Reflections...

I have just finished my first semester of teaching, and I still feel like the world is spinning a bit after getting off of a roller coaster.  Was that fun or scary?  Am I dizzy from the head-whipping pace or the addicting thrill?  The lasting impact of this semester in Biology and Earth Science is yet to be determined, but I know I love teaching, that I am on the right path heading in the right direction, and that I want to improve my craft.  I am grateful to my fellow teachers and my students for the support and inspiration this semester, sad to say goodbye to those inspirations at this school, and very excited for the next school year.

 

For the past month I have been reading Understanding by Design, a gift from my mentor, and it has helped me to articulate my reflections on this semester.  I think my students have gained very little knowledge this semester, but many of them have developed some deep understanding.  That sounds strange,right?  Well, it is a little backwards, but it is my brutally honest diagnosis of my first semester teaching.  In terms of retention of facts, memorization of vocabulary, definitions of processes, or explanation of cycles, my students overall performed very poorly.  When we define knowledge in those terms of (isolated) facts that can be recalled for average evaluation, I failed my students in making that knowledge stick.  I think some knowledge will pop to the front of their minds when the local environmental issues that they requested we study come up in their lives, but for the most part they will not be able to defend themselves in an explination of the fields we studied.  The typical motivation of grades and my cheerleading were not enough to engage some students, and their retention of basic scientific facts was disappointing. 

 

But, the semester overall was not a disappointment because I believe I helped many students develop an understanding of science.  Understanding describes that deeper level of processing and connecting themes and thinking critically.  I think my greatest success this semester is that my students are not afraid of science.  Or at least less afraid, less resentful, and hold less disdain for the subject. They have lost that rejection without justification.  Many of my students can see how science relates to them, and is a part of their daily lives.  And the subject is approachable.  I think that change in mentality is a huge success.  It would be a success anywhere, and especially with the demographics of my students.  After the semester of science, many of my students can make observations, formulate original questions, and identify misconceptions or gaps in their own knowledge.  I think that will be useful to them throughout life, and I think that will move them forward.  I think this type understanding and this aspect of any standard/objective for a science course, which is the most difficult to assess through average evaluations, is very meaningful and important, and is my main accomplishment.  Can I say that my students now think like scientists?  No, that would be too generous.  But have they begun to cultivate scientific thinking and an understanding of how a body of knowledge is developed, that learning is cumulative, that discovery requires inquiry, investigation, and a process of trial and error?  Yes, that I can say with pride.

 

My hope for my students is that is that they believe in themselves, that they know I believed in them, and that they value science.  When they feel curious or interested in a science-related topic, I hope they will recall the skill set and confidence they developed this semester, and that they will explore and discover.  I hope they all invite me to their graduations in the years to come and that they stay out of trouble, and that they become life-longer learners - each in their own way. 

Let's get started

I have decided to start blogging about my experiences, observations, questions, successes and failures in teaching science. I hope to exchange ideas with educators and thinkers that may find themselves on the same wavelength of thought.  I have also been told by my lead teacher that by committing to sharing ideas through this forum that I can move forward in my own professional development and hopefully achieve the ultimate goal of doing better for my own students.  In my classroom, I see and embrace the second law of thermodynamics in action everyday.  The tendency of my class is towards complexity (not chaos!) just like the topics my students are learning about, and that is a wonderful thing, which is why I will call this blog Positive Entropy Classroom.

The question that drives me, in teaching and blogging, is this: how do we teach science in an age where humans are the dominate force on the planet?   As both a student and a teacher, the most compelling issues have always been the diverse ways that people interact with the natural world.  You could put that in fewer words by just saying ‘the environment’, but that is too simple.  All of the natural sciences explain different phenomena of nature, and the nexus of human life and those phenomena is the theme I am talking about. I am teaching, and living, in a time in geologic history that is called the anthropocene era– or the age of man.  Since we are living in an era named after us, I am beginning to wonder if we need to teach science differently to reflect the powerful role humans are playing on this planet.  Global environmental change is one of the most pressing and urgent issues facing our planet today, so this theme can be easily woven and is accessible to student.  I believe that weaving this thread in the science education of students will help in student learning, engagement, and empowerment, and I am in the process of finding out if that is true.

This blog is part of my effort to create discussion around my questions and share experiences in validating or rejecting this hypothesis.  Teaching these themes of human-nature interactions within the tradition science disciplines of chemistry and biology is complex.  This is why I view the state of my classroom as high entropy, and high complexity, as a positive.  I hope that my + Entropy Classroom just might help prepare my students for the next generation of scientific problems.  I look forward to sharing this experiment in the best way to teach science in the anthropocene era.