Class 1 (Lisa Oliverio)

Gunckle Reading:

Finding patterns in experiences is an important scientific practice (Anderson, 2003). Scientists are engaged in a collaborative enterprise to explain how our world works (Gunckel, 2010).

The Gunckel piece elicits the idea and importance of classroom scientists collaborating and working through inquiry-based situations and explorations. However, educators often place science on the low priority, the back-burner, classroom filler category, neglecting the subject that actually allows children to ultimately explore their curiosity, ask questions and become critical problem solvers. Students need experience where they can explore such curiosity using hands-on and minds-on learning through inquiry, make connections and discover patterns, thus allowing students to make their own conclusions and explanations. With this students will become more invested and thus more motivated in inquiry based lessons. In such an environment, students will be acting like scientists themselves, investing time and effort into coming up with conclusions and see their curiosity shift from explorations to discoveries. Another valuable piece of inquiry based science learning is the emphasis on collaboration. In this way, students will benefit from learning and observing through others and working together as a team to become critical scientific problem solvers themselves.

As I read through this piece and noted the importance of self-discovery, I began to imagine my classroom this year. I have often heard my teacher discuss the need for students to read in content areas. Does an inquiry-based science classroom leave room for such instructional tools? Is this avenue within science learning important to consider when thinking of my own classroom in the future?

Ready, Set, Science! Reading:

“Science as practice involves doing something and learning something in such a way that the doing and the learning cannot really be separated.” (Michaels, Shouse, et al., 2007)

As students learn through inquiry, they are essentially practicing “doing” and then learning from their own doing. It is particularly interesting that this piece discusses that students who are engaged in scientific practice and inquiry not only learn about the content but also are developing process or social skills as well. Students are then able to apply and generate explanations to come to better understanding about the world.

While reading the biodiversity project, I noticed the rich experiences of the students through inquiry based learning as well the integration of other subjects within the science fieldwork. This allows students to make connections among subjects, building enthusiasm and motivation. Integrated curriculum provides meaningful learning experiences while building conceptual understanding and relationships.

I did find myself questioning the reasons for the order of the strands. It seems as through scientific inquiry based learning would begin with participating productively in science in order to generate evident, understand explanations and reflect on knowledge acquired.