weSPOT: A personal and social approach to inquiry-based learning

weSPOT is a new European initiative proposing a novel approach for personal and social inquiry-based learning in secondary and higher education. weSPOT aims at enabling students to create their mash-ups out of cloud based tools and services in order to perform scientific investigations. Students will also be able to share their inquiry accomplishments in social networks and receive feedback from the learning environment and their peers. This paper presents the research framework of the weSPOT project, as well as the initial inquiry-based learning scenarios that will be piloted by the project in real-life educational settings

Impact of a Science Methods Course on Pre-Service Elementary Teachers\u27 Knowledge and Confidence of Teaching with Scientific Inquiry and Problem-Based Learning

The purpose of this study was to measure the impact of an elementary science methods course on pre-service teachers\u27 knowledge and confidence of teaching with inquiry and problem-based instructional strategies. Changes in pre-service teachers\u27 knowledge and confidence were measured before and after completing the course activities using a pilot survey entitled Science Pedagogical Content Knowledge & Confidence (PCKC) Survey. An integrated lecture/laboratory elementary science methods course engaged participants with hands-on activities designed to increase their pedagogical content knowledge: including theory, planning and implementation of inquiry, and problem-based learning. The results indicated that pre-service teachers\u27 knowledge and confidence improved as a result of enrollment in the elementary science methods course. This article validates reform movements to incorporate scientific inquiry and problem-based learning into coursework

Peer mediation for conflict management: a Singaporean case study

The burgeoning interest in conflict and its management has recently begun to impact on schools and school systems worldwide. Motivated by a concern for increasing levels of violence in schools and student�student conflict, many school administrators are looking at conflict management programs as a means of dealing with the problem. Most of the more widely used programs have their origins in the United States; their appropriateness and effectiveness in other countries and cultures is, at best, unknown, and in some respects open to conjecture. In this paper the cultural appropriateness of a peer mediation program in a primary school in Singapore is the subject of investigation. The study also addresses, in an exploratory manner, the effectiveness of peer mediation as a mechanism for student�student conflict management

S-COL: A Copernican turn for the development of flexibly reusable collaboration scripts

Collaboration scripts are usually implemented as parts of a particular collaborative-learning platform. Therefore, scripts of demonstrated effectiveness are hardly used with learning platforms at other sites, and replication studies are rare. The approach of a platform-independent description language for scripts that allows for easy implementation of the same script on different platforms has not succeeded yet in making the transfer of scripts feasible. We present an alternative solution that treats the problem as a special case of providing support on top of diverse Web pages: In this case, the challenge is to trigger support based on the recognition of a Web page as belonging to a specific type of functionally equivalent pages such as the search query form or the results page of a search engine. The solution suggested has been implemented by means of a tool called S-COL (Scripting for Collaborative Online Learning) and allows for the sustainable development of scripts and scaffolds that can be used with a broad variety of content and platforms. The tool’s functions are described. In order to demonstrate the feasibility and ease of script reuse with S-COL, we describe the flexible re-implementation of a collaboration script for argumentation in S-COL and its adaptation to different learning platforms. To demonstrate that a collaboration script implemented in S-COL can actually foster learning, an empirical study about the effects of a specific script for collaborative online search on learning activities is presented. The further potentials and the limitations of the S-COL approach are discussed

Building ArtsSmarts' Research Capacity: An Interim Report

In 2006, the Canadian Council on Learning (CCL) created an initiative to build Canada's capacity to conduct research on learning, inviting not-for profit organizations to apply for Researcher in Residence grants. ArtsSmarts was one of the successful grant applicant organizations. Saad Chahine was hired by ArtsSmarts to take on the researcher-in-residence role. Several meetings resulted in the development of a work plan (Appendix A) and an outline of the various activities to be carried out by the researcher-in-residence. The work plan was approved by CCL, and the residency commenced in June 2007. What follows is an interim report on the residency, documenting what has been accomplished since June 2007, and providing direction for continuing to build ArtsSmarts' research capacity going forward

Scientific Literacy in the digital age: tools, environments and resources for co-inquiry

This paper describes some European and International projects to promote Scientific Literacy in the digital age as well as technologies, environments and resources for co-inquiry. The aim of this research is also to describe computer applications, software tools and environments that were designed to support processes of collaborative inquiry learning to promote Scientific Literacy. These tools are analyzed by describing their interfaces and functionalities. The outcomes of this descriptive research points out some effects on student learning and competences developed known from the literature. This paper argues the importance of promoting scientific citizenship not only through schools and Universities (formal learning), but also non-credit online courses and community-based learning programmes (non-formal context), as well as daily life activities, educational open digital materials through social networks (informal scenario)

Tracking Transfer of Reform Methodology from Science and Math College Courses to the Teaching Style of Beginning Teachers of Grades 5-12

The purpose of this study was to determine if reformed science and math courses at community colleges and the university were impacting education majors as they began a teaching career. The reformed courses, in contrast to typical lecture classes, implemented inquiry-based methods that emphasized deep understanding of fundamental science and math concepts. Trained evaluators, utilizing the Reformed Teaching Observation Protocol (RTOP) gathered a total of 86 classroom observations to gauge the level of reform that beginning teachers (one to three years’ teaching experience) were implementing in grades 5-12. The pre-service experience of the beginning teachers varied from having had zero to four reform courses. Results indicated that teachers who had completed reform college courses instructed in a significantly more reformed manner. Furthermore, analysis of years of teaching experience revealed that, while both control and experimental groups achieved higher RTOP scores as they progressed from year to year, the experimental group significantly outpaced their counterparts

An Investigative Approach to Teaching Mathematics: Excitement and Concerns of K-8 Preservice Teachers

Following from the recommendations of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, an Investigative Approach (IA) to teaching mathematics encourages students to explore real-world problems through hands-on activities instead of focusing on rote memorization of facts, formulas, and procedures. This paper discusses thirty-two K-8 preservice teachers‘ responses to questions regarding excitements and concerns about using this method of teaching. Although most preservice teachers are excited about the prospects of using this approach in their future classrooms, some exhibit hesitations related to concerns about time constraints and their own math abilities. A mathematics methods course presently being taught that is centered around the ideas of IA is discussed, and recommendations for the use of IA in preservice math methods courses to help teachers overcome these concerns are made