise, and express information they gathered in an accurate and easy to follow manner. In the everyday world, regardless of education or job experience, the ability to collaborate and express succinct information is valuable. Although each of these skills are critical to developing scientifically literate adults there was still too broad of a focus for my inquiry question. I was overwhelmed trying to develop students’ abilities as researchers, information analyzers, writers, and presenters. Only after I consulted my University supervisor and multiple sources of literature I was able to pinpoint specifically how I would promote student success within and beyond my class in the time I had to work with these students.