Investigations

Recap- I’ve been blogging about the most effective ways students learn in a science environment. For this blog, I will be discussing how scientific investigations are developed.

The book I’m using as a guide recommends 3 ways: Step-by-Step, Trial-and-Error and Investigating. It also defines investigating as the “doing” of science (Berger, 2003).

My first thought is to reject the Step-by-Step process. This was the way that I did science when I was younger. Ask me 3 months ago if I thought this was sufficient to learning science and I would have said yes. Recently, I was taught that Step-by-Step investigations don’t accurately portray how science works. Many disadvantages are discussed here about the Scientific method. Over all the, the this type of process (scientific method) eliminates the notions of exploration and choice.

The Trial-and-Error process is more about students exploring the possibilities of doing something (Berger, 2003). This process fits more with the learning cycle and allows students to explore on their own. As a teacher, this is what I would implement in my classroom if possible. Students are able to understand how to apply something learned if they are more mentally engaged.

Investigating is explained as, “planning and designing experiments, following procedures, assembling materials and asking questions…”(Berger, 2003). I like this method better then the step-by-step process, but I still feel there are many things wrong with it. This method gives limited choices to students; they get to choose, but based on what the investigation recommends.

Berger, C. F., & Czerniak, C. M., & Krajcik, J. K. (2003). Teaching Science in Elementary and Middle School Classrooms: A Project-Based Approach. New York, New York: Mc-Graw Hill.