While I do not teach science, I could envision using WISE to teach topics to my students with various learning challenges. The topic I found most interesting to alter would be the grade 6 unit “Plate Tectonics: How do earthquakes, volcanoes and mountains form.” I chose this topic because it is very interesting, but also comes with a lot of misconceptions. Many students take various ideas and create their own idea of how these scientific events occur. These WISE projects are for students who “bring to science class multiple conflicting views of scientific phenomena” (Linn, Clark, & Slotta, 2003). Therefore, this project would be beneficial to explore further.
The SKI framework follows four tenets. These include “(1) making thinking visible, (2) making science accessible, (3) helping students learn from each other, and (4) promoting lifelong learning “ (Linn, Clark, & Slotta, 2003). This project followed four of these tenets. The content was interactive, accessible, allowed for reflection by answering questions, provided many graphics and videos, and allowed students to relate the events to their own personal lives. While in this project, I was only able to access part of the information (WISE did not work well for me – whether it be poor internet connection, etc.) I did find the content to be quite lengthy, so if I was to use it for my students I would like to shorten it a little bit. I would also like to add more collaborative activities to this project. It is a project that could likely be completed by one person, so adding more partner or group activities would be beneficial to align it more to the ‘helping students learn from each other’ tenet. Perhaps instead of writing a response on a particular question, I could change it to open up a group discussion or conversation instead.
A quote that resonated with me from the book: Inquiry and the National Science Education Standards: A Guide for Teaching and Learning (2000) states: “The challenge for all of us who want to improve education is to create an educational system that exploits the natural curiosity of children, so that they maintain their motivation for learning not only during their school years but throughout life. We need to convince teachers and parents of the importance of children’s “why” questions.” Therefore, I think it would be best to not only have students explore the scientific events of plate tectonics on WISE, but also provide them with hands on activities, and explore outdoors to move them away from the technology. This could provide students with the opportunity to have real, open discussions on these events and bring up ideas and thoughts they may not otherwise have.
I did enjoy using WISE, however it was very limited. It only had content for certain grades, none of which pertained to my teaching practice, which is disappointing. While it has its limitations, I think it’s very beneficial that educators can come in and edit and change content in order to fit their preferences. Since there are so many premade inquiry projects that are unchangeable, it makes sense to allow educators this option.
References:
Linn, M., Clark, D., & Slotta, J. (2003). Wise design for knowledge integrations. Science Education, 87(4), 517-538. DOI: 10.1002/sce/10086
US Board of Science Education. (2000). Book. Washington DC: Retrieved from: http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?isbn=0309064767 (Links to an external site.)