Really True

SpellingCity a great place to learn spelling is a labor of love by a group of web savvy educationally-minded parents who felt there was a need to create a useful educational site. Is that really true???

Astronomy Science Curriculum

A great astronomy science curriculum website covering especially planets, moons, asteroids, meteors, comets, dwarf planets and other solar system facts.

Total standards overhaul

Events are speeding up in the US educational standards world. Most of the states have agreed to a common effort to develop common standards. Which the states will subsequently adopt or not. The learning fun blog says that the States Agree to Share Standards:

Forty-Nine States and Territories Join Common Core State Standards Initiative

The Council of Chief State School Officers - CCSSO - led a Process to Develop Common English-language arts and Mathematics Standards. It's collaborative, it's efficient, it's sensible and it's about time. And I hear it's being extended to include science. What about social studies and geography? Bravo! And I quote the release:

By signing on to the Common Core State Standards Initiative, governors and state commissioners of education across the country are committing to joining a state-led process to develop a common core of state standards in English-language arts and mathematics for grades K-12. These standards will be research and evidence-based, internationally benchmarked, aligned with college and work expectations and include rigorous content and skills.

“To maintain America’s competitive edge, we need all of our students to be prepared and ready to compete with students from around the world,” said NGA Vice Chair Vermont Gov. Jim Douglas. “Common standards that allow us to internationally benchmark our students’ performance with other top countries have the potential to bring about a real and meaningful transformation of our education system to the benefit of all Americans.”

This means no more armies of people redefining the educational standards at each state level. No more need for state specific textbooks. An ability to use common tests around the country and compare results. But wait, there's more:

- They are likely to include science. Maybe social studies too.
- They are likely to include preschool.
- They are likely to define benchmarks that are observable and measurable!
- They are likely to remain consistent with international norms such as the international bac.

The Washington post reported 6/1 that:

Forty-six states and the District of Columbia today will announce an effort to craft a single vision for what children should learn each year from kindergarten through high school graduation, an unprecedented step toward a uniform definition of success in American schools.

Science standards

My question is where are the exact science standards defined? Answer:

1. Project 2061 by American Association for the Advancement of Science - For the big idea on forces and motion, pick 4, then D.
2. Australian Learning Progressions - Are standards online?
3. National Science Foundation Educational Standards.

There's been very little change over the last few years. The current state/federal partnership to update them will involve lowering the number of benchmarks to increased focus on the big ideas!

Science Standards and Groups

We started with standards that came from the NSTA - National Science Teachers Association. But they are broad, vague, grade specific, and voluminous.

The move has been to more:
- outcome based - meaning what the students specifically knows how to do
- hierarchial - with big ideas and less significant ideas clearly distinguished
- international - leadership in science standards has moved into the international arena
- scaffolded and spiraling and grade-banded - the talk is now of students covering the same big idea in K-2nd, 3rd-5th, and middle school at different levels of sophistication.

NSTA
NAEP
National Science Education Standards - see content, items, results over time by grade etc
Education Commission - International Standards
Pennsylvania Science Anchors - html conceptual
Pennsylvania Science Anchors - pdf doc

cool free physics engine

Here's a piece of code waiting for someone to really take advantage of it for educational purposes. http://www.newtondynamics.com However, it's more designed to be downloaded and ran than over the net which is not our preferred modus operandi. Still, it's cool.

Notes on Taking Science to Schools by NAS (2007)

Paraphrasing & Commenting

SCIENCE PROFICIENCY
Consists of 4 elements
1. Know science content
2. Do the evidence-explanation dance.
3. Know "the scientific method".
4. Participate: Do & debate science.

Note: 1 & 3 are knowledge. 2&4 are activities/processes.
Key issues.
A. How to incorporate 2&4 in online program? (esp 4)
B. Does the manditory testing test all 4? Or mostly just 1.
C. Should a (our) curriculum teach to the test (#1) or to Science Proficiency more boadly (#1-4)?

More detailed explanation of the 4 elements
1. Know science/Science content.
2. Do the evidence<->explanation thing.
--Compare evidence to explanation & vice versa.
--Generate explanations from evidence. Test explations using evidence. Say how explanations predict evidence.
3. Know "the scientific method(s). (How science is done and progresses. How it has progressed.)
4. Do & discuss science. (Do experiments and the evidence/explanation dance. Debate science.)

CONCLUSIONS
1. Kids come with implicit scientific knowledge (right or wrong).
2. ...and this varies with experience...
3. ...that is influence by race, gender & other social factors.
4. Kids learn by doing science.
5. Variety of approaches is needed.

Corollaries:
a. Must take into account what students know (meaningful? actionable?)
b. ...and be sensitive (meaningful? actionable?)
c. Kids are smarter (and better at abstracting) than we thought. (but how actionable?)

RECOMMENDATIONS
1. Treat children smarter.
2. Organize K-8 instruction & progression around a few "Big Ideas"
3. Stress the evidence-explanation dance. Include other forms of evidence generation besides experiments (e.g., observation, historical analysis)
4. Get students doing all 4 "Scientific Proficiencies": (1) knowing content (2) the evidence-explanation dance, (3) scientific method? and (4) doing, talking & debating (science).
5. (Authorities should give teachers the mandate to...) Get students investigating, talking and writing around the evidence-explanation dance.

MY SYNTHESIS OF THE CONCLUSIONS AND...
1. Build on the (implicit) science understanding that students come with.
2. Provide a variety of approaches to encourage and accomodate the variety among students (in the understanding/beliefs/attitudes they bring and individual learning styles/abilities/stages.)
...RECOMMENDATIONS
3. Treat children smarter.
4. Organize around "Big Ideas".
5. Get students doing and discussing the evidence-explanation dance.

MY REACTION TO THESE
a. Generally, 1&2 seem hardest and 3-5 seem easiest, most straightforward to implement.
b. 1-3 present the question of how? since they are rather vague and aspirational.
c. In a classroom, 2&3 present some challenges with all but #4: How to include/engage/encourage/not discourage students with "lower" scientific confidence, understanding or ability, with less interest and with different or "less scientific" learning and thinking styles?
d. An individual, online environment presents challenges with #5. How can a student do science and discuss/debate science on a computer, alone, at home?