Designing, launching, and implementing high quality learning opportunities for students that advance scientific thinking
JOURNAL OF RESEARCH IN SCIENCE TEACHING VOL. 53, NO. 9, PP. 1316 1340 (2016) Research Article Designing, Launching, and Implementing High Quality Learning Opportunities for Students That Advance Scientific Thinking Hosun Kang, 1 Mark Windschitl, 2 David Stroupe, 3 and Jessica Thompson 2 University of California Irvine, 3200 Education, Irvine 92697 5500, California University of Washington, Seattle, Washington Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan Received 19 February 2015; Accepted 13 April 2016 Abstract: Instructional tasks are key features of classroom practice, but little is known about how different components of tasks such as selecting or designing tasks for a lesson, launching, and implementing them with students shape the conditions for students' intellectual engagement in science classrooms. Employing a qualitative multiple case study approach, we analyzed 57 science lessons taught by 19 first year teachers. We examined the potential for students' intellectual work built into the tasks across the phases of instruction, and how the demand of the unfolding task deepened (or failed to deepen) students' engagement in science. The findings suggest the importance of beginning a lesson with high quality instructional tasks complex tasks that bear appropriate levels of epistemic uncertainty for a particular group of students in a particular moment. Beginning a lesson with high quality tasks; however, was insufficient by itself to ensure rigorous learning opportunities. With the use of complex tasks, higher quality opportunities to learn were observed in lessons in which: (i) the tasks were framed as a process of understanding contextualized phenomena; (ii) the specific disciplinary concepts in the task were related to big science ideas that transcended the activities themselves; and (iii) students' implementation of these tasks were structured using tools that supported changes in thinking. 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach Keywords: opportunities to learn; instructional tasks; intellectual demand; instructional practices Introduction Despite the use of various hands on, practical, and experiential activities in science instruction, research indicates that classroom learning for students largely remains undemanding, procedural, and often disconnected from the development of substantive science ideas (Banilower et al. 2012; Corcoran Gerry, 2011; Roth Garnier, 2007; Roth et al. 2011) For example, in a study using a nationally representative sample of 31 middle schools in the United States, Weiss et al. (2003) found that few science teachers help students link activity to substantive science ideas. Weiss et al. also found that appropriate sense making opportunities for students coupled with activities were rare (about 16% of observations) and classroom discourse that could support Contract grant sponsor: National Science Foundation; Contract grant number: DRL 0822016. Correspondence to: H. Kang; E mail: hosunk@uci.edu DOI 10.1002/tea.21329 Published online 6 May 2016 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.