Seminar Description Supporting Student Inquiry is a six week netseminar offered through the Center for Innovative Learning Technologies (CILT http://cilt.org). The course is taught entirely over the World Wide Web in the Blackboard CourseSite environment. Supporting Student Inquiry engages participants in creating inquiry based science projects and also focuses on the teaching strategies that can be used to support students throughout these projects. Participants will use the "project based science" model for creating inquiry projects and will create "projects" with driving questions, investigations and artifacts in a meaningful content area. Finished projects will be used to elaborate ideas and demonstrate key issues within the course. Participants will begin to build strategies into their projects including setting clear expectations, modeling desired outcomes and providing feedback. Research shows that when teachers use a variety of teaching strategies to support inquiry, students' scientific understanding is more robust. Some of the course questions include: *How do I build an inquiry based project? *What are appropriate expectations or standards for inquiry projects and student investigations? *How can teachers model desired components of successful inquiry? *What types of feedback do students need during inquiry projects? Seminar Requirements Participants are expected to be working on seminar assignments approximately five to seven hours weekly. The netseminar is conducted on a scheduled asynchronous basis. This means that students may "attend class" at their own convenience, but within weekly parameters. The seminar is not self-paced; instead, students are expected to work together and complete assignments by their due dates. Comments on content are expected within a short timeframe, so everyone will have the advantage of reading and reacting to the comments of others within seven to ten days. Participants should receive a package prior to the course beginning which will contain two articles for course reading. All other materials will be contained within the web-based netseminar. The two articles: Blumenfeld, P., Soloway, E., Marx, R., Krajcik, J., Guzdial, M., & Palincsar, A. (1991). Motivating project-based learning: Sustaining the doing, supporting the learning. Educational Psychologist, 26, 369-398. Collins, A., Brown, J. S., & Newman, S. (1989). Cognitive apprenticeship: Teaching the crafts of reading, writing and mathematics. In L. B. Resnick (Ed.), Knowing, Learning, and Instruction: Essays in Honor of Robert Glaser, . Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Evaluation Participants are expected to do the reading, craft pieces of an inquiry based project and post assignments weekly. Everyone will receive feedback on assignments by peers and the instructor on a weekly basis. Methodology This seminar is designed to provide an engaging experience in designing and creating an inquiry-based science project. This netseminar combines the resources of off-line reading material, websites and online dialogue. The off-line reading and websites provide descriptive and theoretical background into inquiry-based science. The websites and examples built into the netseminar highlight various pieces of inquiry-based projects to spark imagination and idea generation. Participants will use the on-line dialogue to collaboratively review and discuss the readings as well as exchange and comment on each other's project plans. Seminar plan Overview of the Weekly Schedule Week 1 Building our community around inquiry and inquiry-based projects oMeet and mingle oCreate a homepage oDiscuss inquiry oRead/Review article and websites oReflect on readings Week 2 Beginning the design of a project Venturing into strategies that support inquiry oCreate a driving question and investigation oRead about strategies oDiscuss strategies Week 3 Exploring strategy #1: Setting Expectations Continuing to build projects Incorporating strategies into project oExchange ideas on driving questions oRead about setting expectations oCreate a set of expectations Week 4 Exploring strategy # 2: Modeling Desired Outcomes oRead about modeling oView video clip of teacher modeling oDiscuss modeling oNetwork and collaborate on colleagues' projects Week 5 Exploring strategy #3: Providing Feedback Building assessment into projects via artifacts oDiscuss feedback oRead about feedback oCreate an artifact oCreate a rubric Week 6 Wrapping up: Reflecting on course goals and progress oShare reviews of artifacts and rubrics oReflect and Discuss on course progress and insights -- This is the CPS Science Teacher List. To unsubscribe, send a message to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For more information: <http://home.sprintmail.com/~mikelach/subscribe.html>. To search the archives: <http://www.mail-archive.com/science%40lists.csi.cps.k12.il.us/>
