Category Archives: Written by: Sarah Hampton

Computational Thinking Webinar

Computational Thinking, Webinar, Written by: Judi Fusco, Written by: Pati Ruiz, Written by: Sarah Hampton

By Pati Ruiz, Sarah Hampton, Riley Leary, Judi Fusco, and Patti Schank

For the last few months, we’ve been  reading, thinking, and talking about computational thinking (CT) in preparation for three Webinars for Teachers and Parents on the topic. The webinars are on January 30, February 6, and February 13. Go to the link above to sign up for the webinar and get all the details.

ct

A lot of the websites and articles we reviewed about computational thinking for teachers gave us only a brief introduction to it.  We’ve read about what researchers have been doing and how they have been thinking about CT, and using their research, we’ve been trying to think about what CT means for and looks like in the classroom. We also know that it’s a new topic for parents, and that parents may want to think about what it means and what it can look like at home.

The term computational thinking was made popular in a paper in 2006 by Jeannette Wing, and since then, researchers have expressed different understandings and definitions of the term. There wasn’t a common understanding of what it was then, and exactly “What is it?” is still a fair question today. Some people equate computational thinking with coding, but others do not. We agree that computational thinking is a much broader set of skills than just coding or programming, and that it’s not the same thing as computer science. Computational thinking skills include abilities that help people use computers to solve problems. Being able to program is one way of interacting with a computer, but there are other ways that one can work with a computer, and computational thinking is needed in more than just programming classes. For example, when researching for a history project, students may need to use data to strengthen their arguments. Students are using CT when they locate, evaluate, analyze, and display data. Learning to program is an advantage, in terms of learning to think in a new way, but we believe that programming is not the only way to incorporate CT into classes. We’ll explore these things in our webinars.

The first session will be an overview of CT. The second session will be geared toward what CT can look like in K12 classrooms. At our third session––a special webinar for parents or other caregivers––we will think about projects and practices that can be done at home with kids to help them learn and think in this new way. Come to the webinars to learn and think with us about computational thinking and what it looks like in K12 classrooms and at home! Please share this information with interested colleagues and parents as well. We hope to see you there!

Cyberlearning Community Report:  Practical Impact in My Classroom

Cyberlearning, Cyberlearning Report 2017, Engineering, Written by: Sarah Hampton

 

By Sarah Hampton

In my last post, I talked about four reasons we should read the Cyberlearning Community Report: The State of Cyberlearning and the Future of Learning With Technology. I really believe that what you learn from the report will make you a more effective educator. Let me give you one concrete example of how the Community Report has already helped improve my teaching by demonstrating the significant value of learning opportunities outside the classroom and how they can be leveraged. (I had the privilege of sneak previewing the report over the summer so I have had a few months to implement what I learned!) Check out this excerpt from the report:

“The central ongoing research question in this work (from the Expressive Construction section) is how to interconnect appealing, playful environments through self-expression to deeper learning goals. The dimension of time is important: how can play result in learning at timescales of minutes, or weeks, or months or years? The dimension of context also needs more investigation: how do unique aspects of homes, museums, playgrounds or classrooms contribute to or block learning? Strengthening our understanding of the social dimension is also critical as these activities often involve complex ecologies of support from peers, parents, and informal and formal educators — and are not as simple as typical teacher-student interactions…This research is demonstrating how important learning can occur through playful experience, often outside of the school setting. Yet what students are learning clearly relates to existing curricular subject matter, such as engineering, and emerging subjects, like data science and computational thinking. Studying learning in playful and constructive settings can lead to new discoveries about when, where, and how children can learn important ideas and these discoveries can guide policy about when, where, and how these important topics are taught.”

​In past years, I would plan a unit and then take my students on a field trip only if the exhibit(s) aligned at that time. This fall (after reading the report), the technology teacher and I planned an entire unit around a Smithsonian traveling exhibit called Things Come Apart that is currently housed in the Birthplace of Country Music Museum, a museum near our school. The exhibit consists of dozens of common objects that have been taken apart to reveal their inner workings. We tied this into physical science concepts like electricity, circuitry, and engineering. Before we visited the museum, students reverse engineered their own objects such as mechanical pencils, clocks, calculators, speakers, and flashlights. They also built circuits using PhET simulations, snap circuits, and then batteries, wire, light bulbs, motors, etc. 

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Student exploring circuits using PhET simulations
After that, we recruited local experts who donated their time, knowledge, and materials so our students could dismantle iPhone 5s phones.  ​When the students later visited the exhibit, they recognized most of the components in the pieces and were able to ask and answer more informed questions because of their classroom work leading to the trip. Reading the report persuaded me that rich, authentic learning is fostered when connections are made between multiple environments, situations, and people, and it made me more intentional about offering opportunities across contexts. I would definitely describe this unit as a richer learning experience for my students than the ways I have approached it in the past. ​

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Student dismantling the iPhone 5s
Going even further, as part of their final assessment, students are creating infographics on five electronic components and how they are used in one of the pieces from the museum exhibit. This was a suggestion from the technology teacher, and I jumped at the idea after reading about the STEM Literacy through Infographics project in the community report. Our students will present their infographics and dismantled objects at our school STEAM Fair in November.
I hope you take the time to read the report, and I hope it impacts your practice as much as it already has mine. I would love to hear your thoughts after you have had a chance to read it! What did you find most interesting? What innovations are you most excited about? Do you think you might look into one of the projects for your classroom? Post in the comments section below!

Cyberlearning Community Report: A Teacher Perspective

Cyberlearning, Cyberlearning Report 2017, Written by: Sarah Hampton
By Sarah Hampton

It’s here! It’s finally here! Members of the cyberlearning community have been working for months to bring us a report on their recent research in the Cyberlearning Community Report: The State of Cyberlearning and the Future of Learning With Technology. The report brings together key players who “envision, design, and investigate possible futures of learning in the presence of significant innovations.” And when they say significant innovations, they mean significant.

There are new ways to think about learning environments and new ways to use technology that I would have never dreamed about. For example, be sure to check out projects using simulations like RoomQuake in which simulated seismographs in different locations in the room allow students to investigate the earthquake’s effects and locate “roomquake” epicenters within the room. “The students have the social and scientific experience of doing field work, but without ever leaving their classroom.”

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Students using RoomQuake
For another example, check out the BeeSim project in which young students enact the behaviors of a bee community as it tries to satisfy the energy needs of its hive using bee puppets equipped with sensors that interact with puppet hives.
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BeeSim with younger children
I know you’re insanely busy. Teachers do a year’s worth of work in nine months so I get it. Why should you take the time to read the lengthy report? Here are my top reasons:

1. The report is ultimately for us, the teachers. The entire community that prepared the report wants to support and help us improve what we do for our students. We make these findings valuable when we use them to benefit our schools. All the grant money, all the time, and all the discoveries–we determine their worth. There’s a sign in a grocery store parking lot that says that reusable grocery bags can’t help the environment if they are left in the car. This research can’t help our education system if we leave it on the internet.

2. You can’t read this report without getting excited about the future landscape of education. There is a current of enthusiasm and optimism woven throughout the report along with the explosion of technology and research. At school, sometimes the bureaucratic hoops and water cooler chatter is discouraging, but the information in this report will inspire you!

3. There is an encouraging focus on equity. Specifically, there is focus on:

  • Engaging at risk learners. I love this! “Through games and other new technologies, we may be able to engage at risk learners and learners who cannot articulate their knowledge sufficiently on traditional assessments and open doors for the measurement of learning from a wider array of diverse learners.” Learn more in the Learning Analytics for Assessment section.
  • Enabling “learners with disabilities to partake in activities that were previously inaccessible to them.” Learn more in the Multi-modal Analysis section.
  • Giving students agency and choice. “These projects also shift power relations whereby the voices and interests of underrepresented people (e.g., youth) gain legitimacy in community scale conversations and processes of development; creating and arguing from data produced with geospatial technologies is an emerging techno-civic literacy that young people must learn for influencing change in their communities.” “Youth and adults exercise agency in seeking to change their worlds and express their voices through new forms of inquiry, civic participation, and artistic expression.” Read more in the Expressive Construction section of the report.

4. You will learn about our changing roles as educators. Instead of the keeper of the keys of knowledge, the report casts the teacher as a facilitator, organizer, creative engineer of learning moments, and co-learner/co-contributor in the learning process. In addition, as technology becomes better able to automate some teaching tasks and give just-in-time alerts, we are freed to target struggling learners with specific skills while other learners remain engaged in learning tasks managed by digital learning environments. See Inq-ITS aka Inquiry Intelligent Tutoring System in the Learning Analytics for Assessment section, for example. The relationship between technology and teachers in the classroom can be rewarding as well as challenging. As part of the report states, “One tension is to balance the human and digital sides and support each side in what they do best.” Digital environments can never replace the value of human teachers in the classroom. The key is to optimize the dynamic. The community report offers insight on our changing roles and on how we can maximize the contribution of both people and technology.

In a few days, I am going to share a concrete example of how the report has already helped me improve my teaching.  (As a reviewer, I got to read it this summer and get a headstart.) In the meantime, go download the Cyberlearning Community Report! If you’ve gotten a chance to read it, let me know what you think about it and what I’ve said.

Implementing Bootstrap: An Adventure in Algebra and Computer Science Integration

Computational Thinking, Computer Science, Mathematics, Written by: Sarah Hampton

By Sarah Hampton
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In a former post, I wrote about a site I discovered while exploring the 2016 Stem for All Videohall called Bootstrap.

Bootstrap designs curricula that meaningfully integrate rigorous computer science concepts into more mainstream subjects such as math and science. Developed with the help of Brown, WPI, and Northeastern, Bootstrap has backing from several major players including Google, Microsoft, and the National Science Foundation. If that isn’t enough to pique your interest, initial research shows that Bootstrap is one of the only computer science curriculums that demonstrates measurable transfer to algebra, specifically on functions, variables, and word problems. (Wright, Rich, & Lee, 2013 and Schanzer, Fisler, Krishnamurthi, & Felleisen, 2015)

Recently at our school, Sullins Academy, the middle school math teachers (including myself) and the schoolwide technology teacher met to discuss and coordinate implementation of Bootstrap’s algebra curriculum for our eighth graders. The curriculum combines principles of mathematics and programming as students create their own simple video game. Before the meeting, we independently worked through the first unit which included dissecting the parts of a video game, relating the coordinate plane to positioning, relating the order of operations to program evaluation, and planning our own basic video game. After talking about our reactions to unit one, we worked through unit two, distinguishing data types used by programs and writing functions to manipulate them, as a group.

After working through the first two units, we knew Bootstrap was something we wanted to try with our students for three main reasons:

  1. Bootstrap makes algebra relevant and accessible to all learners. This could be a game-changer for traditionally disengaged math students.
  2. Computational thinking (CT) is huge for computer science and math, and Bootstrap is a great way to develop it. According to the Center for Computational Thinking at Carnegie Mellon, CT is “a way of solving problems, designing systems, and understanding human behavior that draws on concepts fundamental to computer science. To flourish in today’s world, computational thinking has to be a fundamental part of the way people think and understand the world.” We agree and want to actively cultivate CT in our students.
  3. Bootstrap might be more motivating for students than a block language like Scratch because they are typing real code. They might feel more as if they are engaged in “real” programming. (Although, we know that the learning outcomes of Scratch can be extremely high-level and beneficial, we have heard students make derogatory comments about block languages being elementary.)

So we knew we wanted to implement Bootstrap, but we still had a big question: when and through what class (math or technology) would this be taught? Similar to most cross-curricular projects, there would be difficulty meeting standards organically for both classes. We decided to implement the curriculum predominantly through the technology class with crossovers in the eighth grade math classes as they naturally arise. (I am lucky to work in a school where we are encouraged to work across classes. Flexibility and collaboration are two of my favorite things about our school.)

Now that we have a plan in place, we are all really excited about the potential learning outcomes. We hope it shows students that math and technology do not exist in individual bubbles and that standards are not just isolated facts to memorize or know for a test. All subjects and content are integrated in real life for authentic purposes. The technology teacher hopes that this will make students realize that programming is within their grasp. It’s not this abstract, crazy, no-way-I-can-do-it sort-of-thing thing. Even if students don’t program again, the technology teacher hopes that it helps with troubleshooting abilities and independence. In addition, she hopes it will motivate students to improve their typing skills and realize why attention to detail is important, for example, when they see that even one missing parenthesis or misspelled word will break the program. Beyond the obvious desire for students to better understand algebra, the math teachers hope it allows students to see that math is really useful beyond the classroom. Most importantly, we hope working on Bootstrap displaces the teacher and puts the students at the center of the learning by improving metacognition and developing perseverance as they work through their error messages. In this way, students might grow out of the teacher-dependent mentality and learn to trust and rely on themselves and each other.

Keeping it real, we are concerned about a few things as well. It was interesting to see our reactions to the curriculum because the technology teacher has ample programming experience, I only have some, and the third teacher has no former experience. This was a fortunate coincidence because it represents the spectrum of prior knowledge our students will have as well. Overall, Bootstrap provides enough scaffolding for any previous exposure to programming as long as you are comfortable with a “learn as you go” approach, although occasionally, it did seem as if Bootstrap made an optimistic assumption about what students would know coming in. For those with no prior experience, we would have liked more direct instruction on key vocabulary, syntax requirements, and reading and diagnosing error messages. Another concern is keeping all students engaged for the length of the project. Undoubtedly, some students will be able to fly through the curriculum while others need a bit more time. We hope the answer to this problem lies in offering the extensions Bootstrap has built in for quick learners.

Overall, we are really looking forward to seeing what Bootstrap can do for our students. Our plan is in place so may the adventure continue! I will keep you posted.

Have any of you implemented Bootstrap or another computer science curriculum like Logo or Scratch? Did you see transfer to math or science? What advantages did you notice? Are there any obstacles you can help us navigate? We would love to learn from you!

Citations and Further Reading
Schanzer, E., Fisler, K., Krishnamurthi, S., & Felleisen, M. (2015). Transferring Skills at Solving Word Problems from Computing to Algebra Through Bootstrap, ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education, 2015.
Available at:
http://cs.brown.edu/~sk/Publications/Papers/Published/sfkf-trans-word-prob-comp-alg-bs/paper.pdf

Wright, G., Rich, P. & Lee, R. (2013). The Influence of Teaching Programming on Learning Mathematics. In R. McBride & M. Searson (Eds.), Proceedings of SITE 2013–Society for Information Technology & Teacher Education International Conference (pp. 4612-4615). New Orleans, Louisiana, United States: Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education (AACE).
Available at:
https://www.learntechlib.org/p/48851/.

Center for Computational Thinking at Carnegie Mellon.
Available at:
​https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~CompThink/

Teaching Out Of The Box

Written by: Sarah Hampton
By Sarah Hampton

On the personality spectrum, I tend to be what people colloquially refer to as “Type A.” In my experience, the majority of teachers tend toward this personality predisposition. It can be very beneficial in teaching, but it can also be detrimental if we allow our own tendencies and preferences to become the measuring stick for student performance instead of objective criteria. Type A personalities may dominate the teaching profession, but our students are all over the spectrum, and just because they may do things differently, their strategies are not necessarily inferior.

Reminding myself to differentiate between subjective preference and objective quality has helped me value multiple student strategies in everything from keeping up with homework assignments to designing science experiments. We are individuals. One size almost never fits all. When we give students permission to get out of the box of a one-size-fits-all mentality, they can each confidently bring a different perspective to the table. Sometimes, everyone’s method is equally valuable; sometimes, one emerges as more effective or efficient. Learning to collaborate, defend ideas, and evaluate the reasoning of self and others is extremely valuable in the classroom and beyond, and we can intentionally develop these skills by restructuring our classrooms away from a culture in which the instructor hands the “correct” strategy down to the students toward a culture in which students are actively engaged in strategy design and evaluation.

Kara Suzuka, Tim Boerst, and Aileen Kennison from the University of Michigan understand this, and they have designed excellent research-based professional development for elementary school math teachers to promote this line of reasoning. I recently discovered their work when browsing the 2017 Stem For All Video Showcase sponsored by the National Science Foundation. The team highlights key differences between being able to do elementary level math and being able to teach math at the elementary level. One of these important differences is recognizing and encouraging multiple student strategies. Their work supports what I have observed while tutoring and teaching math over 15 years.

When I first started tutoring, I would basically teach students to replicate the process that I used to answer the question. In other words, I tried to put the students in my box. However, I noticed that, even when the students could use my procedure to arrive at a correct answer, they really didn’t understand what they were doing or why they were doing it. In other words, it wasn’t building number sense. Even more unfortunately, I was also inadvertently communicating to the students that there is only one correct way to do math, and that way must be affirmed by me, the instructor. When students repeatedly learn math that way, it is hard to convince them of the truth–there are multiple, valid algorithms for solving problems that students themselves should be able to create, verbalize, defend, and assess for efficiency. Now, I seek to recognize the value in each student method, allow them to present their thinking, and let them prove whether or not it will work every time. In other words, I give them permission to get out of the box. This better style of instruction satisfies every single one of the Mathematics Teaching Practices recommended by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics:

  • Establish mathematics goals to focus learning.
  • Implement tasks that promote reasoning and problem solving.
  • Use and connect mathematical representations.
  • Facilitate meaningful mathematical discourse.
  • Pose purposeful questions.
  • Build procedural fluency from conceptual understanding.
  • Support productive struggle in learning mathematics.
  • Elicit and use evidence of student thinking.

I love knowing there are people like Kara, Tim, and Aileen who are working to shift the paradigm of mathematics instruction away from replicating processes to supporting individual student strategies. We can’t teach students every process for every problem type they will ever encounter. But we can teach students to think, create, and evaluate their own processes. Kudos to the team at the University of Michigan for recognizing the need to teach outside of the box and for offering a promising solution. I look forward to reading the final results of their research.

Education Wonderland: STEM for All Video Showcase

Mathematics, Video Showcase, Written by: Sarah Hampton
​By Sarah Hampton

I wish there was an extra planning block built into every teacher’s day for locating quality, relevant resources. Educators and researchers are out there doing amazing things that I rarely hear about through the grapevine. Yet, when I spend a bit of time down rabbit holes on the internet, I stumble across exciting and innovative practices like STEP: Science through Technology Enhanced Play in which young students pretend to be bees and watch their bees interact on screen while an XBOX Kinect sensor bar maps their movements. If you have had similar challenges finding resources, then I have GREAT NEWS for you! Researchers funded by the National Science Foundation have created three-minute videos of some of the best things happening in STEM education in their projects and share them in a showcase. I have watched most from last year’s showcase, and I was surprised to see how many were free, easily implementable, and relevant across all disciplines–even those not traditionally considered to be under the STEM umbrella such as geography. You can also filter the videos by subject or grade level to find ones most helpful to your classroom.

As a science teacher, there are several hands-on activities that easily correlate to the content. As a math teacher, meaningful, engaging opportunities are harder to find. That’s why I was thrilled when I saw this video on teaching Algebra through coding using Bootstrap. The connections to Cartesian coordinates, the distance formula, and functions are tangible as students create their own video games. I have already proposed this idea to another math teacher and tech teacher at my school and they have responded with enthusiasm and buy in. We are hoping to meet over the summer to work through the free curriculum ourselves with intent to implement it through the eighth grade technology class next year.

My trip down this particular rabbit hole felt so much like Wonderland that I am counting down the days until the 2017 Stem for All Video Showcase: Research and Design for Impact funded by NSF beginning May 15. I hope to find you there. More importantly, I hope you find resources to implement in your school there. This is an exciting time to be in education! Check out the showcase and find out why!

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​Students pretend to be bees in STEP.  STEP uses OpenPTrack, an open source platform for sensing position and movement of large groups of people.  

Students write basic code to program their own video games in Bootstrap as a means of learning algebra.

Favorite Tech Tools Series: Google Drive

Classroom Technology, Collaboration, Mathematics, Written by: Sarah Hampton
Edited 2/11/2018 to add the link to the gold award!  Congratulations, Sarah!

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By Sarah Hampton
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From STEM programs to one-to-one device campaigns, we hear a lot about the importance of technology in the classroom. Like most initiatives, this is for good reason! We live in the digital age, and producing students who can responsibly and productively use the numerous technologies at their disposal is a crucial 21st century skill. Also like most initiatives, our tendency might be to view technology use as a bothersome requirement handed down by well-meaning administrators. When we approach anything with this attitude (read: the oft-dreaded professional development), we miss out on the spirit of the requirement. In this case, that means implementing technology in ways that genuinely improve student learning or enhance classroom organization and workflow. In this series of posts, I will share my favorite tech tools for streamlining my middle school classroom and promoting student learning. Let’s start with Google Drive, one of my favorite student-centered learning tools.

Google Drive
Technology is useful when it allows you to do something you can’t do with a whiteboard and markers, or when it allows you to do something better or faster. Google Drive frequently allows me to do both. You probably already know that Google Docs is a powerful collaborative writing tool. Multiple studies have found that web-based collaborative activities, done well, can promote learning outcomes, teamwork, social skills, and basic computing skills among students (Zhou, Simpson, & Domizi, 2012, pg. 359-360). In addition, I love how easy it is to give comments in Google Docs and how easy it is for students to work together. If you haven’t incorporated it yet, then make a class writing project a priority. Here is one example. If you are already a Google Docs pro, then check into using Slides or Forms. Our school frequently uses Forms for quick polls and surveys. Google Sheets is also a must have, particularly for math and science teachers. I would like to demonstrate how powerful this app can be by sharing how it helped me create one of my best lessons this year for middle school algebra (my class included mixed ages of 6th, 7th, and 8th grade Algebra 1 students).

After watching the Olympics this summer, I started to wonder why some countries seemed to do better than others. I posed that question to my students and we brainstormed two main categories that we thought might correlate with a country’s Olympic performance: population (greater probability that gifted athletes live there) and per capita income (more opportunities for athletes to practice and/or have access to high quality facilities and equipment.) I had each student pick three to five countries, research their populations, per capita incomes, and total medal counts in the past four summer Olympics, and add their information to the class spreadsheet. Then, in groups, they created a scatterplot for their assigned factor and analyzed the data using linear regressions to see which factors more highly correlated with Olympic performance. If you want more specifics or want to see the results, then check out our class spreadsheet. You can also find instructions for a similar project at Mathalicious.

This project was organically cross-curricular and addressed multiple algebra standards by necessity. It incorporated geography, because the students placed push pins in their countries on a giant world map, and economics, because they wondered why some countries’ per capita incomes were very high or very low. It gave meaning to population density when the students saw the size of a country on the map and then noted its population on the bar graph. (Iraq and Canada have similar populations? But Canada is soooo much bigger!) It increased number sense when they created bar graphs, scatterplots, and histograms and realized that some of the values were literally off the charts–like the per capita income of Monaco (which presented the perfect opportunity for me to introduce vocabulary like “outlier.”) Astonished, students were naturally curious enough to research why. This led to lessons on digital literacy as we discussed how to appropriately locate, evaluate, and use information from the internet, a skill that is frequently overestimated in today’s students according to a study commissioned by the British Library and JISC (University College London, 2008).

The students really got into this project and even asked to do an extension! They hypothesized that countries with lower average temperatures would perform better in the winter Olympics, so, of course, we analyzed that, too. This matches perfectly with the International Society for Technology and Education’s claim that, “When students take responsibility for their own learning, they become explorers capable of leveraging their curiosity to solve real-world problems” (ISTE, 2017).

As it turns out, we weren’t the only people to look at what factors affect Olympic performance. After the project, my students found two websites that helped explain things further. The first was written by an economics doctoral student and the second by a senior editor at The Atlantic.  (Bian 2005, O’Brien 2012) The other sites concluded that the same factors we studied were major contributors, and their charts and methods remarkably resembled our own, albeit with some more advanced statistics in the case of the doctoral student’s article. My students’ excited comments indicated that they felt validated in their reasoning and felt that they were doing “real math.”

This project hit the sweet spot: students were engaged in deep and relevant learning, and Google Sheets significantly contributed to its effectiveness.

​How have you used Google Drive to create more student-centered environments? What outcomes did you see when you used them? Did anything (good or bad) surprise you? I would love to learn from your experiences by reading your comments!

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Students proudly displayed their results in the hallway outside our classroom.
Citations and Further Reading
Bian, X. (2005). Predicting Olympic Medal Counts: the Effects of Economic Development on Olympic Performance. The Park Place Economist, 13(1), 37-44. Available at: https://www.iwu.edu/economics/PPE13/bian.pdf

International Society for Technology and Education. (2017). Essential Conditions: Student-Centered Learning. Available at: http://www.iste.org/standards/tools-resources/essential-conditions/student-centered-learning

Mathalicious. (2017). Hitting the Slopes. Available at: http://www.mathalicious.com/lessons/hitting-the-slopes

National Writing Project. (2017). Directions for Teachers Participating in Letters to the Next President: Writing Our Future. Available at: http://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/doc/nwpsites/writing_our_future/directions.csp

O’Brien, M. (2012). Medal-Count Economics: What Factors Explain the Olympics’ Biggest Winners? The Atlantic. Available at: https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/08/medal-count-economics-what-factors-explain-the-olympics-biggest-winners/260951/

University College London. (2008). Information Behaviour of the Researcher of the Future. Available at: https://www.webarchive.org.uk/wayback/archive/20140614113419/http://www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/programmes/reppres/gg_final_keynote_11012008.pdf

Zhou, W., Simpson, E., & Domizi, D.P. (2012). Google Docs in an Out-of-Class Collaborative Writing Activity. Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, 24(3), 359-375. Available at: http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1000688.pdf

The Benefits and Obstacles of Constructivism

Constructivism, Mathematics, Science, Written by: Sarah Hampton

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By Sarah Hampton

Sarah Hampton teaches middle school math and science at Sullins Academy in Southwest Virginia.  She has ten years of teaching experience in various disciplines and settings.

Over the last sixty years, thousands of articles have looked at whether or not constructivism works.  I wanted to understand the research, but it was overwhelming.  However, thanks to advances in technology and fancy statistics, researchers can analyze aggregate data on the subject.  After reading multiple articles and three meta-analyses (an analysis that aggregates data and allows you to look across many studies) specifically regarding science education and constructivism, two things became apparent.  First, it is extremely difficult to show an impact of instructional strategies on student learning outcomes!  Out of 1500 studies in one analysis, only six of the studies met the criteria that allow causal inferences to be made (Furtak, Seidel, Iverson, & Briggs, 2009, p. 27).  Second, despite that difficulty, the evidence favors constructivism.  The conclusions from all three meta-analyses demonstrated statistically significant positive effects of constructivist practices on student learning.  So, if we know constructivism is good for our students, then why do we not see more of it in action?  To hit a little closer to home, if I know these are good practices, then why am I not doing more of them?  I think there are some legitimate obstacles.  Here are my top three:

Obstacle 1:  The time it takes to find or create relevant, quality tasks
The number of daily teaching requirements and professional demands apart from planning are enough to fill our workday!  Planning inquiry instruction is extremely time-consuming because you have to sort through all of the activities that aren’t that great or don’t apply to your subject or grade level. Half the time I end up creating my own from scratch, which is also a time drain. In contrast, planning for direct instruction is a snap. Decide what you want to cover and write down the topic in your lesson plans.  Done.  As a result, to save time, we often revert to direct instruction (otherwise we cut into our family time to plan).

Proposed Solution A:  Find a resource that produces quality learner-centered, constructivist materials and start there.  For math, I use http://www.mathalicious.com/ and https://illuminations.nctm.org/.  Both allow you to filter by topic and grade level, which saves additional time.  For science, I like http://www.middleschoolchemistry.com/.  

Proposed Solution B:  Try to view the time spent on finding quality materials as a necessary startup cost.  If you like them, then you can recycle them year to year.  In addition, Berland, Baker, and Blikstein argued that constructivism can actually save time when fully implemented by enhancing “classroom dynamics that may streamline class preparation (e.g., peer teaching or peer feedback)” (Berland, Baker, & Blikstein, 2014).

Obstacle 2:  The instructional time it requires to implement meaningful tasks
I don’t know about you, but I start my year feeling behind!  There just doesn’t seem to be enough time for my students to deeply comprehend the required algebra or physical science concepts as dictated by state and national standards within the given time frame.  When we allow the pressure of the standards and test to dictate our instructional practices, we begin to look for the fastest possible way to disseminate information, and direct instruction is efficient—we just tell them what it is we want them to know.  However, efficient is only efficient if it is also genuinely effective.  

Proposed Solution:  Try to see beyond the standards and the test.  D.F. Halpern expressed concern about our preoccupation with these and said, “We only care about student performance in school because we believe that it predicts what students will remember and do when they are somewhere else at some other time.  Yet we often teach and test as though the underlying rationale for education were to improve student performance in school.  As a consequence, we rarely assess student learning in the context or at the time for which we are teaching” (Halpern & Hakel, 2003, p. 38).  

I am not a teacher because I want my students to pass a test.  I am a teacher because I want my students to excel in life.  Constructivist practices require students to think critically and creatively, innovatively problem solve, collaborate, and communicate—therefore preparing students for the test and beyond.  As Hmelo-Silver, Duncan, and Chinn (2007) argued, “This evidence suggests that these approaches can foster deep and meaningful learning as well as significant gains in student achievement on standardized tests” (p. 99).  I suspect the greatest benefits of constructivism are immeasurable and consequently undocumented and marginalized.  I would love to know the impact on long-term retention, higher order thinking, lifelong learning, and employer satisfaction.  

Obstacle 3:  The difficulty of meshing inquiry and explicit instruction
I want my students to do the work of the learning, so it doesn’t seem like inquiry if I’m leading the discussion. But sometimes whole group instruction makes the most sense for the instructional goal.

Proposed Solution:  Adjust your understanding: constructivism does not preclude explicit instruction.  You are probably engaged in more constructivism during whole group instruction than you think.  Simple strategies like accountable talk and purposeful questioning lead to minds-on learning even when students aren’t engaged in hands-on learning (Goldman, 2014).   Constructivism is often equated with minimally guided instruction, but they are not synonymous.  In fact, “most proponents of IL (inquiry learning, a type of constructivism) are in favor of structured guidance in an environment that affords choice, hands-on and minds-on experiences, and rich student collaborations” (Hmelo-Silver et al., 2007, p. 104, emphasis added).  

The goal of constructivism is for our students to actively construct meaning for new information rather than passively accepting our word for it.  Since we can create opportunities for our students to do this in multiple ways, we should focus on the culture of constructivism rather than the day to day teaching methods we use to maintain that culture.

In conclusion, constructivism isn’t easy, but it is necessary to help students learn.  It’s worth finding a way to overcome the obstacles.  If you are interested in reading more about why, then please see below for a complete list of the works I cited and consulted.  Don’t forget to leave your own comments – I would love to hear your obstacles and solutions, too!

Citations and Further Reading 

Alfieri, L., Brooks, P. J., Aldrich, N. & Tenenbaum H. R. (2011). Does discovery-based instruction enhance learning?  Journal of Educational Psychology, 103(1), 1-18.  
Available at: http://www.cideronline.org/podcasts/pdf/1.pdf

Berland, M., Baker, R. S., & Blikstein, P. (2014). Educational data mining and learning analytics:
Applications to constructionist research. Technology, Knowledge and Learning, 19(1-2),
205-220.
Available at: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/41c0/0af6ce63b919530ea691d058e8725d33d901.pdf

Furtak, E. M., Seidel, T., Iverson, H., & Briggs, D. (2009).  Recent experimental studies of
inquiry-based teaching: a meta-analysis and review, European Association for
Research on Learning and Instruction, Amsterdam, Netherlands, August 25-29, 2009.
Available at: http://spot.colorado.edu/~furtake/Furtak_et_al_EARLI2009_Meta-Analysis.pdf

Goldman, P.  (2014, January 22). #2. What is Accountable Talk®?  Institute for Learning
Podcast.
Available at: http://ifl.pitt.edu/index.php/educator_resources/accountable_talk/podcasts/2

Halpern, D. F. & Hakel, M. D. (2003). Applying the science of learning to the university and
beyond: teaching for long-term retention and transfer.  Change, July/August 2003,
36-41. Available at: http://www.chabotcollege.edu/planning/outcome-assessment/index.php

Hmelo-Silver, C. E., Duncan, R. G. & Chinn, C. A. (2007).  Scaffolding and achievement in
problem-based and inquiry learning:  a response to Kirschner, Sweller, and Clark
(2006).  Educational Psychologist, 42(2), 99-107.
Available at:
http://www.sfu.ca/~jcnesbit/EDUC220/ThinkPaper/HmeloSilverDuncan2007.pdf

Kirschner, P. A., Sweller, J., & Clark, R. E. (2006). Why minimal guidance during instruction
does not work: an analysis of the failure of constructivist, discovery, problem-based,
experiential, and inquiry-based teaching.  Educational Psychologist, 41(2), 75-86.  
Available at: http://cogtech.usc.edu/publications/kirschner_Sweller_Clark.pdf

Lang, Albert. (2010).  Executives Say the 21st Century Requires More Skilled Workers.  
Available at:
http://www.p21.org/news-events/press-releases/923-executives-say-the-21st-century-req
uires-more-skilled-workers

Minner, D. D., Levy, A. J., & Century, J.  (2010).  Inquiry-based science instruction – what is it
and does it matter?  Results from a research synthesis years 1984 to 2002.  Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 47(4), 474-496.
Available at:
https://www.ntnu.no/wiki/download/attachments/8324914/JRST-Inquiry-based+science+instruction+-+what+is+it+and+does+it+matter-+Results+from+a+research+synthesis+years+1984+to+2002.pdf

Schroeder, C. M., Scott, T. P., Tolson, H., Huang, T., & Lee, Y. (2007).  A meta-analysis of
national research:  Effects of teaching strategies on student achievement in science
in the United States.  Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 44(10), 1436-1460.  
Available at: http://cudc.uqam.ca/publication/ref/12context.pdf

Shah, I. & Rahat, T. (2014). Effect of activity based teaching method in science.  International
Journal of Humanities and Management Sciences, 2(1), 39-41.  Retrieved from
http://www.isaet.org/images/extraimages/K314003.pdf

Stohr-Hunt, P. M. (1996). An analysis of frequency of hands-on experience and science
achievement.  Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 33(1), 101-109.
Available at: https://vista.gmu.edu/assets/docs/vista/JournalOfResearch.pdf

Windschitl, M. (1999).  The challenges of sustaining a constructivist classroom culture.  Phi
Delta Kappan, 80(10), 751-756.
Available at: http://www-tc.pbs.org/teacherline/courses/inst335/docs/inst335_windschitl.pdf?cc=tlredir