Scribd
Upload
201 views4 pages

Objective 3

The document outlines strategies for developing scientific attitudes in students, including: 1. Maintaining curiosity by encouraging student questions and investigation. 2. Fostering honesty by having students record all data accurately and consider differing interpretations. 3. Developing objectivity by using activities where outcomes are unknown and evaluating competing theories. 4. Taking a positive approach to failure by accepting evidence-based answers, even if incorrect, and allowing retesting. 5. Modeling respect for the environment and limiting harm to living organisms in activities and experiments.

Uploaded by

Joseph Gratil
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
201 views4 pages

Objective 3

The document outlines strategies for developing scientific attitudes in students, including: 1. Maintaining curiosity by encouraging student questions and investigation. 2. Fostering honesty by having students record all data accurately and consider differing interpretations. 3. Developing objectivity by using activities where outcomes are unknown and evaluating competing theories. 4. Taking a positive approach to failure by accepting evidence-based answers, even if incorrect, and allowing retesting. 5. Modeling respect for the environment and limiting harm to living organisms in activities and experiments.

Uploaded by

Joseph Gratil
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 4

OBJECTIVE 3:

CURIOSITY
 The problem with the scientific attitude of curiosity is not in developing it but rather
maintaining it.

 If we want to maintain curiosity, we need to develop a classroom atmosphere where our


students feel free to be curious. This kind of atmosphere occurs when we encourage questions
from the children we teach, and more importantly, encourage children to investigate those
questions to find the answers.
 Curiosity is not fostered when we ignore the questions children asks, belittle those who ask
questions, or answers all questions from children in an authoritarian manner.
 Curiosity is fostered when children are able to investigate educationally valid tangents as well as
the topics directly under consideration.

HONESTY

 This scientific attitude requires a change in the way most teachers think about science content.
 In developing scientific honesty, you can do the following:

1. Assist children in developing journals in which they maintain accurate records of their activities
and investigations
2. Praise children for developing conclusions consistent with the data they collect but that may not
reflect known scientific facts or principles.
3. Discuss limitations that may exist within experiments or activities and may affect the accuracy of
the results
4. Discuss with students how all of the data from an activity or experiment must be recorded and
considered rather than only the data that reflect the desired outcome
5. Encourage students to present differing interpretations of data from experiments and activities
and to discuss the merits of those interpretations

WILLINGNESS TO SUSPEND JUDGEMENT


 In a classroom where willingness to suspend judgment is fostered, one would expect to see
the following:
1. a variety of different sources of information including books, magazines, newspapers, films,
filmstrips, and resource persons
2. children learning which criteria can be used to judge the validity and/or bias of a source of
information
3. children discussing differing results for an activity or experiments and trying to determine the
causes of those differences as well as the validity of the varying results
4. students debating and discussing controversial issues, in which all sides are considered no
matter how popular or unpopular the view
5. teachers presenting a variety of activities to show a particular concept
6. displays of newspaper and/or magazine articles that show the development of a theory over
time
7. questions from teachers and students like these:
A. What was your source of information?
B. What evidence do you have to support that idea?
C. Did you consider all of the information before you made a decision or drew a conclusion?
D. How valid do you think your sources of information were?

SKEPTICISM
 As teachers we can encourage the development of the scientific attitude of skepticism
through the following:
1. Consideration of sources of information by study of biased versus unbiased approaches
2. Presentation of variety of differing sources of information during any unit of study
3. Consideration of a variety of activities in which a principle is clearly shown in the majority, but
its opposite in indicated in some
4. Displays and reading of new advances in science, which may conflict with text or program
material
5. Interviews in which the interviewer must probe for the resources of the interviewee
6. Comparison of fictional materials- books, comics, cartoons- with factual materials and discussion
of the differences in a “which is more accurate” framework
7. Viewing and discussing both print and televised advertisements and the claims they make in
terms of the evidence presented
8. Using fake and real articles and having students decide how they could go about determining
whether or not the articles are fake or real

OBEJECTIVITY
 Developing the child’s ability to look objectively at the content of the science program
means the teacher must change the customary pattern of teaching science in the
elementary school.

 USING A TEXTBOOK
 Most textbook activities for teaching content are presented to illustrate the principle that has
already been developed by a text
 The student is told the purpose of the activity and so is told the outcome. Because the outcome
is known to prior to the activity, there can be no doubt in anyone’s mind what will occur.
 Rather than illustrating what is already known, activities designed to develop objectivity should
be presented in such a way that the students will not know the outcome.

 USING OPERATIONAL QUESTIONS


 A second way to develop the scientific attitude of objectivity is to ask and investigate
operational questions.
 Teachers should pose such questions in a neutral form so students must base their answers to
the questions on the data they collected rather than on the thrust of the question

 EVALUATION-LEVEL QUESTIONS
 A third possibility for the development of objectivity in children is used for the teacher to
propose evaluation-level questions, particularly when the student is asked to judge against a set
of established criteria.
 Thus two theories can be compared using appropriate criteria developed either by the teacher
or by the students in large or small group settings
 DISCUSSING CONTROVERSIAL TOPICS
 As students reach the fifth through eighth grade levels and become more able to carry on
discussions, controversial topics can be considered inside the classroom
 This discussion should take place in an atmosphere where all students feel free to voice
opinions. Make no attempts to direct students toward a particular viewpoint, but rather model
the behavior of listening to all sides of an issue and considering all sides before making a
personal decision.

 USING FAMILIAR ADVERTISMENTS


 Advertising brings to students generally biased viewpoints.
 As students begin to consider advertising, they can also begin to consider what the
advertisements actually say, or do not say.
 Students can begin to compared the actual specifications of two or more different kinds of cars,
or toothpaste, or basketball shoes

A POSITIVE APPROACH TO FAILURE


 In general, the best technique for developing a positive approach toward failure is to
institute a science program in which the content of the program is developed through the us
of the processes of science, a program in which the procedures used for developing the
content and considered equally important to the content that is derived and in which
students learn from doing rather than from hearing or seeing.
 Within this general orientation toward the science program, certain techniques are
particularly appropriate:
1. In the lower elementary grades, develop operational questions which the children respond to by
making predictions of the outcome and testing their predictions
2. In the upper elementary grades and in the middle school grades, use experiments in which
students develop hypothesis that predict the outcome of the experiment
3. Discuss the data collected from both operational questions and experiments in which incorrect
predictions were made, trying to show what has been learned from data
4. Encourage children to make multiple inferences from their data and to develop ways of testing
to determine the validity of those inferences
5. Display magazine and newspaper articles in which research is discussed that did not produce the
external results. These are fairly common in topics dealing with medical research and with
research in space
6. Accept answers that are based on evidence, even when scientifically incorrect, and have the
child develop a means for retesting a hypothesis
7. Rewrite textbook activities and experiments so the outcome is not known. Have the children do
the activities and experiments before they read the information in their textbook
8. Model the scientific attitude honesty in data collection and interpretation

RESPECT FOR THE ENVIRONMENT


 The techniques for developing respect for the environment are simple:
1. Model the desired behavior.
 Modeling is the most powerful of all techniques for developing the scientific attitude of
respect for the environment.
2. Develop activities that demonstrate the desired behavior.
 For example: Constructing an insect zoo in which live insects can be observed and
identified and then returning them to the environment is an appropriate activity for
developing respect for the environment
3. Discuss scenarios in which students decide the best course of action for a particular situation.
 For example: You are hiking through the woods when you come across a black snake
right in your path. What would you do?
4. Study the role played in the environment by animals and plants not generally considered
“good”.
 For example: Student could look at poisonous snakes, sharks, bats, spiders, poison ivy,
or poison sumac.
5. Use CD- ROM and other programs to simulate dissections rather than dissecting preserved
organisms killed for the purpose of dissection.
6. Limit activities and experiments utilizing living organisms to those that cause no harm to the
organism.

LACK OF SUPERSTITION
 Developing a student’s ability to look at the world logically and to seek out explanation base on
scientific reasoning and laws can be difficult because some of the superstition maybe integrally
related to a child’s religious belief, consequently the teacher must tread.
 Modelling the attitude of objectivity is necessary in this area.

You might also like

pFad - Phonifier reborn

Pfad - The Proxy pFad of © 2024 Garber Painting. All rights reserved.

Note: This service is not intended for secure transactions such as banking, social media, email, or purchasing. Use at your own risk. We assume no liability whatsoever for broken pages.


Alternative Proxies:

Alternative Proxy

pFad Proxy

pFad v3 Proxy

pFad v4 Proxy