Improving Quality of Science Teacher Training in European Cooperation
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E-learning

Strategies for supporting process skills development and assessment

• define teaching strategy, teaching method and teaching technique;
• know diverse range of active teaching strategies and how to choose them;
• be able to recognize different strategies for teaching and studying and distinguish between major teaching methods;
• be able to choose the appropriate strategy for forming of process skills.

The notion of strategy in didactics is sometimes used as a synonym of methods and techniques, and sometimes as a synonym of direction, activities and proceedings related to teaching, learning and the arrangement of the educational process [1].

Strategy is viewed as „an individual way to arrange and use a set of skills or techniques to the aim of a more rational assessment of definite information or one or another problem solving. “Learning strategies are a combination of skills, a set of proceedings used by a learner according to the requirements of a definite situation [2]. Strategy is any activity or attempt used by a teacher to interpret, illustrate or stimulate the learning. For a more effective learning the teacher should seek for student centered and team work oriented strategies.

We can assume that strategies are a set of approaches, activities, methods and techniques used to stimulate learning and to help students assess the aims of education.

A teaching method is a system for planning, conducting and evaluation of the educative work. It includes development of objectives, ways and means of achieving objectives and procedures for evaluating learner progress. Method is also said to be a way of teaching, especially a regular, orderly, definite procedure and means of the approach towards study of the phenomena. Method is comprised of many techniques.

Teaching techniques are the details or procedure by which a method is carried out. Examples include: demonstrations, field trips, resource persons and the way something is used in teaching. Teaching techniques are specific approaches to teaching, manipulated by the teacher and designed to aid in helping students learn.

• Convey technical information;
• Promote student interest;
• Help students retain information;
• Make teaching more enjoyable;
• Involve the five senses.

Under teaching aids could understand anything that aids teaching (pictures, charts, models, etc.) and objects which supplement the learning environment.

Teaching and studying strategies can be classified as active, reproductive, research, analytic, checking, cognitive heuristic, reproductive and productive. The degree of independence and problem solving is used as criteria. For example, reproductive strategies include frontal teaching, asking questions, explanation, repetition, affirmation, independent work to solve cognitive tasks from the textbook [1].

• Intellectually more stimulating and so are more effective in promoting learning;
• Likely to be enjoyed and therefore sustain pupil motivation;
• Offers opportunities for pupils to work and progress at their own speed;
• Offers opportunities for pupils to work collaboratively;
• Promote essential scientific skills such ass problem solving.

Teaching and learning strategies can be determined as from teacher-centered and to students-centered (Table №2).

From Teacher-Centered		To Student-Centered
Objectives set by the teacher in advance to meet needs he had identified.	Most of outcomes are predictable (set by teacher) but some outcomes will be unexpected. Pupils are made aware of the objectives in advance.	Objectives are set by pupils, assisted by the teacher and will evolve during the learning process.
All pupils go through the same learning experience at the same time.	Pupils experience a variety of activities controlled by the teacher.	Pupils will be engaged in variety of activities at any one time to suite their individual needs.
Decisions are made by teachers who maintain control over the work and decide in advance the order in which things are taught.	The teacher explains his decisions.	Decisions are made by pupils or jointly by teachers and pupils, and pupils control the order in which they learn things.
The teacher evaluates the success of his objectives.	The teacher evaluates in terms of the extent to which pupils feel the teachers’ objectives have been met.	Pupils examine the process of their own learning and identify what they discovered and how.
Relatively few teaching / learning methods are used. They are selected by teacher according to his preference or ideas.	The teacher selects methods according to his perceptions of pupils’ needs.	Pupils and teachers select jointly from a wide variety of teaching / learning methods.
The teacher is seen as a role, rather than as a person, relationships are formal.	The teacher is seen as a person, but not as a member of the group.	The teacher is seen as a person, not as a role. Personal relationships develop.
The teacher selects and provides resources and decides what is relevant.	The teacher controls access to all resources.	The teacher is seen as one of many resources to which pupils have access.
The teacher is the ultimate authority and has ‘the right answer’.	The teacher manages the lesson in order to guide the pupils towards ‘the right answer’.	There may not be a ‘right answer’. Everyone’s opinion is valid.
The teacher instigates individual tasks which are performed in isolation.	The teacher controls the degree of individual and group work.	Communication and interpersonal skills are an essential part of the learning.

Active strategies are the strategies used when the centre of the teaching process is focused on students to some extent. And so, the purpose of these strategies is realized – to give an opportunity to the students to express their will and their abilities better.

The choice of a strategy is only one of the conditions which work on the effectiveness of the teaching process.

• Any strategy selected should involve the students as participants in the activity, help them acquire knowledge, develop the ability to reason and asses the information presented.
• Students learn in a variety of ways (remember three basic learning styles – auditory, visual, and kinesthetic) and through different means. As a rule, more than two strategies or activities should be used particularly for more complex knowledge.
• The teacher should begin with simpler and move to more complex strategies.
• Audiovisual aids and visual tools should be included whenever possible for reinforce learning.
• The ultimate factor to choose some or other strategies could indicate the following: abilities and interest of students, size of class, teacher competence, facilities available, time available, behavioral objectives of class, resources available.

• The process of aims identification changes. The aims of a lesson with the use of multimedia should be multi-variant, on different levels, so that each student is able to find his place in it. The aims of teaching need new formulation and new order focused on the individual independent acquisition of knowledge;
• The choice of contents in multimedia and hypermedia has specific features. It is related to the correct amount and adaptation of information regarding the aims and should be systematized in its structure and systematically renewed;
• The very character of education changes and becomes highly individualized. Students’ independent work needs new arrangement, which arises a necessity to research into the issues of the individual way to knowledge and the development of skills in independent study;
• Teachers are responsible for the creation of conditions and necessary instruments for self-control and self-evaluation of the expected results;
• With the mass access to ICT teachers’ creativity becomes the main index of professional competency;

All in all the main functions of science teachers’ change and a new teacher’s professional profile is created. Teachers become organizers, consultants, counselors and assistants and teaching becomes student centred to a significant degree.

To be able to use amply their creative possibilities in the use of multimedia in the teaching of physics, science teachers need to know what multimedia education possibilities are. The latter could be described in regard to several criteria, such as students’ attitude, teaching arrangement and technical possibilities [4].

1. In regard to students’ development:
   • Increases motivation;
   • Activates students’ participation in education, both in class and in their individual studies;
   • Enhances interest in physics and astronomy;
   • Increases the scientific level of presentation of knowledge;
   • Widens students’ knowledge about contemporary means of information;
   • Provides additional possibilities for the development of model images;
2. In regard to the arrangement of teaching:
   • Creates possibilities for individualization and differentiation of teaching;
   • Provides additional possibilities for problem situations;
   • Provides good knowledge systematization;
   • Arranges a fast check of hypothesis suggested to students;
   • Makes possible a fast diagnosis of teaching results and a quality test check (highly objective evaluation, use of various problems, fast check);
   • Provides possibilities for self-control;
   • Use of graph and text designs for the results of assignments, didactic materials, presentations and papers;
   • Use in laboratory and demonstration experiments;
3. In regard to technical possibilities:
   • Provides possibilities to include in the teaching of physics modeling processes impossible or difficult to demonstrate in reality;
   • Provides additional visualization possibilities;
   • Provides possibilities to measure and visualize fast processes;
   • Provides possibilities to observe in details particular moments from a physics demonstration experiment;
   • Provides possibilities for a successful representation of the transition from qualitative into quantitative research;
   • Cuts down the time necessary for activities related to processing of information;
   • Provides possibilities to present information in various ways (tables, graphs, drawings, etc.).

As supporting process skills we will accept these formed during secondary education physics learning and are of great importance to students. We considered some basic and some integrated process science skills and we offer a sample description of the activities which could build these skills. Knowledge of these activities and of some of their details is significant to teachers when they choose the proper strategy of organizing a learning process based on a certain theme.

We will consider ways of process skills formation in students via organizing students’ activity while processing and analyzing data collected in an experiment. Formation of process science skills is closely related to the science character, structure, and relations. That is why we will offer a definite sequence of actions which students perform under a teacher’s guidance about formation of knowledge connected to the specific structural elements of physics [5].

We will pay special attention to activities performed by a student during arranging experiment data in tables, making graphic presentation based on the collected data, and re-collecting data from graphs (a communication and classification skill), working with text and some integrated process skills related to study of the specific structural elements of physics knowledge: physics phenomenon, quantity, law, and physics device.

We offer to your attention a sequence of actions which the students should perform under teacher’s guidance in order to build proper process skills.

• The process of data collection requires students to answer given questions or to ask their own questions whose answers they will get through data collection from an experiment or observation;
• Students should get acquainted with methods of collecting data and a teacher should organize proper assimilation and use of these methods by students;
• A repetition of data collection processes to be organized (if possible) in order a proper documentation to be provided;
• Data examination to be organized and attention to be paid to existing causative-consecutive relations;
• To be put tasks and questions that will make students draw a conclusion based on evidence.

After a successfully performed experiment data about certain quantities is graphically presented. It is important to be determined the number of columns in a table which is equal to the number of measured quantities plus the number of constant quantities (in this experiment). After that teacher and students entitle each column –each title is the sign of a quantity and its unit of measure. While filling the columns the choice of proper unit of measure is of great importance. Students should fill the columns with data as they are careful with units of measure.

• to determine which value is an argument and which is a function;
• the argument is presented horizontally, the function vertically;
• the values are represented with their measures on both axes;
• the zero is fixed;
• the numbers from the table are presented on the graph;
• the dots are connected with a line.

Graphs could be used for examining a dependency between variable and constant quantities and one between dependent and independent variables. Graphic presentation of data provides clearness that would make data dependencies and discrepancies to stand out.

To analyze data results, students should be able to interpret and analyze graphs.

1. They read the title of the graph and the signs written on the different lines (or other geometrical figures);
2. They determine the symbols on the axes;
3. They determine the units of measure used for the presentation of the quantities;
4. They determine the type of graph (most often it is linear function);
5. They determine certain points or parts of the graph if any;
6. They interpret data considering the type of graph (linear graph-direct proportionality of quantities);
7. They draw conclusions about dependencies of quantities and analyze the whole information taken from the graph.

The work with a physics text is an important process skill. With this skill students have good chances to organize successfully their individual work and their self-training. Reading physics text has its peculiarities and a student should be familiar with them. Some of these peculiarities are related to the presence of many different signs for different quantities, references to graphs, tables, schemes, figures, and pictures. Presence of mathematical formulae is the main characteristic of physics text. Teachers should assist students to build up special skills for reading comprehension of formulae. In this case the relation between mathematics and physics is of absolute importance.

A formation of a skill for work with physics text is started from the very beginning of learning physics as a separate school subject and it is important this skill to be improved during the whole training by regular organization of a physics texts reading during the classes.

First, for the formation of this skill a reproductive method is used – a teacher reads physics text and shows how the signs, formulae, and graphs should be interpret. This method is suitable for primary education. For secondary education it is better teachers to give instructions to students how a physics text should be read. And these instructions to include: questions which students should answer after reading the text; writing down formulae on the note books with certain explanation; oral expression of what the graph is, etc.

For formation of physics knowledge, which includes the elements listed below, a teacher organizes students' thinking in a definite sequence via putting questions and tasks:

1. Describe external indications of the phenomenon;
2. Give descriptive definition (based on external indications);
3. Name conditions under which it can be observed (it happens);
4. Give examples of observation of the phenomenon;
5. Describe experiments demonstrating the phenomenon;
6. Name values, concepts and laws describing the phenomenon;
7. Point methods of study;
8. Give explanation of the phenomenon based on contemporary scientific theories;
9. Is there relationship with other phenomenon (cause and effect relationships of the phenomenon);
10. What is practical applications of the phenomenon in everyday life, industry and equipment;
11. Name cases in which the phenomenon is harmful and not useful for man;
12. Are there ways to manage the course of the phenomenon;
13. Make historic reference on the discovery and study of the phenomenon.

1. What is its denomination and symbol;
2. Give explanation of the physical essence of the value (i.e. making clear the quantity of which property of bodies, phenomenon or state is expressed by this value);
3. Give definition (the system of characteristic features);
4. Write formula expressing its relationship to other physical values;
5. What are the units of measurement and scale of the value;
6. What are the ways and equipment of measurement;
7. Make historic reference on the introduction of the value.

1. Which physical phenomenon is characterized by this law and the relationship between which values is it concerned with;
2. Under what conditions is this law valid?
3. Which are the Limits of application;
4. Give expression of the law: verbal, in a table, graphic, analytic;
5. By what experiments demonstrate the validity of the law;
6. Give explanation of the law based on contemporary scientific theories;
7. Try to explain the physical essence of the law as a quantitative representation of the cause and effect relationship between two or more types of phenomena;
8. Give examples of the practical application of the law including its use in scientific predictions;
9. Use of the law as a means of management and scientific prediction;
10. Make historic reference on the discovery of the law.

1. What is the name and the application of the device;
2. Describe appearance and features;
3. Which is its scheme representation;
4. What is its working principle;
5. Describe the main parts and their use;
6. Are there work instructions;
7. Which are scientific, technical and practical applications?

• What is the relationship between strategy, method and technique? Define each notion.
• Mention some strategies and methods of teaching. Explain one method of teaching of your choice.
• Which are the criteria to choose a teaching strategy? Should the teacher use more than one strategy or activity in one lesson?
• What requirements does ICT place to teachers? What didactic possibilities does ICT provide in the teaching of physics? What approaches do teachers of physics use when they use ICT in the different lesson types?
• Describe possible strategies to form in students skills to get information from a graph.
• What are possible techniques to form students’ skills to study physics phenomena, value, low and device?

Students discuss on the tasks they are given and consider the outlines of the lessons they have planned. They comment on these particular parts in which the techniques for formation of process science skills are described.

• Choose a text from a secondary education physics book and write instructions for organizing self-dependent reading by students. (Guidelines: Determine the length of the text and put concrete questions related to its physics character.)
• Give a concrete example for formation of knowledge of a certain physics law (you choose which law) from the secondary education and use the previously mentioned organization for the students’ mental processes

Strategies are a compilation of approaches, activities, methods, and techniques used to stimulate teaching and learning and for achieving the objectives of training. Method is a way of teaching, a course, specific rules and means of the approach towards study of phenomena. A method is a compilation of many techniques. Techniques of teaching are details or procedures through which a method is carried out. Strategies of teaching and learning may be classified as active, reproductive, research, etc. The main factor for choosing one or another strategy is related to students, to their abilities and interests, to their number in class and to the problem that they should be active participants in the training. The inclusion of ICT in the teaching process changes its character and determines the choice of a certain strategy. Formation of process science skills such as to collect and process data and to present it graphically is related to a concrete organization of students’ activity. Some integrated process skills related to assimilating of different structural elements of physics knowledge (physics phenomenon, physics value, physics law, and physics device) may be formed through an organization of students’ mental processes in a certain sequence.

• Is it necessary for a teacher who is beginner to use different teaching strategies? Isn’t it better to begin only with a teacher-centered strategy?
• Does a strategy in which students are an active side in the learning process take much time?

http://www.aea267.k12.ia.us/cia/index.php?page=teaching_strategies# – teaching strategies

Library Skills, Information Skills, and Information Literacy: Implications for Teaching and Learning

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