PBL in Science and Technology

 

This article and its links originally appeared on http://www.designworlds.com/techscape/Sherm_ArticleLinks.html

PBL IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY:
A CASE STUDY OF PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Sherman Rosenfeld
and
Yehuda Ben-Hur
Department of Science Teaching
Weizmann Institute of Science
Rehovot, Israel

 

Project-Based Learning (PBL) is “a teaching and learning model that focuses on the central concepts and principals of a discipline, involves students in problem-solving and other meaningful tasks, allows students to work autonomously to construct their own learning, and culminates in realistic, student-generated products” (Thomas, et al., 1999).

Despite the educational potential of PBL, it is clear that without providing proper attention to teacher development and school change, actualizing this potential will remain a dream (e.g., Marx, et al., 1997).

Our case study focuses on one approach to the professional development of science and technology in regard to PBL. First, we present the rationale and goals of our approach. Next, we describe the context, population and methods of our case study.

Continue reading “PBL in Science and Technology”

An Exploration into the Learning Styles of Teachers and Their Students

This article and its links originally appeared on http://www.designworlds.com/techscape/Sherm_ArticleLinks.html

UNDERSTANDING THE “SURPRISES” IN PBL:
AN EXPLORATION INTO THE LEARNING STYLES OF TEACHERS AND THEIR STUDENTS

Rosenfeld, M.
Department of Psychology
Tilburg University
Tilburg, The Netherlands

and

Rosenfeld, S.
Department of Science Teaching
Weizmann Institute of Science
Rehovot, Israel

Background and Aims

Veteran observers of project-based learning (PBL) have anecdotally noted the phenomenon of student “surprises,” when teachers are pleasantly surprised that some of their academically-weak students perform well on research projects.

The intent of our pilot study was to better understand the nature of these “surprises.” Our guiding questions were, “What characterizes students who perform poorly in conventional classrooms, yet do well in PBL environments?” and “What characterizes teachers who are surprised at the improvement of these students?”

We decided to investigate this phenomenon as a function of the learning styles of teachers and their students (Pask, 1988). We hypothesized that (a) academically low-achieving students who did well in PBL would prefer applied, discovery, technical, or creative (confluent) processing, and that in contrast, (b) their surprised teachers would have learning styles that stressed a preference for acquisition of serialized, factual knowledge.

Continue reading “An Exploration into the Learning Styles of Teachers and Their Students”

An “Interlocking Loops” Model to Support Teacher Development

This article and its links originally appeared on http://www.designworlds.com/techscape/Sherm_Model.html

AN “INTERLOCKING LOOPS” MODEL TO SUPPORT TEACHER DEVELOPMENT AND SCHOOL CHANGE IN PROJECT-BASED LEARNING (PBL)

Rosenfeld, S., Loria, Y., Scherz, Z and Eylon, B.
Department of Science Teaching
Weizmann Institute of Science
Rehovot, Israel

and

Association for the Advancement of
Science Education in the Upper Galilee
MIGAL
Kiryat Shmona, Israel

Aims

In recent years, the educational potential of project-based learning (PBL) has captured the imagination of the educational community. However, a growing body of research shows that, without attention to the issue of supporting teacher development and school change, actualizing this potential will remain a dream (e.g., Marx, et al., 1997).

We have focused our attention on this issue by developing a research-based and practical model to support four audiences in their PBL efforts: students, teachers, leading teachers and teacher educators. Based on action research, we have identified the major needs and difficulties of each audience, and have developed specific support materials and support structures to meet these difficulties. Our paper will describe our resulting model and its educational significance.

Background

The Department of Science Teaching at the Weizmann Institute of Science and the Association for the Promotion of Science Education in the Upper Galilee are both part of a major national initiative to improve the teaching and learning of science and technology in Israeli schools. One aspect of this initiative has been to integrate and promote the teaching and learning of science content along with research and development skills, through project-based learning (PBL).

Theoretical Background and Methodology

Our work is based on an earlier study of teacher development (Rosenfeld, Scherz, Orion and Eylon, 1997) which empirically generated an “evolving model” of teacher development. Based on this work, teacher educators initially created a PBL program for teacher development and school support. To expand the scale of this effort, another program was developed for leading teachers to carry out this work.

The methodology employed in generating our PBL support model included in-depth observations of participants from each of the four target audiences, as well as interviews and questionnaires from these participants, collected over the past 5 years at our two institutions.

Outcomes

Table 1 summarizes the four target audiences, in terms of their major goals and difficulties, as well as their support settings, support staff and support materials. Students need to learn PBL skills but have difficulties in developing PBL knowledge and skills. Teacher teams have goals which relate to themselves as learners of PBL skills, as teachers in the PBL classroom, and as innovators of PBL on the school level; their difficulties involve developing PBL knowledge and skills, PBL pedagogy, and PBL implementation in their schools. Leading teachers, in their work with teachers, have goals related to teacher development, classroom support and school support; their difficulties arise in regard to how they can best transmit such knowledge and practice to the teachers. Teacher educators, in guiding the PBL framework, have goals related to research and development, teacher development, and organizational support; their difficulties include how to set goals and methods of PBL work in concert with realities such as existing school practices and problems of scaling up the innovations.

To meet these goals and difficulties, our model presents three overlapping and overlapping support structures. They include: (1) students guided by the teacher teams, (2) teacher teams guided by leading teachers and (3) leading teachers guided by teacher educators. These support structures can be visualized as three interlocking loops (Figure 1).

Educational Significance

Our model has been useful in helping us integrate the theory, research, and practice of project-based learning. Such integration is difficult under the best of conditions, since many different audiences are involved, i.e., students, teachers, parents, principals, the community, administrators, teacher developers, and educational researchers. Since these audiences often have different agendas and priorities, they are usually not well-coordinated in terms of their goals, methods, activities and priorities.

Identifying the major goals, difficulties and support structures for four of these audiences can contribute to a unified, common effort. Based on our model, we are proposing a Center for Project-Based Learning in Science and Technology (Figure 2). Our model and center will hopefully guide us to promote project-based learning with teachers and schools, not as a passing fad but as a long-term educational innovation.

 

References

Loucks-Horsley, S. Hewson, P.W., Love, N., & Stiles, K.E. (1998). Designing

Professional Development for Teachers of Science and Mathematics. Thousand

Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Marx, R., Blumenfeld, P., Krajcik, J., and Soloway, E. (1997). “Enacting

Project-Based Science,” Elementary School Journal, 97 (4): 341-358.

Rosenfeld, S., Scherz, Orion, N. and Eylon, B. (1997). “An Evolving Model for

Long-Term Teacher Development.” In: Vosniadou, S. et al. Conference Proceedings for the 6th European Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction. University of Athens, Greece.

 

A. Students
B. Teacher Teams
C. Leading Teachers
D. Teacher Educators
1.
MajorGoals

PBL as aLearner

  1. PBL as a learner
  2. PBL as a teacher
  3. PBL as an innovator
  1. Teacher developmentb. Classroom support

    c. School support

a. Research and developmentb. Teacher development

c.Organizational support

2.
MajorDifficulties

Developing PBL knowledge and skills
Developing knowledge and skills relating to:a. PBL

b. pedagogy

c. school implementation

Developing knowledge and skills in teacher development as related to:a. PBL

b. pedagogy

c. school support

a. Setting goals and methods for PBL.b. Developing models for teacher development, classroom practice, school practice.

c. Problems of

scale.

3.
SupportSetting(s)

Classroom
a. In-serviceb. Classroom

c. School

a. In-serviceb. Classroom

c. School

a. In-serviceb. Classroom

c. School

4.
SupportPersonnel

ClassroomTeachers

Leading Teachers andTeacher Developers

TeacherDevelopers

Other teacher educators and relevantprofessionals

5.
SupportMaterials

StudentPBL Guide,

Student

Video,

PBL software

TeacherPBL

Manual,

Teacher Video, PBL software

Examples and analysis of student PBL work; PBL Workshop Lesson Plans
Research and experience from other PBL efforts from around the world

 

Table 1Four Interlocking PBL Audiences. These audiences (students, classroom teachers, leading teachers and teacher developers) are analyzed in terms of the setting in which they work, their major goals, major difficulties, who supports them, and support materials. The audiences are connected by interlocking support structures, i.e., teacher teams support students (in classrooms), leading teachers support teacher teams (during in-services and implementation support), and PBL developers support leading teachers (in workshops and seminars), as presented in Fig. 1.

 

Figure 1. Three Interlocking Loops of PBL Support.

Another representation of the interlocking model shown in Table 1

is shown here. The four audiences as linked by three support frameworks:

(1) teacher teams support students (in their PBL work), (2) leading teachers

support teacher teams (via in-service workshops and school guidance), and

(3) teacher educators support leading teachers (via seminars and in-service guidance).

In practice, the four audiences may be more flexible in their interactions

than shown. Also, other audiences (e.g., principals, parents, community-based experts, etc.) may participate in the three support loops.

 

 Teacher School Materials Research and Development Change Development Development

 

Figure 2. Functions and Activities of a Center for Project-Based Learning.

The proposed Center would engages in teacher development (e.g., in-services, newsletters), school change (e.g., implementation guidance), materials development (e.g., development of student and teacher guides, videos, computer-based learning environments), and research and development (e.g., studying the relationship between learning styles and achievement in PBL, student difficulties in PBL and strategies to overcome them, etc.)

overcome them, etc.)

Teacher Development In PBL: Promoting the Culture of Research in Schools

This article and its links originally appeared on http://www.designworlds.com/techscape/Sherm_ArticleLinks.html

TEACHER DEVELOPMENT IN PBL:
PROMOTING THE CULTURE OF RESEARCH IN SCHOOLS

 

Practitioners of PBL may find it useful to familiarize themselves with educational research which focuses on various aspects of the topic. The following articles were written on the theme of “Teacher Development in PBL: Promoting The Culture of Research in Schools” by the staff of a research and development effort in Israel, led by Dr. Sherman Rosenfeld.

A barrier to the realization of quality project-based learning (PBL) is the issue of teacher and school support. What are the major challenges and how should they be approached? What type of support should be offered, by whom, and under what conditions?

(1) A model. “An Interlocking Loops Model to Support Teacher Development and School Change in PBL” is based on an analysis of the goals, difficulties and support needed for four audiences (students, teacher teams, leading teachers, and teacher educators). We propose three “interlocking loops” of support. Based on this model, guidelines to establish a Center for PBL are presented.

(2) Integrating PBL skills with content knowledge. “Integrating Content and PBL Skills: A Case Study of Teacher from Four Schools” reports an action-research PBL study that showed that, despite many successful outcomes, PBL teachers and their students were overwhelmed with the “cognitive load” of developing PBL skills, and neglected content knowledge. Recommendations are made to better integrate skills with content.

(3) PBL and learning styles“Understanding the ‘Surprises’ in PBL: An Exploration into Learning Styles of Teachers and their Students” suggests that students who are “pleasant surprises” in their PBL work have learning styles which are less adapted to the typical classroom, while students who are “disappointing surprises” have learning styles which are more adapted to the classroom and less to PBL environments. Implications for teacher development are suggested.

(4) A PBL software environment. “The Development of Software to Support Teachers and their Students in PBL: The Golden Way” describes a rich software environment design to support PBL. The software is based on the metaphor of a guided journey and uses a common task structure. Research studies illuminate how to best use the software to support teacher development and classroom practice.

(5) Professional Development in PBL. “PBL in Science and Technology: A Case Study of Professional Development” is an action research study of a PBL inservice for teachers. The study traces the sequence of the inservice, the resulting teacher projects in science and technology, and phenomena of note in the workshop. Finally, we discuss our findings and their relevance for practice.