# Presentation: 525184

## Strategies for Engaging Students’ Thinking in Beyond Einstein Science 

**Tim Slater**
- University of Arizona
*Department of Astronomy*
- Conceptual Astronomy and Physics Education Research (CAPER) Team
- http://caperteam.as.arizona.edu

**Project BETA – July 27, 2007 – NASA Goddard**

## A Short Video Clip:  Do We Need To Teach This Stuff?

## It ain’t what you don’t know that is the problem, its what you already know that ain’t so

- Often attributed to Will Rogers and equally often to Mark Twain via Huckleberry Finn

## How People Learn

- Misconceptions are Hard to Fix:  *What you already know (or think you already know) impacts what you can learn*
- Fragmented Knowledge is Useless: *Ideas, cartoons, facts, and figures need to be organized in an accessible mental framework to be useful*
- Metacognition is Key:  *You have to develop an intuition for when you understand something and when you don’t*
- Learning is Social:  *Most people have to interact with other people in order to deeply learn a concept so that they can self-test their level of understanding.*

## In other words ...

- Lectures from classroom teachers or visitors, no matter how enthusiastic or articulate have very, very, very limited impact BECAUSE
**Its not what the instructor does that matters; rather, it is what the students do!**

- _Learner-Centered Astronomy Teaching _
-  Slater & Adams, Prentice Hall Publishing, 2003

## Most ideas about teaching are not new, but not everyone knows the old ideas

- Euclid

## The best learners ... often make the worst teachers.  They are, in a very real sense, perceptually challenged.  They cannot imagine what it must be like to struggle to learn something that comes so naturally to them.

- Stephen Brookfield

## Just as students have misconceptions about science teachers have misconceptions about teaching

- Good teachers explain things precisely and articulately
- Good teachers use enthusiasm to motivate and encourage students
- Good teachers possess a deep and extensive understanding of their discipline
- Good teachers are productive researchers in their discipline
- Good teachers teach the same regardless of the students’ demographic characteristics and community because science is science no matter who does it

- It's not about the teacher!!

## Exchange Rather Than Transmission

*Lecture is often the process by which what is written on the professor’s notes gets transferred into students’ notebooks without passing through the brains of either.*

## Insufficient "Wait-Time" 
The Rapid-Reward 
The Programmed Answer 
Fixation at a Low-Level of Questioning
Non-Specific Feedback Questions
Teacher's Ego-Stroking & Classroom Climate 
Too much information on your overheads or on your PowerPoint slides

- Insufficient "Wait-Time"
- The Rapid-Reward
- The Programmed Answer
- Fixation at a Low-Level of Questioning
- Non-Specific Feedback Questions
- Teacher's Ego-Stroking & Classroom Climate
- Too much information on your overheads or on your PowerPoint slides

## Too much information on your overheads or on your PowerPoint slides

## Not clearly distinguishing what exactly students are supposed to learn 
Focusing on concepts as being most important in class and then primarily testing students on vocabulary
Disenfranchising females and minorities from your course topics by teaching from Euro-male perspective

- Not clearly distinguishing what exactly students are supposed to learn
- Focusing on concepts as being most important in class and then primarily testing students on vocabulary
- Disenfranchising females and minorities from your course topics by teaching from Euro-male perspective

## What else can I do?

## Answer first by yourself, then with a partner:  

*Answer first by yourself, then with a partner:  *

## THINK-PAIR-SHAREVote on an answer before conferring with the person next to you, then I’ll ask you to vote a second time.

- If you breathe in O2 and out CO2, why does mouth-to-mouth CPR work?
- 1. Humans can convert CO2 to needed O2
- 2. It’s the physical breathing action, not the O2 that mouth-to-mouth actually does
- 3. You exhale CO2 AND O2
- 4. Mouth-to-mouth doesn’t actually work except on TV

## Personal Responder Devices

- What are responders?
- IR or Radio wireless voting device
- Sometimes referred to as Classroom Communication Systems (CCS), “clickers”, etc.

## Class Response System – Low Tech 

## 

## THINK-PAIR-SHAREVote on an answer before conferring with the person next to you, then I’ll ask you to vote a second time.

- If you breathe in O2 and out CO2, why does mouth-to-mouth CPR work?
- 1. Humans can convert CO2 to needed O2
- 2. It’s the physical breathing action, not the O2 that mouth-to-mouth actually does
- 3. You exhale CO2 AND O2
- 4. Mouth-to-mouth doesn’t actually work except on TV

## Superheroine Wonder Woman’s most useful tool was 

- Lasso of truth
- Invisible jet
- Flying boots
- X-ray vision

## Which author wrote Of Mice and Men?

- Ray Bradbury
- Michael Moore
- John Steinbeck
- Mark Twain

## Given that a seed grows into a massive tree, where does most of the mass of the tree come from?

- From water
- From dirt and soil
- From the air
- Its already in the seed.

## ...that is the question!

- Do you think some questions are better than others to generate meaningful group discussion?
- What would be their attributes?

## Work with a small group
Make sure your question is multiple choice
Select a member of your group who will model “think – pair – share” using your question 		
			On the topic of:
BLACK HOLE SCIENCE

- Work with a small group
- Make sure your question is multiple choice
- Select a member of your group who will model “think – pair – share” using your question
- 			On the topic of:
*BLACK HOLE SCIENCE*

## What else can I do besides lecture?

_***He-Said-She-Said***_
*Who, if either, do you agree with, and why?*
- Pat says:  Black holes don’t really suck everything in, they actually emit X-rays
- Chris says:  I disagree.  Objects moving toward a black hole emit X-rays as a last plea for help before becoming extinct

**Convert your question into a student-debate...**

## Case Study Assignment
Your class has been given $1000 to advertise a new exhibit and planetarium show on black holes at the nearby museum.  How would you advertise and what exactly would your advertisements promote?  Create a single-page sized sketch and 50-word caption that proposes how to promote this AND demonstrates your understanding of black holes.

- Your class has been given $1000 to advertise a new exhibit and planetarium show on black holes at the nearby museum.  How would you advertise and what exactly would your advertisements promote?  Create a single-page sized sketch and 50-word caption that proposes how to promote this AND demonstrates your understanding of black holes.

- What else can I do besides lecture?

## Brainstorm Top Ten Lists a’la David Letterman Style:
Over the next three minutes, list as many reasons as possible that black holes should be included in YOUR curriculum.

This late in the workshop, creativity counts!

*Over the next three minutes, list as many reasons as possible that black holes should be included in YOUR curriculum.*
*This late in the workshop, creativity counts!*

- What else can I do besides lecture?

## Muddiest Point

*Take out a sheet of paper and write a few sentences on the following:*
- What is one thing that still doesn’t make sense about teaching black hole science to your students?

## As Yet Unanswered Burning Questions

## YouTube Resources

- Homer 3D on YouTube
- _[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mz-tiFKtgpI](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mz-tiFKtgpI)_
- Hawking on the Simpsons
- _[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJJMdOr5WYA](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJJMdOr5WYA)_

## Strategies for Engaging Students’ Thinking in Beyond Einstein Science 

**Tim Slater**
- University of Arizona
*Department of Astronomy*
- Conceptual Astronomy and Physics Education Research (CAPER) Team
- http://caperteam.as.arizona.edu

**Project BETA – July 27, 2007 – NASA Goddard**