Marina Milner-Bolotin, Heather Fisher & Alexandra MacDonald
Saturday, July 13, 2013
IPTEL
Using Technology for Conceptual Learning in Physics Teacher Education
Engaging Teacher-Candidates as Learners and Teachers
UBC Teacher Education
Getting to Know Each Other
How important is technology in teacher education?
A. EssentialB. Very ImportantC. ImportantD. Somewhat ImportantE. Irrelevant
Getting to Know Each Other
In education, is it enough to know how technology works?
A. YesB. No
Getting to Know Each Other
How important is it for students to be actively engaged?
A. EssentialB. Very ImportantC. ImportantD. Somewhat ImportantE. Irrelevant
Thinking about Pedagogies
1. What are your reasons for choosing the pedagogies you implement in your classrooms?
2. How do you know your pedagogies are impacting your students?
Objectives
Model AE in the context of the
course content
Explore a possible mechanism for AE
pedagogy
Investigate the effect of Active Engagement (AE) on teacher-
candidates’ (TCs’) epistemologies
Navigating the Resource
Navigating the Resource
Navigating the Resource
http://scienceres-edcp-educ.sites.olt.ubc.ca/
Logical reasoning
If m and p are positive integers and (m + p) x m is even, which of the following must be true?
A. If m is odd, then p is odd.
B. If m is odd, then p is even.
C. If m is even, then p is even.
D. If m is even, then p is odd.
E. m must be even.
Question Title
A. 24 m2
B. 76 m2
C. 100 m2
D. 124 m2
E. Not enough information
What is the area of the figure below?
Question TitleArea
10 m
6 m
4 m10 m
Comments
Answer: B
Justification: One way to find the area is to imagine a 10 m by 10 m square and subtracting a 4 m by 6 m rectangle.
CommentsSolution
A = 10 m x 10 m – 4 m x 6 m = 76 m2
Alternatively, the shape’s area can be found by dividing it into 2 rectangles and adding the areas together.
10 m
6 m 4 m
4 m
6 m
10 m
Secondary Physics Methods Course (+ 2-week short practicum)
13 students13 weeks
Enhanced Practicum 3 weeks
Post-Practicum Interviews
(7) Focus Group (1)
Pre-Practicum Interviews (8)
Extended Practicum
10 weeks
Research ProjectT
imel
ine
TPCK
Koeler & Mishra, 2007
Pre-Practicum TPCK
“It really opens the door for umm discussions between people. Um regarding a) you know, what is the right answer,
and b) how would you explain that to uh either teacher-candidates or to your potential students.”
Pre-Interview 2
Pre-Practicum TPCK
“It really opens the door for umm discussions between people. Um regarding a) you know, what is the right answer,
and b) how would you explain that to uh either teacher-candidates or to your potential students.”
Pre-Interview 2, Participant 9
Pedagogical Knowledge
Content Knowledge
Technological Knowledge
Post-Practicum TPCK
“So, if you set it up in a dynamic where… different types of
people have [different needs], so if you need to talk to someone,
you still get that, if you need silence, you get to think on it on your own, and then people aren’t so stressed… And they actually get to argue and talk back and forth and they’ll remember it
more. So for them, I think they’ll master it more.”
Post-Interview 2, Participant 20
“So, if you set it up in a dynamic where… different types of
people have [different needs], so if you need to talk to someone,
you still get that, if you need silence, you get to think on it on your own, and then people aren’t so stressed… And they actually get to argue and talk back and forth and they’ll remember it
more. So for them, I think they’ll master it more.”
Post-Interview 2, Participant 20
Pedagogical Knowledge
Content Knowledge
Technological Knowledge
Post-Practicum TPCK
Modified-TPCK
Milner-Bolotin, Cha, Chachashvili-Bolotin, Raisinghani, 2013
Emerging Themes
• Student understanding as beyond current classroom context
• Role of TCs previous conceptual understanding
“…physics is…not about applying formulas, and doing math. It is…about gaining an
appreciation of the world around us. And, being able to use your understanding and extrapolate … explain what’s
happening around you. [It] has nothing to do with math
formulas.” Post-interview 1
VALUE OF CONCEPTUAL UNDERSTANDING
Emerging Themes
• Necessary for conceptual understanding
• Classroom realities are single most limiting factor in application of this value
“… some of the physics 11s who are just doing it to do a science, and are just, ‘Alright, Physics, I’ll try it out.’ Some of them were not as en-engaged, and I think doing
the… voting-style questions helped get them more into it and more involved. So I’d say… it’s
helpful to get those students who hide at the back in these 30
person classes.”
Post-interview 3
ROLE OF STUDENT ENGAGEMENT
Emerging Themes
• No purpose without sound pedagogical support
• Conceptual understanding optimal outcome of this pedagogy
• Alternative mechanisms can achieve similar outcome
“It wasn’t just the clickers alone. It was also in…. the presentation of the question. It wasn’t a simple
plug in the answer-type question. It had to be conceptual, in which
you could… , the Bloom’s taxonomy, the higher learning of
students. So, in itself, clickers… is only a tool. But it needs to be
complemented with good conceptual questions in order to
make it work.”
Pre-Interview 5
CLICKERS AS A MECHANISM
Returning to Objectives
Model AE with the course content
Investigate the effect of Active Engagement (AE) on
teacher-candidates epistemologies
Modeling impacts TCs epistemologies,
regardless of successes/challenges in
practicum
“I’m there as a teacher, (pause) but I’m also there as a student. Conversely, they’re there as a student, but they’re also there as a teacher. That doesn’t mean they’re teaching necessarily, teaching me. They’re teaching each other... You’re always a student-teacher, regardless of whether or not, what your position says.
The-the moment you step out, and you meet someone, you now are both a teacher and a learner.”
Post-Interview 1
Explore a possible mechanism for AE
pedagogy
Clicker-enhanced pedagogy works as a
mechanism for AE pedagogy in a small
class
“Coming into the program, we were all sort of thought that we were expected to be masters, and if the instructor puts up a clicker question,
you think ‘Jeez, I don’t actually know the answer’ – immediately you think well, we’re all supposed to be masters, I’m probably the only one who
doesn’t know. But uh when the responses come in, you see other people think like you, it’s definitely reassuring.”
Pre-Interview 2
Returning to Objectives
• Beatty, I., Gerace, W., Leonard, W., & Defresne, R. (2006). Designing Effective Questions for Classroom Response System Teaching. American Journal of Physics, 74(1), 31–39.
• CWSEI Clicker Resource Guide: An Instructors Guide to the Effective Use of Personal Response Systems (Clickers) in Teaching. (2009, June 1).
• Lasry, Nathaniel. (2008). Clickers or Flashcards: Is There Really a Difference? The Physics Teacher, 46(May), 242-244.
• Milner-Bolotin, Marina. (2004). Tips for Using a Peer Response System in the Large Introductory Physics Classroom. The Physics Teacher, 42(8), 47-48.
• Mishra, P., & Koehler, M. J. (2007). Technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPCK): Confronting the wicked problems of teaching with technology. In Society for Information Technology & Teacher Education International Conference (Vol. 2007, pp. 2214–2226). Retrieved from http://www.editlib.org/p/24919/
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