TfR Seminar: Session 11

1. TfR Seminar: Session 11 Systems, Order, and Organization

2. Do Now! (3 min) • Take out all session 11 Handouts, please! • Take out completed Handouts 10.14 and 10.15, the planning investigations strategy implementation planning and reflection sheets • Review your work in preparation for the discussion in your strategy discussion.

3. Session 11 Objectives • ANALYZE the unifying concept of systems, order, and organization. • BUILD a continuum showing how the concept develops in the standards, noting where the concept is introduced, developed, and mastered. • IDENTIFY common misconceptions and values about systems, order, and operations, hypothesize places within the curriculum where these misconceptions may have developed, and develop strategies for teaching content in a way that corrects misconceptions. • EVALUATE and select effective strategies for teaching students to gather data. • Refine skill in teaching proceduresthrough practice and targeted feedback

4. Session Agenda

5. Strategy Implementation Pairs • Will and Laura • Chris and Ann Marie • Ashley and Adrianna • Jessica and Caitlin • Alison, and Travis • Michael and Blake

6. Strategy Debrief • (8minutes ) Meet with your strategy partner and follow the directions for the strategy debrief on Handout 11.1. • Remember you will be using all of the strategy planning and reflection work for an analysis during Session 15, so you should keep them all in an organized fashion.

7. Transition • As you try out new instructional strategies, it is essential that you evaluate them in the context of your students’ skills and learning goals. • Examine the effectiveness of your teaching plan in moving students toward end-of-year goals for science process skills. • In the next section, we will continue build the unifying concept continuum so as to visualize how the concept develops in secondary science, where student misconceptions might emerge, and begin to help students make meaningful connections between the key concepts within a discipline as well as amongst disciplines.

8. Session Agenda

9. Section 1: Building a Unifying Concept Continuum • Take out Handout 11.2, and Handout 11.3, the chart you have completed for homework. • You will need to refer to the handouts during the next activity.

10. Step 1 (5 minutes) - Multidiscipline groups Step 2 (20 Minutes) - Course-alike groups (Blue;Physics, Green;biology, Red;Chemistry, Purple: Middle school) and 11.5 • use only the assigned marker color for your discipline • Write abbreviated standard on strip • Step 3 (20 minutes) -Multidiscipline groups – misconceptions on Handout 11.4- grades 6-12 • Tape strips on Chart paper (11.6 for notes) • Step 4 (5 minutes) -Multidiscipline groups discuss and write summary- Handout 11.7

11. Summarizing the Unifying Concepts • (5 min) Gallery walk of the other continuum posters • Add to your summaries, if needed.

12. (10 min) Reflection • What were some of the differences in the continuum posters? • What difficulties did you encounter in this activity, if any? • What challenges might you have in teaching these concepts? • How might you incorporate the unifying concept, form and function, in your lessons? • What misconceptions might students have that are related to systems, order and organization? How can you redirect student misconception related to this idea?

13. Transition • We will now explore ways to apply the unifying concept to classroom instruction. • We begin with a focus on the way that graphic organizers can be used to solidify student understanding of order and organization within systems. • We will examine an activity for redirecting misconceptions relating to the differences between parts and systems.

14. Session Agenda

15. Break Time! 6:20-6:25

16. Session Agenda

17. Think-Pair-Share (2 min) • Read the statement at the top of Handout 11.8. • Silently reflect on the statement, for 30 sec. • You may want to jot down notes or circle significant phrases. • Turn to a partner to share your reflection(1 min) • Now share your partner’s reflections.

18. Graphic Organizers Graphic organizers are one effective tool to help students understand systems, order, and organization. • First, we will have the opportunity to identify how to use several different graphic organizers to help students deeply understand order and organization in our discipline. • Then, we will explore the use of graphic organizers to solidify student understanding of part-to-whole relationships. • Finally, we will practice using analogies to help students understand systems.

19. How Graphic Organizers Help • Graphic organizers allow students to sort and store their understanding of specific concepts and ideas in a visual way. • Graphic organizers help students visually delineate information and represent the relationship between pieces of information by recording their understanding in certain areas of the organizer. • Research shows that nonlinguistic representations, such as graphic organizers, are an effective way to represent relationships. • Both using nonlinguistic representations and specifically, identifying similarities and differences are two instructional strategies proven most effective to help students achieve across the curriculum.

20. 5 Common Ways of Organizing Science Concepts and Content • Takeout Handout 11.8: (3 min) • Ithas graphic organizers representing each of these five common organizing patterns: • Classification • Compare/Contrast • Cause/Effect or Cycles • Sequence of Events • Levels of Organization • Look at the examples in the charts on the right hand side of the Handout.

21. Sequence of Events • Refer to Handout 11.9 (Silently Read) • In the classroom, students would cut apart the boxes on the bottom of the handout and then work in pairs to put the parts in sequential order as they are in the digestive system, and then match the parts with their respective functions. • Sequencing and matching using sentence strips is an effective way to visually and kinesthetically support students with these higher thinking skills. • Students can manipulate the order and match-ups as they think through the entire process.

22. Application Of Strategy (5 min) • How might this activity help students with the common misconception of distinguishing between the part of a system and the system? • How can you build on or modify this activity to maximize learning for your students?

23. Analogies • In addition to graphic organizers, analogies are an effective method to help students understand topics in the unifying concept of systems, order, and organization. • Analogies are comparisons showing the similarities or like features of two things. • Using analogies in the classroom is a highly effective strategy for deepening student understanding of new concepts by identifying similarities to concepts they already know and understand. • Creating and analyzing analogies enhances students’ ability to use knowledge. • Ensuring that the relating factor between the two things being compared is consistent requires students to think about details of both systems.

24. Take out Handout 11.10:Systems All Around Us Brainstorm with your table (2 min) • Write as many analogies as you can remember that you have used in class. Chose 1 analogy to work through the steps, thinking about how they might work in your class.(5 min) • How could you use it to clarify the concept of systems, order and organization?

25. Debrief (3min) • How can teaching with analogies deepen student understanding of the unifying concept of systems, order, and organization?

26. Transition • We have seen how graphic organizers can help students understand order and organization as well as how analogies can help students make connections between systems they already know and scientific concepts related to systems. • In the next section, participants will explore the science process skill of gathering data, and determine strategies that you will implement in your classrooms to support students in gathering data.

27. Session Agenda

28. Section 3: Practice Implementing Effective Strategies That Support Students in Gathering Data Gathering Data and Communicating through Tables Brainstorm : (2 min) • Recall some of the strategies we have experienced in earlier sessions that would help students to gather data.

29. Gathering Data • Not just a skill of measuring and writing down observations in a premade chart, but a communication skill that requires insight and understanding of the investigation and the ability to relay the collected data in an organized fashion.

30. Take out Handout 11.11 Read the quote at the top of the page describing students’ abilities in communicating investigation findings. • (1min) Reflect on this statement and the challenges you have faced with students being able to collect data and communicate their findings through self-generated data tables. • Share your experiences with a neighbor. (3 min) • Whole group share reflections(4 min)

31. Determining How to Collect Data • Assemble into groups as follows: ( 30 sec) Station 1: Chris, Alison and Blake Station 2: Michael, Jessica and Laura Station 3: Travis, Caitlin and Ashley Station 4: Anne Marie , Adriana, and Will • This activity is designed to help us think about how guiding questions can help our students to clearly collect and communicate information through data tables. • Review Handout 11.11 (6 minutes) • Answer each question and discuss how each piece of information will influence their data tables. • Draft your data table post on chart paper

32. Volunteer Share (2 min) • Share your table • Explain your choices

33. Data Collection Process ( 3min) • What variables do we need to consider? • How can we keep things the same each time we measure the height? • Will each group be able to compare its data with that of other groups?

34. Transition to Practice • Lets now work on improving our practice in an area of great importance in science classrooms; teaching a procedure for data collection in your classroom • To do this we will engage in practice activities

35. Teaching A Procedure

36. Planning Your Investigation • ( 15 min) Working in your group and Using Hand Out 11.11 and 11.12 as reference: • Determine how you would introduce this investigation for your students • Prepare to practice this procedure in a small group

37. Introduce Skill: Structuring Inquiry • Inquiry activities are often complicated and require us to establish routines to ensure safety and lesson focus • Routines make it easier for students to successfully complete the assigned task and to understand lesson objectives • Less off task behavior=more instructional time

38. What will we do? • Using the tennis ball investigation, we will each practice how we would introducing this investigation to our class ( 2-3 min) • We will also each provide feedback, based on established indicators.

39. Before we begin our Practice • (5 min) Plan your 2-3 min “Teaching a Procedure” practice • Practice the procedure for the tennis ball investigation

40. Completing Feedback Forms • Read indicators on “look for” checklist carefully • Check off all indicators which you have seen demonstrated • Make notes of specific evidence in “strengths” and “Opportunities to Improve” boxes • Provide feedback which is as specific and data based as possible • Take 1 minute to complete the forms before the next practice round begins

41. Oral Feedback • When all practice rounds are completed each persons will provide oral feedback, in turn (1min/person) • Oral feedback should include at least 1 area of strength and no more than 2 opportunities for growth • Be as specific in your suggestions as possible

42. Practice Activity Timing

43. Practice Debrief ( 5 min) • Sharing Strengths • Sharing missed opportunities • Where there any strategies you noted which were especially effective? • Any suggestions offered which you found especially helpful? Next Steps: • Implement what you have learned in your own class and reflect on the effectiveness of your delivery, post your thoughts on the discussion tab in our session wiki.

44. Transition • Finish revising your plans and implement this revised plan and continue to plan instruction strategically. • Reassess science process skills from a lab report to be assigned before Session 12. • The goal is that beyond this course, the (instructional) inquiry process becomes a regular part of your practice rather than a series of worksheets they are required to fill out.

45. Session Agenda

46. Closing • Review Objectives • Review Instructional strategies: tuning protocol • Preview of next session, Session 12: • the focus will shift from unifying concepts to science process skill strategies • you will have time to analyze your third lab report data to determine next steps for instruction. • Review portfolio connections and homework • Complete exit slip!

47. Portfolio Connections • Component 5 --- Planning Strategies (Creating and Implementing an Instructional Plan) • Explain instructional planning process focused on targeting instructional strategies • Artifacts: Instructional planning document and student work samples • Component 2 --- Exploring and Developing Content Area Knowledge and Skill • Address ability to communicate content organization to students

48. Homework • Complete the strategy routine with Handouts 11.13 and 11.14 and bring evidence of strategy implementation for gathering data to Session 12. • Bring a laptop with Excel software on it to use during Session 12, if possible. For Session 12 data analysis: • Collect the lab reports from the investigative lab activity implemented with students since goals were set at Session 9. • Score the second lab reports using the rubrics provided in Session 5 of this course, using a highlighter to mark the criteria met on the rubric. • Bring a printout or electronic copy of the data tracker with new data. • Bring the science process skills respond plan from Session 9. • Select students who have unique intensive support or specific needs that are common to many students. For these students, bring samples of student work, including their lab reports, with the scoring rubrics.

49. Exit Slip Respond to the following: • How did the data analysis protocol help you strengthen your instruction toward closing the achievement gap? • What are your concrete next steps? • How will the practice activity portion of the session benefit your classroom practice? • What portion of the session will have the most impact on your classroom immediately?