Back to Graduate Work Index

GRADUATE SUBMISSION:

Three Kinds of Hands-On Science in the Garden

Scott Hays and Brinet Mullen-Lee

District/Project Name:
LASERS (Language Acquisition in Science Education for Rural Schools), Santa Cruz, California

Team Members
Scott Hays ( Staff Developer) and Brinet Mullen-Lee (Teacher On Special Assignment)

Scott Hays Staff Developer	Brinet Mullen-Lee Teacher On Special Assignment

Audience
This is the second of what we call "Preplanning Days" for our Sumnmer Academy. The audience for this workshop are the 30 teachers and coaches who will staff the Summer Academy. The Summer Academy is a five week summer school for students in grades K-4 (pre-1 to pre-5) that focuses on integrating science and language instruction during the morning hours when students are attending, then focuses on practice and design in the afternoon as part of the professional development package. The Academy is divided into five grade level teams: There are roughly four teachers and two coaches for each grade level, and there is one Mini-Corps student in each classroom. Each of these grade level teams are further subdivided so that each coach works with two of the classrooms and the other coach works with the other two classrooms. During this preplanning day, the grade level teams are meeting to plan the lessons they will all teach in the first week of the Summer Academy.

What purpose are you trying to accomplish by doing this activity with this audience?
The purpose of doing 3 Kinds of Hands-on Science with the 30 Summer Academy teachers and coaches during the preplanning day is to provide them with some insights regarding the types of lessons they choose to plan for their students. It is our hope that they will recognize the advantages and disadvantages of using different approaches to teaching science and will include them appropriately in their planning. Additionally, a part of their professional development in the afternoons will involve promoting their own inquiry, and a good part of the follow-up during the school year is a deeper look at inquiry, so we also hope to begin some conversations about the nature of learning and inquiry.

Why do you feel like this activity is a good way to accomplish this purpose?
Time for planning is short. The lessons that they will be teaching their children during the Summer Academy will be taken from a garden-based science program (Life Lab). The content strand of the Summer Academy (as received by students) will have a garden focus; the content strand of the Professional Development hours in the afternoons will also have a garden focus. We therefore wish to provide direct experience with the 3 Kinds of Hands-on Science in a context that will be useful to their planning and their instruction -- using Foam or Tops would have many advantages, but are not contextual to our purposes.

When the session is going to start?
The 3 Kinds of Hands On Science in the Garden will be done Saturday, June 6. It will last until the close of the Summer Academy on July 17 (though closure will probably occur some time earlier than that)

Brief Description of the Activity

first rotation:	40 minutes
second rotation:	40 minutes
discussion:	up to 40 minutes

The guided activity asks participants to measure and draw certain characteristics of 2 plant starts, such as lengths of stems, leaves, and roots. Then it asks them to predict and draw what they think the plants will look like in 5 weeks if one is placed in the light and one in the dark.

The challenge activity asks people, in groups of two or three, to select a plant growth variable to control as they try to grow the tallest plant. They must choose only one variable which they control by using two plant starts, one to do the experiment with, and to be the control.

At the exploratory phase of inquiry station, participants are asked to work in groups of two or three to explore any (or all) variables associated with plant growth.

In one rotation, groups spend either 40 minutes at the exploratory phase of inquiry station, or 20 minutes each in the guided and challendge station. Participants from different groups are jigsawed for the discussion.

The discussion prompts were:

* How did it feel to work in each area? What was your personal reaction?

* What questions came up in each area? Were they different?

* What characterisics distinguished the exploratory phase of inquiry from the other two approaches.

To see a full write-up of the activity, click here.

How it went?
Today we did the two-hour workshop planned at the Exploratorium during the May 4 Professional Development Design Workshop (Three Kinds of Hands-on Science With Plants) . We had some real reservations about doing this as a long-term investigation rather than something "closed" with definite results in a limited amount of time, but were interested in doing something with a life science focus.

There were 31 teachers and coaches participating. Facilitators for the three different stations and five debrief discussions included LASERS staff developers who have all attended the Design Workshop at some time in the past two years.

The workshop went amazingly well. People were focused and on task. They were not bothered by the fact that the investigations begun in each station were to be continued over a five-week period. Participants kept accurate notes, labeled everything so it could tracked, and were extremely conscientious. There were a couple of inconsistencies in the Guided Station between the direction sheet and the worksheet (the same measurment was called two different things, resulting in some confusion). As a rule, the Challenge Station was done first; but in the second rotation both times, the Open-ended station finished first, followed by the Challenge. It took longer to complete the worksheet than to do the more inquiry-oriented stations. There are now cups (and other containers) of plants all over the classroom in which the investigation took place, a grow light with several cups under it, and plants distributed all over campus.

The debrief was EXCELLENT. We followed Fred Stein's suggestion and changed the discussion prompts from that posted earlier -- instead of asking the groups to comment on "strengths and weaknesses" of each type of hands-on science activity, we asked them to consider and describe the characteristics of each. People responded pretty well, focusing on looking at each type of activity as having a purpose and an audience. However, as Fred warned us, the conversation STILL drifted to them trying to identify the "correct" sequence in which to use these three types of lessons.

We saw immediate application of some of the ideas in the workshop and discussion as teachers followed up the activity by beginning to plan the lessons they will teach their students starting June 15. Many made conscious choices to "use" different types of hands-on activities, and even began planning ways to make the commercial unit they were using more open-ended.

What surprised you? Pleased you? Disappointed you?
There were several surprises, but three stand out:

(1) I thought that, with no "product" or closure to the challenge activity (use the materials in this station to manipulate a variable and see if you can grow the tallest plant) that competition would not play a particularly significant role. Wrong! Groups were extremely secretive about their plans and their experimental design, unwilling to share and even accusing one another of "cheating" on two occassions when perceived that another group was "looking". The discussion about this station thus followed pretty closely to the discussion we had at the Exploratoreum -- some found the challenge frustrating, closed and difficult; others found the competition to be focusing and motivating.

(2) Again, because each station lead to an ongoing investigation, there was no closure to any activity. I thought this would mean there would be little carry-over of information or skills between the stations. Wrong! Depending upon the order of the stations, each station provided clues and ideas that were used at other stations (except the guided, if it was visited last; in which case most felt it was pretty "boring").

(3) Despite warnings issued in the introduction and the facilitation of the different group leaders, all five discussion groups wanted to sequence the types of lessons rather than view them as different approaches that could be used with a single lesson.

I was extremely pleased with the controlled and disciplined way the teachers approached the three stations. All remained on task and worked until "finished" before looking for other things to do. All gave activities in each station a great deal of attention. We purposefully made the Guided Station more than inconsequential -- there may have been too many things for the folks to do, but they remained on task and even developed unplanned and uncalled for cooperative strategies to get the work done in the allotted 20 mintes. Few found the station "boring", and all felt it will provide important information related to plant growth when doen. Many (especially those who visited early in the workshop) felt that it provided them with clues to use in the other stations (things to measure, draw pictures ahead of time, etc.) I was also pleased with the uniform and even discussions held in five breakouts after we were done. I expected each facilitator to have at least one horror story/nightmare to share and a wide range of topics discussed, but it turns out the conversations all seemed to pretty much cover the same ground.

About the only thing that disappointed me was that we could have used more time. I also have an added responsibility of keeping A LOT of plants alive for the next couple of weeks until the summer school starts.

Would you do it the same again? If not, what would you change?
I would do it the same again. One group asked if I had access to motor oil, which I had not included as one of the materials in the open-ended station, but that was Okay -- they did not quit when informed there was none; they found something else equally interesting to do. Several groups in the Challenge Station wanted additional materials (especially if they had visited the open-ended station first), but we refused to provide them and turned their request by suggesting the materials provided were done so consciously, and we would like for them to meet the challenge with those materials. All acquiesced.

I would change only two things for the next workshop:

(1) I would want more time for the post station discussion -- we had fifteen minutes, but most facilitators could not get their people to stop talking for 25. And that was not enough. They really had good thoughts about feelings, differences and applications that they wanted to share. I would also like to have a little time to reconvene as an entire group and hit the high points of each discussion (not repeating, for example, things said by an earlier reporting group). This would provide the time to reinforce the idea that the three lessons do not represent a hierarchy, but rather different approaches that can be used for the same lesson, depending upon a number of factors.

(2) After people have had about an hour to look at, think about, and begin to plan the lessons they will present to their students at the summer school, I would want to have a few people explain how the structure of a lesson they were planning utilizes one (or more) of the types of hands-on science we experienced.

What would you like feedback on from the group?

Comments regarding the practicality of this effort would be appreciated -- possible shortcoming or pitfalls to watch out for. In particular, we feel that doing Foam, regardless of which station one begins in, creates knowledge of outcomes that is useful at subsequent stations whereas doing a longer term life-science investigation (by necessity, owing to the nature of life science investigations) has no "closure" in 20 minutes so subsequent stations are not informed by what was "discovered" at earlier stations. Will deferring "solutions" negatively impact what we are trying to accomplish? Will debriefing at intervals during the Academy be as effective?

Also, the plan is posted, and it has not changed. People will be observing and recording observations (and quantifiable data) over the next five weeks for EACH investigation. I will need at least one final debrief, and maybe one interim discussion about what is going on with these investigation. Especially in regards to the final debrief, does anyone have any ideas of discussion questions facilitators could ask to motivate a conversation?