What is the role of practical activities in primary science teaching?

John Cripps Clark

Deakin University

jcc@deakin.edu.au

Paper presented to the annual conference of AARE, Brisbane, 1-5 December 2002.

Abstract

Practical activities are a central feature of science teaching. The roles of practical activities in science teaching can be classified into:

• acquiring information, concepts and principles; • developing process skills; • learning about the nature of science; and • improving attitudes to science.

Learning science concepts is seen as the most important role in many discussions but there is little evidence that practical activities contribute to the learning of concepts. If practical activities do not contribute to the learning of concepts then it is likely that they are serving other purposes and it is worth doing a naturalistic case study to investigate the role of practical activities in the context of a sequence of lessons, before we either abandon practical activities or prescribe a 'better' way of using them. This research plugs a hole by looking at science teaching: as it is currently being practised (without intervention or the selection of a preferred mode of teaching) in primary schools (secondary and tertiary teaching is usually examined) and in the context of a sequence of lessons.

In order to understand what it is possible to accomplish through the use of practical activities in a primary science classroom, four exemplary primary teachers of science were selected using recommendation by science teacher educators. The schools were in Victoria and N.S.W. and included a rural school, a school in a regional centre and two metropolitan schools, in a middle class and a working class area. The research used videotape and observations of a unit of science lessons work running for a term together with interviews with teachers and students.

The observations appear to confirm studies of secondary and tertiary science teaching: that there was seldom any direct transfer from the practical activities to the students learning of concepts but that practical activities almost always improve student's attitudes to and enjoyment of science; that process skills can be effectively taught by practical activities; and that practical activities also seems to be involved in learning about the nature of science but a longer time period than a term would be needed, probably tracking a small number of students.

Practical activities were observed to provide a common set of experiences which can be used in discussions, both whole class and individually, to link practical activities with other parts of the lessons. These connections to the practical activities are also facilitated by clarity in communicating the purpose, key ideas and procedures of the lesson as a whole and the practical activities in particular; consciously balancing the space and time during practical activities between specific objectives and free investigation; and recording of activities in terms of concepts. Finally, it is important not to forget the effect of practical activities on attitudes and motivation as this is the one thing that practical activities reliably achieve.

Although the four teachers in this study had quite different teaching styles and lesson organisation they all felt isolated as primary teachers of science. This research highlights the need for further consideration of the needs of primary teachers who have a particular interest and expertise in teaching science and of ways to create a community in which the ideas and experiences of primary teachers of science can be shared.

The research was done in two parts: first a pilot study, current primary science practice (cpsp), to try and get a feel for the way science is taught in primary schools in Victoria, N.S.W. and the A.C.T., followed by an in study of a term-long unit of science teaching done by four teachers at four different schools in Victoria and N.S.W.

Current primary science practice (cpsp)

Very little has been published about the amount and nature science teaching in Australian primary schools and that which has is based on written surveys completed by teachers and principals at a sample of schools. The research that has been reported is based on written surveys completed by teachers and principals at a sample of schools and suggests that a minimum of 1hour of science is done each week. There is, however, anecdotal evidence that in the majority of primary schools science is taught infrequently and there is little direct evidence of the nature of the science teaching. It is difficult to gauge the amount and nature of primary science teaching because in primary schools: science is often integrated with other subject areas thus the amount of science taught can vary widely from lesson to lesson; one teacher is teaching many subjects and doing many activities with the students, science may be taught incidentally at other times; for example during show and tell; the relative importance and teaching style of science varies widely between teachers; in schools the normal routine is rarely normal and never routine, there are numerous disruptions and intended subjects are not taught; and surveys are often better at gauging intentions than actions.

Thus self reporting surveys may not give the whole story.

Method

Eight schools were chosen so as to cover a wide variety of Australian primary schools, selected on the basis of personal contacts. Fourteen lessons were observed taught by twelve teachers (Tables 1 & 2).

Table 1

Distribution of schools visited

State Location Type No. of students

Victoria 3 Metropolitan 6 Government 5 >500 2

A.C.T. 3 Regional city 1 Catholic 2 500-150 3

N.S.W. 2 Rural 2 Independent 1 <150 3

Table 2

Description of schools visited

State Location Type No of classes observed

No of teachers observed

Comments

S A.C.T. Metropolitan Catholic 1 1 Large, boys, K-12 College

T Vic. Rural Government 2 2 K-12 College

E A.C.T. Metropolitan Independent 2 1 Small recently established Christian school

L Vic. Metropolitan Government 2 2 Medium sized middle class

H A.C.T. Metropolitan Government 3 3 Medium sized middle class

P N.S.W. Rural Government 1 1 Two teacher school

F Vic. Metropolitan Catholic 1 1 Medium sized middle class

A N.S.W. Regional city

Government 3 1 Small working class school, 20% aboriginal

Each school was visited for one day during which I:

• met with the science coordinator about the science program in the school, collect a copy of any school policy and curriculum documents and look at science resources and facilities (approx 30 min);

• observed up to three science lessons or lessons which involve a component of science. These were, as far as possible, the lessons that would normally occur at this time; and

• interviewed up to three classroom teachers, including the teachers of the two lessons observed (approx 30 min).

The interview was unscripted but covered: the lesson observed, the teachers attitudes to the use of activities and how the teachers use planning documents within the school.

The science coordinator selected the teachers in each school so that a range of grades was covered. The choice of teachers was restricted to those who are teaching a science lesson on the day of the visit and are available for the discussion.

Results

The ubiquity of practical activities in primary science lessons can be seen by structure of the lessons observed (Table 3). The lessons fell fairly naturally into three parts; the introduction and conclusion were divided into procedural (organisation and discipline) and time actually spent on science. The practical activities I have separated out the time students had for free investigation because the division between teacher and student directed activity is important to understand the students' experience of science.

Table 3

Structure of the science lessons observed

S T1 T2 E1 E2 E3 L H1 H2 H3 P F1 F2 A1 A2 Average

minutes min %

Introduction Review 1 5 0 1

Procedural 12 2 4 6 5 4 3 9 15 2 4 10 6 5 6 12

Conceptual 5 8 4 2 10 3 9 23 9 17 29 7 5 9 18

Activity Practical activities

17 10 15 13 37 10 18 25 20 32 31 9 15 17 34

Free investigatn

6 0 1

Watching video

2 2 6 7 7 5 2 2 4

Conclusion Procedural 5 20 9 5 18 3 7 3 3 1 9 5 3 6 12

Recording 20 1 3

Discussion & reporting

13 18 7 3 21 14 8 1 15 10 10 8 16

total time 54 48 53 42 65 48 34 44 48 45 56 59 68 42 38 50

The two lessons, which did not contain practical activities, were described by the teachers as atypical. In L a video was viewed instead of a practical activities and in A1 the teacher

had a number of extra students in her class, spent most of her time in discipline. While this does not indicate the proportion of primary science lessons that contain practical activities, since my presence would have altered what was taught, it does show that teachers of primary science have a strong preference for including practical activities in the science lessons that they teach.

A review of the previous lesson only occurred only in two lessons (once for less than a minute). This points to the unconnected nature of science teaching in primary schools. Most of the teachers spoke of the way that the lesson observed arose out of the previous lessons but this was not in evidence in practice.

Conclusion

One of the assumptions of this research has been the centrality of practical activities to science teaching. It is worth periodically re-examining assumptions and, if nothing else the current primary science practice project has confirmed the importance of practical activities to teachers of primary science. In this sample practical activities occurred in most lessons and occupied one third of classtime.

As far as the one of the primary aims: to gauge the amount and nature of primary science teaching, this project has been a failure. It is difficult to randomly interrogate the practice or even the amount of science teaching in primary schools. You cannot for ethical and practical reasons, randomly visit schools, unannounced. Teachers naturally want to please and will preferentially teach science when they know you are visiting the school. The science taught and its manner of teaching will be affected by the observer's presence.

The structure and organisation of science lessons was remarkably uniform as were the difficulties experienced by teachers trying to teach science.

Role of practical activities in prmary science teaching (ropa)

The role of practical activities in primary science teaching was a study that examined four exemplary teachers of science in primary schools. The teachers were selected by recommendation and personal contacts. Two of the teachers were classroom teachers, one was a classroom teacher who took all the science lessons for her grade level and one was a specialist science teacher for the whole school. The schools were all government but represented a variety of environments in Victoria and N.S.W. (Table 4).

Table 4

Description of schools

State Location Type No. of students

Grade level

Comments

Pastoral Central (PC)

N.S.W. Rural Government 43 3-6 Prosperous rural, near regional city

Sylvan Stream (SS)

Vic. Metropolitan Government 420 5-6 Middle class

North Eastern (NE)

Vic. Regional city

Government 390 6 Middle class

Black Nob (BN)

Vic. Metropolitan Government 250 3-4 Working class

In each classroom all science lessons and science related lessons were videotaped during a term. The teacher was fitted with a radiomicrophone and a shotgun microphone was used to capture what was said within a group of students. The teacher was interviewed at the beginning, middle and end of the unit and the students in the group videotaped was interviewed in the middle and at the end of the unit. When lessons moved into the playground they were followed and two of the classes went to museums during the term and these also were videotaped.

The following descriptions examine the structure of the units taught at the four schools

Pastoral Central

Description of the school

Pastoral Central is a two teacher, rural state school in the NSW, close to a major regional city. The school is set amongst forest trees, including a small forest in the school grounds, overlooking a verdant mixed agricultural valley. The school consisted of two buildings: the old brick schoolhouse containing the library, computer room, office and kitchen with the permanent prefab. containing the two classrooms joined by walkway. There is a lunchshed, a toilet block and a large grassed area. Students mostly come from surrounding farms. The school is divided into two classes: Kindergarten (in Victoria Prep) to Grade 2 and grade 3-6. The principal teaches the senior class and the junior was shared between two teachers. There is also a part-time librarian and part-time administrative secretary.

I: Can you describe the school?

PH: Pretty much an even balance between boys and girls, enrolment 43. Overall the children are fairly homogeneous; there aren't any cultural disparities; there aren't significant differences in beliefs and values to do with the school and therefore when it comes to organisation because most people are running along the same track we are able to have programs implemented quite quickly and without any other deliberation because people do have those values and beliefs. (PC A1.2)

Description of the unit

The science unit during term 3 was weather. Over a six-week period 26 distinct science lessons were taught ranging in length from 4 to 50 minutes. The lessons averaged 23 minutes but divided naturally into short (5 to 10 minute) and longer (20 to 50 minute) lessons. During the six weeks science was taught on roughly half the school days for an average of just under 40 minutes each day often broken into two or three distinct activities. There was no set time or day for science lessons.

The unit followed a trajectory of starting with a few lessons and building up to seven lessons in the central week and then reducing to one lesson in each of the final two weeks.

The science program runs on a four year rolling cycle (there have been two cycles while Philip has been teaching at Pastoral Central) because the class contains students from years 3 to 6.

It makes it more interesting because if you have touched on the weather five years ago you can leave that go; you can go exploring a bit more myself into some other area. It does create a further stimulus for the teacher instead of going: the weather, the weather, the weather which would pretty boring. So this way it does come through at the right time for the teacher and with that enthusiasm you are able to carry that on to the students. (PC A1.7)

Table 5

Science lessons taught in weather unit at Pastoral Central.

Date (99)

Dur. (min)

Activity Description

13/10 (30)* Worksheet: recording own ideas

Recorded in workbook (2p with illustrations)

14/10 (20)* Worksheet: brainstorming questions about the weather

Recorded as an amalgamated list of 21 questions by the teacher. Used in rest of the unit, notably to design the worksheets

18/10 4 Worksheet activity: What is weather?

Reading from Guinness book of Records: extreme weather examples, first discussion of "What is weather?" - volcanoes, earthquakes and tidal waves

18/10 19 Measurements Testing thermometer in shade and sun, discussing measurement techniques

18/10 7 Worksheets Introducing: assessment criteria, reading about condensation, mild bottle description, cloud types

18/10 4 Measurements Whether to measure temp in sun or shade & cloud cover discussed.

22/10 4 Measurements

22/10 27 Anemometers Discussion, four designs suggested by students, Stuarts selected. Constructed and tested anemometers made using ping pong balls, string and protractors

25/10 27 Anemometers Investigate relationship between length of string and displacement of the ping-pong ball

25/10 21 Worksheets Definitions of weather terms

25/10 6 Wind explanation Teacher reading from book, using gesture, specific questions, leads into (incorrect) explanation of vapour trails, then recapitulation

27/10 11 Measurements Raining heavily, very quick by three boys recorded on board, teacher elaborates on measuring windspeed (ping-pong ball anemometer mentioned) and cloud types.

27/10 39 Worksheets Introduction discussing why rain is cold, how wind is produced, difference between tornadoes & hurricanes; reading to class about a rain of fish in middle of work.

27/10 9 Worksheets Teacher reads article about hurricanes and tornadoes

28/10 5 Measurements

28/10 50 Measurements Introduced with whole class discussion of types of graphs then individual work on worksheets and then graphs

29/10 42 Worksheets: Group presentation on weather question

Introduction, then group preparation of talk/demonstration answering one of the weather questions, then presentation to class.

1/11 14 Memory game Whole class. Round the circle cumulatively adding weather words. (Also revisits 'what is weather?')

1/11 52 Worksheets Individual work. Includes going through answers

1/11 3 What is weather? Report on tidal waves/earthquakes/volcanoes

3/11 49 Weather maps Includes: discussion, demonstration and Met website. Concepts of air pressure discussed

4/11 17 Measurements Discussion of results

5/11 44 Weather maps Design own weather map then present to class

10/11 29 Worksheets: Poster on weather terms

Working in groups each with a different self selected term

10/11 10 Worksheets: Poster presentation

At assembly to K-2's

19/11 46 Instruments: Design task

Instrument for measuring wind speed and/or direction. In pairs or singly and then four groups selected by teacher to present to the class

25/11 1:30 Science museum During a three day excursion to Brisbane. Included a half hour talk/demonstration by museum staff (with other school groups) and two half hour free time exploring exhibits

25/11 1:30 Queensland museum

During a three day excursion to Brisbane. In groups of half a dozen, accompanied by an adult, completing worksheets

The activities fell into four distinct but interrelated strands:

• Measurements: this consisted of students going out into the school grounds and recording: rainfall (from a rainguage set up in the grounds for this unit), temperature (shade), cloud cover, cloud type, wind direction and speed. The measurements were introduced by a whole class discussion and concluded with lessons in which the measurements were graphed and then discussed.

• Instruments: Construction and testing of an anemometer and design of an instrument to measure wind speed and/or direction.

• Worksheets: The core of the unit was a booklet of worksheets which was constructed by the teacher from a questions about the weather generated by the students. This was preceded by the students recording prior knowledge in a two-page spread in their workbooks. Worksheets were done individually during classtime and when completed there was a whole-class discussion of answers.

• Worksheet activities: These arose directly from the worksheets and included: weather maps, word game, explanations by the teacher and definitional issues such as whether tidal wave, earthquakes and volcanoes were weather.

The worksheets were seen as the main component of the unit by both the teacher and students. The way the activities related to each other; drew from or built apon previous lessons is shown in the Figure 1. The classification into science, practical activities, technology, mathematics and language is somewhat arbitrary since most activities contain elements of a number of components; certainly the anemometer was both a practical activity and a technology activity

Descriptions of elements of the unit:

What is weather-definitions: volcanoes, earthquakes, tidal waves, hurricanes, tornadoes and twisters

The question of whether volcanoes, tidal waves, earthquakes were weather and what was the difference between tornados, hurricanes and twisters was raised early in the class discussions. The teacher withheld any resolution of the question and encouraged students to express different views, partly because he was not sure. The questions were finally resolved by reference to books by the students, directed by the teacher.

For example even last week on the Friday when I did the first one and we were saying what about tornados and twisters. And actually I was a little unclear about that myself: what is the difference between a tornado and a twister? Well the books are currently showing there are no differences. A twister is just called a twister because it twists trees around and twists around itself and it has a twisting shape, but it's still a tornado. Is that the case? Is that the case in all the literature or is there somewhere different? (PC A1.12)

Anemometer

In this series of two lessons of about 25 minutes on Friday and the following Monday, the first discussed four designs for an instrument to measure windspeed, the construction of a ping pong ball anemometer and testing it and in the following lesson investigating the relationship between the length of string and displacement of the ping pong ball.

Philip described the ping-pong ball anemometer as arising from student interests.

I: [using] the ping-pong ball for the anemometer?

Philip: Well that came in from the reading. Stuart actually saw it in one of the books and thought that's a good idea and that stuck in his mind already. This is where the lit. search comes in very handy in developing these ideas. (PC A1.13)

for example, Stuart turns over the page and sees the protractor dangling down, and I saw that he saw that. When he made that suggestion straight away I knew where he had got that suggestion. (PC A1.28)

If they are more interested in this one area, as they seem to be, albeit guided purely Stuart because he is the leader of the group. Now Stuart takes a major role in a lot of things; if Stuart says something then the others will follow; he's a leader. So if Stuart is more bent to using a ping pong ball with the protractor as the anemometer then the others will also be guided into that way too. (PC A1.34)

My observations would describe the process in a slightly different manner (much more teacher directed):

Stuart saw the ping-pong ball anemometer in a book he was reading. Philip who was standing behind him pointed it out to Stuart.

Philip initiated a whole class discussion on how to measure windspeed. He linked it to the weather observations they were making at the time.

Four different methods were suggested. Philip gave time for each student to elaborate their idea (2-3 minutes, with questions (2-3) from the class and Philip). The class listened attentively to all the suggestions

a cup anemometer attached to a bike speed meter

a tube that funnels the wind to a fan

a folded paper pinwheel

a ping-pong ball anemometer (Stuart)

Philip chose the ping-pong ball anemometer as the model that they would construct. The class tacitly accepted this choice.

Philip looked around classroom for equipment and found the protractors and string

Philip asks anyone who has ping-pong balls to bring them in. He buys a packet of ping-pong balls over the weekend

Ping-pong ball anemometers are constructed in small groups, self-selected roughly according to year level.

Ping-pong ball anemometers tested outside

Discussion of problems both in small groups outside and in whole class discussion at end of lesson. Issues raised included the repeatability of measurements, converting the angular displacement to windspeed, comparability of instruments and the effect of the length of the string.

Philip privileges the length of the string as the problem for the next lesson

What you are trying to figure out on is: when the wind blows the ball does it have to blow it further if the string is longer; does it have to blow it further if the string is longer? If it is shorter does it only have to blow it a little way? But if the string's really long it has to blow a long way to get to 80* whereas if the string is short it only has to blow it a little distance to get to 80*. So the length of the string is an important factor. (Philip talking to two year 6 girls, PC H3 10:20: 40)

Weather maps

During the interviews the only time that Philip mentioned learning concepts or skills was with respect to the weather maps.

But at the same time I hope they get the concepts of, at the end of the unit: reading a weather map, recognising that the lines actually mean something on a map, that there are cold fronts and warm fronts, that clouds, that there could be some likelihood of some prediction (even the weatherman gets it wrong a lot of the time). (PC A1.50)

Figure 1 Relationship of lessons in the weather unit

Notes on Figure 6.1 (and diagrams of the relationship between lessons in subsequent sections):

1. Although all lessons were science lessons the colour coding indicates the primary learning focus of the lesson.

2. Arrows indicate that science concepts or skills have been taken from one lesson and used in the next lesson.

3. The four column categories of lesson type were extrapolated from the four units observed.

• Observing and measuring objects such as bones or organs or phenomenon such as the weather, this includes manipulation such as dissection and recording either visually or numerically.

• Experimenting is where science ideas are developed and tested by using practical activities. This includes investigating tricks such as why a card is held onto the bottom of an upended glass of water and the relationship between heart rate, breathing and exercise.

• Designing and constructing and testing models or instruments such as anemometers, rockets, robots, lungs, pinwheels and parachutes.

• Researching is the obtaining and communicating scientific information primarily using text resources (books or internet). This includes worksheets, making posters or preparing and presenting talks

There are two observations that arise from considering Figure 6.3.:

the practical activities were almost completely separate to the worksheets; and

the practical activities related closely to mathematics and technology activities whereas the worksheets related to language activities.

In primary schools since literacy is at the heart of teaching it is only natural that most activities relate closely to language; whereas science has always been inextricably linked to both mathematics and technology.

North Eastern Primary School

Description of the school

North Eastern is a medium sized (about 400 students) state school in a middle class suburb of a Victorian regional city. Catherine is, at present, a specialist teacher of science for all classes across the school. Lessons run for an hour and are held in the library that is in a modern annex attached to the main school building that was built in the 20's. There is a large oval behind the school where the rockets were set off and the children exercised for the exercise-pulse rate activity.

Description of the teacher

Catherine is an example of aspects of a secondary science ethos in a primary teacher.

I had completed the two-year postgrad. so I've got a science degree and I had wanted to do science teaching at secondary school but I got offered the primary position as a science specialist and I thought that's good, that's taking the best of both worlds: no discipline as a science specialist, teaching in a manner similar to secondary schools (NE TI 1.11)

I suppose I follow a fairly basic format where I have this five to ten minutes of talk at the start, then I have hands on activities, then I like to have a closure at the end. That was fairly set and fairly dry when I first started. I am trying to change that and I am trying to bring a little more demonstration into the discussion at the start. (NE TI 1.11)

Catherine audits her topics were against the Curriculum and Standards Framework (CSF), usually during reporting to check that all the outcomes are covered

After I had finished term 1 and I realised that I had completed one of the biological outcomes and not the other, I thought: Oh where else can that fit in,

in light of what I want to do and I thought if I just put a slightly different emphasis in this aspect. (NE TI 2.10)

Catherine's discipline based approach science is again reflected in her organisation and selection of topics. When she started teaching she organised topics into the categories of: Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Environmental and taught topics so that over a year all discipline areas were covered. Now that CSF2 is organised on discipline lines: Physics, Chemistry, Biology and Earth and Space, Catherine finds it much easier to use.

But this is the first year that I've been as structured as that in terms of CSF. Other years I'd do it and look at what CSF outcomes were and then that would be how it would fall. But I find that the structure of the new CSF and the fact that they have reduced the number of outcomes required so that the ones that are left are probably the most important, the most crucial or even some of them are much broader in the wording so that you can interpret them fairly broadly into what you are doing. (NE TI 2.11)

Description of the unit

The dissection unit consisted of eight lessons, an introduction, five dissections, an experiment on respiration and pulse rate, and a concluding exercise. The unit was paralleled by extension units that were done in groups of six during the lunch hour. Two extension units were done during this term: constructing and testing a rocket and a robot.

Table 6 Science lessons taught in the dissection unit at North Eastern P.S.

Date (01)

Dur. min.

Activity Description

23/4 58 Introduction - body organ sheet

Photocopied sheet with body outline and separate organs given to students who cut out organs, glue into outline, colour and write descriptions of role of each organ.

30/4 60 Heart dissection

2/5 53 Rocketry extension

Balloon race

7/5 57 Kidney dissection

7/5-10/5

National Science Week

Family science-activity sheet sent home; science Quiz-identification quiz in library; science Fair-student demonstration/display challenge

9/5 43 Rocketry extension

Constructing rocket 1

21/5 58 Eye dissection

23/5 47 Rocketry extension

Constructing rocket 2

28/5 53 Rocketry extension

Firing rocket

28/5 55 The full pluck

4/6 58 Brain dissection

13/6 47 Robotics extension

Construction 1

18/6 62 Respiration-Pulse rate-exercise

Students, in small groups, measured rate of breathing and pulse before, immediately after, 5 minutes after and 10 minutes after running twice around the oval.

19/6 48 Robotics extension

Construction 2

20/6 45 Robotics extension

Construction 3

25/6 55 Full body map

25/6 51 Robotics extension

Construction & testing

Figure 2. Relationship of lessons in the dissection unit, NE

Sylvan Stream

Description of the school

Sylvan Stream is a set in the heart of the Eastern Suburbs of Melbourne in a bushland setting close to a creek. It consists of three long blocks build in the sixties with classrooms running off a long corridor that runs down the spine. Winsome's classroom is at the end of a block that contains the classroom and administration.

Description of the teacher

Winsome is an experienced grade 6 classroom teacher. She takes the science lessons for all three grade six classes with the other teachers taking other lessons. Lessons were 90 minutes long and the activities invariably ran for more than one lesson although they were usually planned to be single lesson activities.

Description of the unit

The unit started and ended with two paper based tasks to elicit knowledge: drawing body parts onto a body outline and a concept map. In between there were three major activities; observing, drawing and discussing bones of a real half skeleton in groups of four; designing and performing an experiment on respiration and heart rates in pairs; and producing and presenting a poster on a self selected body system in pairs. In the last week of term grade six went to the Melbourne Museum to visit, amongst others, the body and mind gallery.

Table 7

Science lessons taught in the body systems unit at Sylvan Stream

Date (01)

Dur. min.

Activity Description

8/2 90* Introduction - drawing body parts

Drawing body parts and/or systems on a photocopied sheet titled 'The Skeleton'

30/4 90 Bones - pt 1 Observing, drawing and discussing real half skeleton

2/5 90 Bones - pt 2 As above + Paper skeleton

1/3 90 Circulation & respiration pt1

Design and conduct an experiment about the circulatory and/or respiration systems

15/3 90 Circulation & respiration pt 2

(Continuation of above)

19/3 60 Circulation & respiration experiment pt 3

Conclusion and discussion

22/3 90 Research on body systems pt 1

Working in pairs students produce a poster and presentation to the class on a body system of their

choice

29/3 Research on body systems pt 2

(Continuation of above)

3/4 Museum excursion Melbourne museum, mind-body gallery

5/4 Concept map Individually drew a concept map of the unit as a poster

Figure 3 Relationship of lessons in body systems unit, Sylvan Stream

Black Nob

Description of the school

Black Nob is a medium sized school in a large double storied building built in the thirties. It is set in a working class area in Melbourne and draws its students from the local community. The class was a composite grade 3 and 4 but included two children who were moderately intellectually disabled, one of whom had an integration aid.

Description of the teacher

Sally has only been teaching in this school, and the state system, for a year and has previously been teaching in small independent, alternative schools. She does not have a science background but has developed an interest and expertise in teaching science during her years of primary teaching. She is strongly committed to practical activity and teaching science concepts and engages in substantial whole-class discussions before and after the practical activity.

Description of the unit

The unit was based around the concept that air can exert a force. There were seven lessons of about an hour long but running for longer if the lesson required. Lessons started with whole class discussion, followed by a practical activity and then whole class discussion and often recording, usually as a labelled diagram.

Table 8

Science lessons taught in the air unit at Black Nob.

Date (01)

Dur. min.

Activity Description

1/8 57 Finger on the hole Introduction - how can we tell air can push; activity - finger on the hole; recording - concept map.

8/8 46 Plastic bag of air Filling a plastic bag with air, tying off and seeing how much weight it can bear.

15/8 63 Tissue in the cup Keeping paper dry under water and pushing down a floating boat

22/8 95 Windmills (morning & afternoon) Construction and testing of a pinwheel using paper, nail and wooden rod.

29/8 56 Holding card under jar

Filling jar with water, putting on a card and turning upside.

5/9 86 Parachutes Constructing and testing

12/9 unseen Syringe plungers Connecting two syringes and observing how they push each other

Figure 4 Relationship of lessons in air unit, Black Nob

Conclusions

It is worth considering the figures showing the relationships between the lessons between the lessons in each unit were described. To compare the overall pattern the figures are reproduced above, much reduced, on one diagram (Figure 5).

The immediate question that arises is to what extent are the obvious differences between the units are a result the teacher or of the topic; how do the teaching style, which depends on the individual teacher and their class and the epistemology and practicalities of the particular science topic interact to affect the way a unit is taught.

Figure 5 Comparison of the four units observed

Show and tell as a venue for incidental science

Not all science occurs in the formal science lessons. Philip acknowledged the science that students bring from their experiences outside the classroom.

From home, the children do bring a lot from their discoveries at home. For example wheels and bearings: Cameron and Stuart have developed a billy cart for the billy cart derby at Bangalow. And they are very much into the discovery of motion and movement; so they'd have a great understanding of cogs even gears and pulley and motion and things like this. I feel that I know where they get that knowledge from: from their father, in this case, because he's really into metal and building these particular shapes, these experiments. (PC A1.19)

It has been suggested that, in primary classrooms, just as other KLA's are integrated into the science lesson, science is taught and learnt outside science lessons. Show and tell has been posited as a venue for this incidental science. The evidence from this study would not support this suggestion. For example in one of the show and tell lessons that was videotaped (PC H4.47) all but two of the items involved significant science content but this was not pursued by either the teacher or the other students. This appeared to be partly because of the pressures of time and also because other learning agendas, notably social and emotional, were the focus.

Table 9

Show and tell items at Pastoral Central, 18/10/99

Items with science content Teachers response

Pepper got attacked by RJ and she died Students feeling

Fishing - whiting and dolphins Dads secret fishing spot

Lismore show - bumper cars and bull How did you feel

Handling wild horse at home (no response)

Kitten getting a tick and dying Type of tick

Dog getting paralysis tick and getting antivenom - almost died

That's good it got better

Black eel at the golf-course Where exactly did you find it

Dead brown snake on the way to school (no response)

Playing on the seesaw and bumping nose Did you enjoy yourself

Disruptions

One of the characteristics of Australian schools are the disruptions that occur to the classroom teaching program . Understanding these disruptions not only clarify some of the observations of the unit (for instance why it was concentrated into a few weeks) but also, of themselves, reveal information about the experience of teaching and learning in an Australian primary school.

There were a number of disruptions during the term that caused the cancellation, postponement or reduction of science lessons:

School concert preparation

Swimming

Principal release and conference

Brisbane excursion and preparation for excursion

LOTE - problems with the availability of the teacher who came in to teach Indonesian

I know I was pretty pressed for time because the children really love their sport and at the same time we're trying to go through our plays because there is only four weeks to that, there's a lot of learning to do for that. So I'm trying to squash more things in at this time and still give each one its own priority. ... I've got to keep it moving along. (Philip, PC A1.61)

As the school concert (17/11) approached the opportunity for science lessons reduced and lessons became shorter to accommodate practice. The swimming program running, every afternoon for two weeks simultaneously with the concert practices also impinged on science lessons.

The unit was concentrated into a five-week period because of the Brisbane excursion. This was a three-day trip to Brisbane and one of the major activities for the year. It caused not only the disruption of that week but, because of preparation, the preceding week only had one science lesson.

Although two science related activities were conducted during the excursion, visits to the Science Museum and the Queensland museum, these were not related to the weather unit and are discussed elsewhere

Status of science in primary schools

The status and collegiality of the science teacher in the primary school was a subtext in many of the conversations. Kaye at Alphaville P.S. (cpsp), a first year out teacher, was employed because of her Japanese teaching qualifications, replacing a teacher of Japanese, but after she was hired was required to teach science for half of her load. She had not taught or studied science before taking up the position. Conversely, Catherine of North Eastern P.S. (ropa) was required to teach Japanese for a year with no previous experience in Japanese even though she was a science specialist.

Catherine: Last year I was at [the university] part time; I did science the first half of the year and Japanese the second half.

I: I didn't know you had those skills.

Catherine: I don't. ... Were my talents being best used teaching Japanese? (NE TI1.52).

This commutative relationship suggests that it is not seen that science and Japanese require specialist training or skills but rather teaching is often seen as a generic skill independent of discipline. A consideration of the different epistemologies even within the discipline of science should alert us to the difficulties of teaching across disciplines even at the primary level.

All the teachers felt isolated as teachers of science in the primary school. They felt that there was little support of their science teaching by their colleagues or the school. They felt that there was no community of practice among primary science teachers to provide support, information and resources. This year only one of these four exemplary teachers of primary science is still in the classroom teaching. As Catherine who has subsequently left teaching said:

Even those teachers who teach science, they still don't see that as a priority; they still don't see it as third place to language and maths. There's language and maths, top priority, science is one of six other areas. Whereas the government is saying that science is up there just behind literacy and numeracy and that's why there is such a big push. But at this school doesn't see it as that. For years I've trying to make science one of the priorities. When we did our charter, I tried to get science as one of the charter priorities, or at least one of the charter goals and it's never been written up into anything, as a goal or a priority or anything and I don't understand why. In fact when staffing was really tough, back in about 95, I had teachers complaining about ... it was the last year I did science as a specialist area. One of the teachers sat in the staffroom and said: "With money so tight, how can you afford to have a science specialist?" She didn't say: "How can we afford to have an art specialist, or a library specialist?" It's much more comfortable now, people support the idea of science, but only while it fits in with the school, the school's timetable. (NE TI1.51)

Building a community of practice among teachers of primary science is an important and continuing component in improving the science that primary students experience.

My apologies the references were lost in transit. If you want them email me.