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ABSTRACT: A high-school physics teacher writes that his new
superintendent (partial to guided practice, independent practice, and
research-based instructional processes) is forming an "instructional
design team" to evaluate instructional practices and find out what
makes a teacher effective. I contrast guided and independent
practice with "guided inquiry," give three physics Nobelists'
comments supportive of the latter, and conclude that teachers, to be
effective, need to use a wide variety of pedagogical methods to suit
classroom occasions, subject matter, and the diverse natures of their
students.
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Rob Spencer (2007) in his PhysLrnR post "soliciting suggestions"
wrote [bracketed by lines "SSSSS. . . ."]:
SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
I teach high school physics and have been an eager follower of
advances made by physics education research for about 7 years now.
Today I attended the first meeting of a committee of teachers and
administrators in our school corp. called the "Instructional Design
Team." This committee is the brainchild of our new superintendent.
He would like to evaluate the instructional process and develop an
understanding of what makes a teacher effective.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
So, I would appreciate any information, links, directions toward this
type of information. He is especially interested in "research-based"
instructional processes.
He has mentioned his bias toward "guided practice" and "independent
practice." While these sound similar to guided inquiry, I am
reserving judgement until I see more of what his approach turns out
to be.
Does anybody recognize these buzzwords from ed. psych. possibly?"
SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
Google is great for researching buzzwords. A Google search for:
1. ["guided practice" education] (with the quotes but without the
square brackets) yields 165,000 hits. One that appears reasonable is
<http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/students/learning/lr1guid.htm>
from the "North Central Regional Educational Laboratory." NCREL
<http://www.learningpt.org/page.php?pageID=243> states:
"Posing questions that gradually lead students from easy or familiar
examples to new understandings is a teaching strategy known as Guided
Practice (Rosenshine, 1979, 1983). The strategy is effective for
teaching thinking skills as well as content."
Since Rob's new superintendent is especially interested in
"research-based" instructional processes, it would be interesting to
know the research basis for the claim that "the strategy is effective
for teaching thinking skills as well as content." I suspect that the
"research" may be rather thin - see e.g., "An Elusive Science: The
troubling history of education research" [Lagemann (2000)].
In addition to the two Rosenshine references, NCREL, to its credit,
gives about 50 other academic references relevant to "guided
practice" at
<http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/students/learning/lr1refer.htm>.
2. ["independent practice" education] (with the quotes but without
the square brackets) yields 323,000 hits. One such is
<http://k6educators.about.com/od/lessonplanheadquarters/g/independent_pra.htm>
where one Beth Lewis writes:
"Through Independent Practice, students have a chance to reinforce
skills and synthesize their new knowledge by completing a task on
their own and away from the teacher's guidance.. . . . Independent
Practice can take the form of a homework assignment or worksheet, but
it is also important to think of other ways for students to reinforce
and practice the given skills."
Thus it appears that both "guided practice" and "independent practice" are:
(a) well ensconced in the educational literature,
(b) a far cry from "guided inquiry."
For a cogent discussion of "guided inquiry" see the "Foreword: A
Scientist's Perspective on Inquiry," pages xi -xiv, of "Inquiry and
the National Science Education Standards [NRC (2000)] by biologist
Bruce Alberts, former president of the National Academy of Sciences.
Alberts writes:
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Teaching science through inquiry allows students to conceptualize a
question and then seek possible explanations that respond to that
question . . . . . . Inquiry is in part a state of mind-that of
inquisitiveness. Most young children are naturally curious. They care
enough to ask "why" and "how" questions. But if adults dismiss their
incessant questions as silly and uninteresting, students can lose
this gift of curiosity. Visit any second grade classroom and you will
generally find a class bursting with energy and excitement, where
children are eager to make new observations and try to figure things
out. What a contrast with many eighth-grade classes, where the
students so often seem bored and disengaged from learning and from
school!
The "National Science Education Standards" . . . .[NRC (1996)]. . .
released by the National Research Council in 1995 provide valuable
insights into the ways that teachers might sustain the curiosity of
students and help them develop the sets of abilities associated with
scientific inquiry. The "Standards" emphasize that science education
needs to give students three kinds of scientific skills and
understandings. Students need to learn the principles and concepts of
science, acquire the reasoning and procedural skills of scientists,
and understand the nature of science as a particular form of human
endeavor. Students therefore need to be able to devise and carry out
investigations that test their ideas, and they need to understand why
such investigations are uniquely powerful. Studies show that students
are much more likely to understand and retain the concepts that they
have learned this way."
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
I'm guessing that Rob Spencer's new superintendent may be an
education specialist, and may not be easily persuaded that "guided
inquiry" or "interactive engagement" methods (if you'll pardon the
term) are more effective than "guided practice" or "independent
practice" in promoting students' conceptual understanding of science.
Nevertheless, sometimes even education specialists, psychologists,
physicists, chemists, and biologists will at least briefly consider
the pro-guided-inquiry opinions of Nobel Award winners such as 1982
physics Nobelist Ken Wilson, 1988 physics Nobelist Leon Lederman,
and 2001 physics Nobelist Carl Wieman.
Wilson & Daviss (1994, p. 176) wrote: "Drawing on the work of Swiss
developmental psychologist Jean Piaget and incorporating insights
from computer science, cognitive theorists have evolved a view of
learning as uniquely subjective and personal. Their ideas,
collectively known as constructivism, are being corroborated by
ongoing experimental work worldwide."
Lederman (1976) wrote: "We are strong believers in paying attention,
in the Physics-Chemistry-Biology sequence, to storytelling or, more
formally, to the process, in addition to the content, of science. How
does it work? How do we know? What are the common laws, . . . . . "
Wieman (2007) wrote:
WWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW
Lectures were created as a means of transferring information from one
person to many, so an obvious topic for research is the retention of
the information by the many. The results of three studies-which can
be replicated by any faculty member with a strong enough stomach-are
instructive. . . . . .[Hrepic et al. (2007)]. . . asked 18 students
from an introductory physics class to attempt to answer six questions
on the physics of sound and then, primed by that experience, to get
the answers to those questions by listening to a 14-minute, highly
polished commercial videotaped lecture given by someone who is
supposed to be the world's most accomplished physics lecturer. On
most of the six questions, no more than one student was able to
answer correctly. . . . . . These results do indeed make a lot of
sense and probably are generic, based on one of the most
well-established-yet widely ignored-results of cognitive science: the
extremely limited capacity of the short-term working memory. The
research tells us that the human brain can hold a maximum of about
seven different items in its short-term working memory and can
process no more than about four ideas at once. Exactly what an "item"
means when translated from the cognitive science lab into the
classroom is a bit fuzzy. But the number of new items that students
are expected to remember and process in the typical hour-long science
lecture is vastly greater. So we should not be surprised to find that
students are able to take away only a small fraction of what is
presented to them in that format.
WWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW
Modesty forbids mention of a meta-analysis [Hake (1998a,b)] discussed
by Wieman (2007) and Wieman & Perkins (2005), and consistent with the
above.
I hope the "instructional design team" formed by Rob's superintendent
will realize that teachers, to be effective, need to use different
approaches (e.g., coaching, guided practice, independent practice,
collaborative discussions, Socratic dialogue, and even - on rare
occasions - didactic lectures) to fit the classroom occasions,
subject matter, and diverse natures of their students. Each method
has its strengths and weaknesses for each type of student, but in the
hands of a *skilled teacher* each can be made to compliment the
other methods so as to advance *every* student's learning. A skilled
teacher might *lecture* on material that can be rote memorized,
*coach* skills such as typing or playing a musical instrument, and
use *Socratic dialogue or collaborative discussions* (or other
"guided inquiry" or "interactive engagement" methods) to induce
students to construct their understanding of conceptually difficult
material. The complementarity of various pedagogical methods is
insightfully discussed by David Perkins (1995) in "Smart Schools."
Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University
24245 Hatteras Street, Woodland Hills, CA 91367
<[log in to unmask]>
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake>
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi>
"Education is the acquisition of the art of the utilization of
knowledge. This an art very difficult to impart. We must beware of
what I will call 'inert ideas' that is to say, ideas that are merely
received into the mind without being utilized or tested or thrown
into fresh combinations."
Alfred North Whitehead (1967) in "The Aims of Education."
REFERENCES [Tiny URL's courtesy <http://tinyurl.com/create.php>.]
Hake, R.R. 1998a. "Interactive-engagement vs traditional methods: A
six thousand-student survey of mechanics test data for introductory
physics courses," Am. J. Phys. 66(1): 64-74; online at
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi/ajpv3i.pdf> (84 kB).
Hake, R.R. 1998b. "Interactive-engagement methods in introductory
mechanics courses," online at
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi/IEM-2b.pdf> (108 kB) - a crucial
companion paper to Hake (1998a).
Hrepic, Z., D. Zollman, & N. Rebello. 2006. "Comparing students' and
experts' understanding of the content of a lecture," to be published
in Journal of Science Education and Technology. A pre-print is
available at
<http://web.phys.ksu.edu/papers/2006/Hrepic_comparing.pdf> (96 KB).
Lagemann, E.C. 2000. "An Elusive Science: The troubling history of
education research." Univ. of Chicago Press. Publishers information at
<http://www.press.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/hfs.cgi/00/13993.ctl>.
Lederman, L.M. 2006. "An Invitation to Conversations about 'The
Cornerstone-to-Capstone Approach'," Biological Sciences Curriculum
Study; online at <http://www.bscs.org/pdf/capstoneinvitation.pdf> (1
MB).
NRC. 1996. "National Education Standards." National Academy Press;
online at <http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=4962>.
NRC. 2000. "Inquiry and the National Science Education Standards: A
Guide for Teaching and Learning," National Academy Press; online at
<http://books.nap.edu/catalog/9596.html>.
Perkins, D. 1995. "Smart Schools." Free Press; Reprint edition;
Amazon.com information at <http://tinyurl.com/yptoyq>. Note the
"Search Inside" feature.
Rosenshine, B. 1979. "Content, time and direct instruction," in P. L.
Peterson & H. J. Walberg, eds., "Research on teaching." Berkeley:
McCutchan.
Rosenshine, B. 1983. "Teaching functions in instructional programs,"
The Elementary School Journal 83: 335-351.
Spencer, R. 2007. "soliciting suggestions" PhysLrnR post of 26 Nov
2007 22:04:25-0700, online at <http://tinyurl.com/2a68hq>.
Whitehead, A.N. 1967. "Aims of Education, " Free Press. Amazon.com
information at <http://tinyurl.com/yo6k6c>. Note the "Search Inside"
feature.
Wieman, C. & K. Perkins. 2005. "Transforming Physics Education,"
Phys. Today 58(11): 36-41; online at
<http://www.colorado.edu/physics/EducationIssues/papers/PhysicsTodayFinal.pdf>
(292 kB).
Wieman, C. 2007. "Why Not Try a Scientific Approach to Science
Education?" Change Magazine, September/October; online at
<http://www.cwsei.ubc.ca/resources/files/Wieman-Change_Sept-Oct_2007.pdf>
(804 kB). See also Wieman & Perkins (2005).
Wilson, K.G. & B. Daviss, "Redesigning Education" (Henry Holt, 1994);
for a description see
<http://www-physics.mps.ohio-state.edu/~kgw/RE.html>.
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