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Successful Science and Engineering
Teaching in Colleges and Universities
2nd edition
A volume in Science & Engineering Education Sources
Calvin S. Kalman, Series Editor
Successful Science and Engineering
Teaching in Colleges and Universities
2nd edition
Calvin S. KalmanConcordia University
INFORMATION AGE PUBLISHING, INC.Charlotte, NC • www.infoagepub.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A CIP record for this book is available from the Library of Congress http://www.loc.gov
ISBN: 978-1-68123-957-6 (Paperback) 978-1-68123-958-3 (Hardcover) 978-1-68123-959-0 (ebook)
Copyright © 2017 Information Age Publishing Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.
Printed in the United States of America
This volume is dedicated to my wife Marilyn, my children Ben and Sam, grandchildren Josh, Lily, and Max, and as I have indicated in the acknowledg-ment section, this work would never have come to fruition if it were not for the inspiration and ideas from my late wife Judy Kalman (February 23, 1946– June 29, 2006) in addition to her unflagging support and encouragement.
She was a truly great teacher and a model for my own teaching. —C.S.K.
vii
Contents
About the Author .........................................................................xiii
Acknowledgments ..........................................................................xv
Foreword to the Second Edition ................................................. xvii
Author Note ................................................................................. xix
1 Introduction ................................................................................... 1Road Map of the Book ...................................................................... 6
Writing to Learn .............................................................................. 6Two Goals for Any Science and Engineering Course .......................... 7Questions by Students ....................................................................... 7What Students Get Out of Class ........................................................ 8In-Class and Out-of-Class Activities .................................................. 9Solving Problems ............................................................................ 10Computer Aids ................................................................................ 10
Summary ......................................................................................... 10
2 Reflective Writing ..........................................................................13Freewriting ...................................................................................... 15Getting Students to Read Material in the Textbook
Before Coming to Class ........................................................... 17Gadamer’s Hermeneutical Approach ............................................ 18
Instructions on Doing Reflective Writing ......................................... 22Samples of Student Use of Reflective Writing ................................... 23
viii Contents
Marking Reflective Writing ............................................................. 24
Student Response to Reflective Writing ............................................ 24
Summary ......................................................................................... 25
Reflective Writing Rubric ............................................................... 26
3 Writing to Learn ........................................................................... 27
Reflective Write–Pair–Share .......................................................... 29
Scenario for a Class......................................................................... 29
The Course Dossier Method .......................................................... 31
Transforming Each Lecture Into a Mini Research Paper .................. 31
End of Semester .............................................................................. 32
Hosting an End of Semester Conference ...................................... 35
Summary ......................................................................................... 38
Reflective Write–Pair–Share ........................................................... 38
The Course Dossier Method ............................................................. 38
End-of-Semester Conference ............................................................. 38
Appendix A ..................................................................................... 39
Appendix B ..................................................................................... 44
4 Constructing Student Knowledge ..................................................47
Cognitive Dissonance ..................................................................... 47
Students’ Intellectual Development .............................................. 49
Student Misconceptions ................................................................. 51
Debate in the Science Education Community ............................. 53
Critical Thinking ............................................................................ 55
Summary ......................................................................................... 56
Note ................................................................................................. 57
5 Collaborative Groups ....................................................................59
Team Work and Group Projects .................................................... 59
Benefits to Having Students Work in Groups ................................... 60
Team Formation ............................................................................. 61
Team Size ....................................................................................... 61
Team Management ......................................................................... 61
Team Evaluation ............................................................................ 61
Group Development ....................................................................... 62
Classroom Warmups ....................................................................... 63
Contents ix
Roles for Group Members ................................................................ 64Dysfunctional Groups ..................................................................... 66
Summary ......................................................................................... 66Benefits of Small-Group Format Activities .....................................66Characteristics of Effective Groups................................................... 66Dealing with Dysfunctional Groups ................................................ 67
6 Utilizing Collaborative Group to Promote Conceptual Conflict .....69Conceptual Conflict ....................................................................... 69Peer Instruction .............................................................................. 71Collaborative Group Conceptual Conflict Activity ...................... 72Comparison of Peer Instruction With the Conceptual Conflict
Group Activity .......................................................................... 73Incommensurabilty in Conceptual Change ................................. 76Original Conceptual Conflict Conceptual Change
Group Activity .......................................................................... 77Summary ......................................................................................... 79
Conceptual Conflict ....................................................................79Peer Instruction .............................................................................. 80Collaborative Group Conceptual Conflict Activity ............................ 80
Comparison of Peer Instruction With the Conceptual Conflict Group Activity .......................................................................... 81
Appendix: Task Sheets for Warm-Up and the Four Concept Exercises ............................................. 82
7 Selected Methods of Utilizing Collaborative Groups ................... 85Labatorials ....................................................................................... 85Jigsaw ............................................................................................... 88The Learning Cell .......................................................................... 93
Concept Mapping ........................................................................... 94Collaborative Concept Mapping ...................................................... 95
Summary ......................................................................................... 96Labatorials .............................................................................. 96Jigsaw to Relate Philosophers of Science to Course Material .............. 97The Learning Cell .......................................................................... 98Concept Mapping ........................................................................... 98
Appendix ......................................................................................... 99Sample Labatorial Worksheet .......................................................... 99
x Contents
8 Changing Students’ Epistemologies ............................................105Developing a Scientific Mindset .................................................. 106Stages in Epistemic Development in Students ............................ 106Certainty of Knowledge ................................................................ 108Simplicity of Knowledge ............................................................... 109Source of Knowledge .................................................................... 109Justification for Knowing ............................................................. 109Attainability of Truth ....................................................................110Critique Exercise ............................................................................110Model Course: Presenting Students With Alternative Frameworks:
Pre-Galilean Physics and Newtonian Physics ....................... 113Group Work ....................................................................................114Essays in Midterm and Final Examinations .................................117Students’ Epistemic Thinking.......................................................118The Montreal and Vancouver Study: Reflective Writing,
Collaborative Group, and Critique ....................................... 121The Calgary Study: Reflective Writing and Labatorials ............ 122Summary ....................................................................................... 124
Epistemology ...........................................................................124Critique Exercise ........................................................................... 125Students’ Epistemic Thinking...................................................... 126Appendix: Critiques ..................................................................... 127
Critique #1 ................................................................................... 127Critique #2 ................................................................................... 128Critique #3 ................................................................................... 128
9 Problem Solving ..........................................................................129Solving Problems Using Templates Versus Solutions
Using Paradigms .................................................................... 129Five-Step Method for Solving Problems ...................................... 131Problem-Solving Strategies .......................................................... 132
Problem 1 ..................................................................................... 132Problem 2 ..................................................................................... 133Problem 3 ..................................................................................... 134Problem 4 ..................................................................................... 135Problem 5 ..................................................................................... 138
Contents xi
Summary ....................................................................................... 140Appendix ....................................................................................... 140
Letter From a Student ................................................................... 140
10 Methods for Training Students to Solve Problems ........................ 143Writing Their Way Into the Solution ........................................... 143Collaborative Problem-Solving Groups ...................................... 144How Many People Should Be in the Group? .............................. 146Who Should Be Placed in the Group? ......................................... 147Individual Accountability ............................................................. 147Summary ....................................................................................... 147Appendix ....................................................................................... 148
A Student’s Advice for Studying Physics ......................................... 148
11 Using the Computer to Aid Teaching ..........................................151Computer-Assisted Instruction (CAI) ......................................... 151Using the Computer to Manage Laboratories ............................ 155Summary ....................................................................................... 159
References ...................................................................................161
Index ............................................................................................171
Successful Science and Engineering Teaching in Colleges and Universities, pages xiii–xivCopyright © 2017 by Information Age PublishingAll rights of reproduction in any form reserved. xiii
About the Author
Calvin S. Kalman is a tenured full professor in the Department of Phys-ics and principal of Science College at Concordia University. He is also
an adjunct professor in the Department of Educational and Counseling Psychology at McGill University. He has held many positions at Concordia including chair of the Department Physics. He has been the chair of the Division of Physics Education of the Canadian Association of Physicists.
He was awarded the Canadian Association of Physicists Medal for Ex-cellence in Teaching, the Concordia University Council on Student Life Teaching Award, and the Arts and Science Dean’s Lifetime Achievement Award for Teaching Excellence. He is a member of the Provost’s Circle of Distinction at Concordia University, and received a Teaching and Creativity Award from the Society for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education.
Kalman authored Successful Science and Engineering Teaching: Theoretical and Learning Perspectives and How Did We All Begin, Where Is God in All That?
He has been chair of the international series of conferences on hy-perons, charm, and beauty hadrons (Montreal 1997, Genoa 1998, Valen-cia 2000, Vancouver 2002, Chicago 2004, Lancaster, England 2006, North Carolina 2008). He has also been editor-in-chief for the proceedings of these conferences. He co-chaired and co-edited the 26th annual Montreal-Rochester-Syracuse-Toronto (MRST) conference on high energy physics,
xiv About the Author
and coauthored the book: Preons: Models of Leptons, Quarks and Gauge Bosons as Composite Particles.
Kalman was science editor and senior executive editor of Academic Ex-change Quarterly and is on the editorial board of Science & Education.
Altogether he has been an author of 75 published papers related to high energy physics and 58 papers on science educational research. He has often been invited to give papers or workshops on educational research. For example, he gave the keynote address at the annual spring teaching forum, Teaching the Future: Innovation in the College Classroom at Yale University and presented the keynote address to the Physics & Engineering Physics Division annual meeting of the American Society for Electrical Engineers. He has served as commissioner for elementary schools and also as commis-sioner for high schools of the Protestant School Board of Greater Montreal.
Successful Science and Engineering Teaching in Colleges and Universities, pages xv–xviCopyright © 2017 by Information Age PublishingAll rights of reproduction in any form reserved. xv
Acknowledgments
First, I credit my late wife Judy Kalman (February 23, 1946–June 29, 2006), who had many successes in teaching writing at Concordia University
and Dawson College, with inspiring much of my effort to bring writing into the science classroom. She also convinced me to set aside my initial skepti-cism of writing methods such as journaling to attend an intensive two-day workshop at the University of Vermont that impressed me enough to try some new techniques myself (the course dossier). She and Marjorie McK-innon were instrumental in convincing me to use collaborative groups in my teaching. At the time, Marjorie was associate director of the Concor-dia University center for faculty development. My first efforts in innovative teaching based upon computer assisted instruction would never have come to fruition without the help of Ron Smith and David Kaufman. Craig Nel-son, whom I have never met, inspired my idea to follow conceptual conflict collaborative group exercises with a writing activity. Without the support and many discussions provided by Mark Aulls, I would never have come to my understanding of how reflective writing worked. The first edition of this book owes much to Carolyn Dumore, managing editor at Anker Pub-lishing Company. She carefully went over every word and provided helpful suggestions for revisions. I would like to thank Teresa Larkin for sharing the guidelines and call for papers along with brochures to illustrate my discussion of her end of semester conference. Some parts of this book have
xvi Acknowledgments
appeared in articles I wrote for Physical Review Physics Education Research, The Canadian Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, Physics in Canada, Canadian Journal of Physics, American Journal of Physics, Science & Education, and Academic Exchange Quarterly. I wish to thank Thomson Learn-ing and Toby Fulwiler for granting me permission to reproduce and/or paraphrase some material in this book.
Successful Science and Engineering Teaching in Colleges and Universities, page xviiCopyright © 2017 by Information Age PublishingAll rights of reproduction in any form reserved. xvii
Foreword to the Second Edition
Many advances in research in science education have occurred since the appearance of the first edition of this book over 10 years ago. For ex-
ample, much more is now understood about how Reflective Writing benefits students. Most important on this point is that much better instructions are available for students on how to use reflective writing. A rubric has been con-structed that simplifies the marking of Reflective Writing. It also has been rightly pointed out that there was no discussion of peer instruction in the first edition. Since then research has been done comparing peer instruction with the conceptual conflict collaborative group activity that was described in the first edition. There is a description of an activity called labatorial that combines tutorials with labs. This edition now includes a discussion about the long-standing debate in the science education community between those who believe that students come into the classroom with a theory about the subject, which is different from that described by the teacher and found in their textbooks; and those who feel that a student’s knowledge consists of isolated structures called phenomenological primitives (p-prims). The former was the accepted paradigm on student conceptions in science in the 1970s through the 1990s. Discussion is included here of new information on how combining Reflective Writing with one or more interactive interventions can produce statistically significant changes in how students learn.
Successful Science and Engineering Teaching in Colleges and Universities, page xixCopyright © 2017 by Information Age PublishingAll rights of reproduction in any form reserved. xix
Author Note
This book is intentionally informal. In writing it, I have viewed it as a discussion of our mutual interest in helping students learn. I hope that
you will continue the conversation by letting me know what works for you and ways that you have changed the material that I present in ways that work better in your courses.
