Facilitating problem solving in high school chemistry

The major purpose for conducting this study was to determine whether certain instructional strategies were superior to others in teaching high school chemistry students problem solving. The effectiveness of four instructional strategies for teaching problem solving to students of various proportional reasoning ability, verbal and visual preference, and mathematics anxiety were compared in this aptitude by treatment interaction study. The strategies used were the factor-label method, analogies, diagrams, and proportionality. Six hundred and nine high school students in eight schools were randomly assigned to one of four teaching strategies within each classroom. Students used programmed booklets to study the mole concept, the gas laws, stoichiometry, and molarity. Problem-solving ability was measured by a series of immediate posttests, delayed posttests and the ACS-NSTA Examination in High School Chemistry. Results showed that mathematics anxiety is negatively correlated with science achievement and that problem solving is dependent on students' proportional reasoning ability. The factor-label method was found to be the most desirable method and proportionality the least desirable method for teaching the mole concept. However, the proportionality method was best for teaching the gas laws. Several second-order interactions were found to be significant when mathematics anxiety was one of the aptitudes involved.     

Junior high school physics: Using a qualitative strategy for successful problem solving

Students at the junior high school (JHS) level often cannot use their knowledge of physics for explaining and predicting phenomena. We claim that this difficulty stems from the fact that explanations are multi‐step reasoning tasks, and students often lack the qualitative problem‐solving strategies needed to guide them. This article describes a new instructional approach for teaching mechanics at the JHS level that explicitly teaches such a strategy. The strategy involves easy to use visual representations and leads from characterizing the system in terms of interactions to the design of free‐body force diagrams. These diagrams are used for explaining and predicting phenomena based on Newton's laws. The findings show that 9th grade students who studied by the approach advanced significantly from pretests to post‐tests on items of the Force Concept Inventory—FCI and on other items examining specific basic and complex understanding performances. These items focused on the major learning goals of the program. In the post‐tests the JHS students performed on the FCI items better than advanced high‐school and college students. In addition, interviews conducted before, during, and after instruction indicated that the students had an improved ability to explain and predict phenomena using physics ideas and that they showed retention after 6 months. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 47: 1094–1115, 2010     

Making sense of genetics: Students' knowledge use during problem solving in a high school genetics class

Interest in including ideas about the nature of science in instruction and research has led to the realization that, in addition to developing courses which offer students experience with science practice, it is important to understand the ways in which students learn and use science knowledge within such courses. The study reported here is based on a particular view of the nature of scientific practice: Science is collaborative; scientists use knowledge in the construction of new knowledge; and scientists' understanding of problems and problem-solving strategies change during knowledge construction. Given this perspective, the study examines the ways in which students in an innovative high school genetics class collaborate to construct knowledge as they develop genetics models. In this classroom, students use three kinds of knowledge: knowledge of genetics, permitting them to recognize anomalous aspects of new data and providing a template from which to develop new models; knowledge of the process of model revision, helping them make decisions about how to develop new models; and knowledge of their own problem-solving strategies, allowing them to “keep track” of what they have done, as well as make connections between the development of new models and their knowledge of genetics. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Curriculum integration in the senior secondary school: a case study in a national assessment context

This paper considers curriculum integration in the secondary school context and investigates the claims made that it can enhance learning outcomes for students. I argue that curriculum integration should be utilized not as a main means of curricular delivery but as a supplementary opportunity to put disciplinary knowledge to use in certain, well-planned contexts. In other words, disciplinary learning comes first and is then deepened through application in an interdisciplinary context. This argument is illustrated through a case study of a new ‘21st Century’ secondary school where interdisciplinarity is a cornerstone of the school’s philosophy. Methods for the study included weekly observations, interviews, focus groups and a survey. I conclude by suggesting that teachers require further time and assistance to develop programmes and evaluative criteria to ensure learning moves beyond thematically generated common sense knowledge, towards interdisciplinary insights.     

Education collaboration to promote school participation in northern Ghana: A case study of a complementary education program

This study explores the perceived benefits and challenges of the collaboration model of a complementary education program which operates in marginalized communities in northern Ghana. The scope of the paper includes the background, collaboration as a transformative process, research methodology, findings, and discussion. The study revealed that: (a) the collaborative partners’ “shared values” were a major drive of the collaboration; (b) the collaboration model was fluid, contextual, and an unstructured process; (c) the process provided new strategies promoting school participation in northern Ghana; and (d) the collaborative partners’ idiosyncrasies posed a major challenge to the collaboration.     

Open-ended problem solving in school chemistry: A preliminary investigation

This paper uses a new set of 14 open-ended problems, designed for 14-17-year-old pupils studying chemistry, to attempt to gain some initial insights into the ways pupils solve open-ended chemistry problems. The emphasis is on how concepts and linkages between concepts influence success in solving such open-ended problems. Pupils worked in groups of three attempting to solve the problems and were encouraged to talk freely, to make notes of their progress, and to note their agreed answers. Evaluation sheets were also completed individually by the pupils after each problem. By studying the interactions between pupils by means of written materials, observation and audiotapes, it was possible to build up a picture of the way the pupils approached the problems and to explore some of the reasons for difficulties they experienced. In the light of the evidence, it is suggested that creating the links between 'islands' of knowledge is an important skill in solving open-ended problems and that this skill is not easily achieved by pupils at these ages. The notion that problem solving is a generic skill which can be taught is questioned.     

Mask-making as identity project in a high school English class: a case study

This study reports on the composing process of one student, Peta (a pseudonym), as he reflects on a significant composition he produced during a unit on identity in a 12th‐grade English class in a U. S. high school. The unit was the first thematic exploration of the year for the students and was designed to help them think about themselves as readers, writers, and individuals. The teacher's goal was to have students' engagements with literary and artistic texts serve as vehicles for developing better understandings of themselves. The study demonstrates how students' engagement with more ‘traditional’ artefacts is essentially an example of multimodality and evidences why teachers and researchers should see such work as part of the long tradition of creativity within English. It also demonstrates how such an apparently ‘traditional’ artistic approach in fact covers the same territory as that of the digital revolution, that is that multimodal ‘tools’ engage all the cultural resources of students from their domestic, community and school settings, in contrast with much typical school activity that is perceived as pointless and tedious.     

Leadership to build a democratic community within school: a case study of two Korean high schools

This article aims to explore how democratic community is manifest in schools in Korea. It also tries to examine how leadership, specifically transformational leadership, functions in shaping a democratic community within a school. Toward this aim, we have conducted a case study of two religious high schools in Korea. Based on the findings from the schools, we have discussed five aspects related to democratic community and transformational leadership. When school principals’ leadership has transformational characteristics and consistency over the years, the leaders’ mission and vision become shared values among the school members. The shared vision and cultural values make democratic systems work effectively. This article includes implications for educational policy and practice.

高中数学分析和解决问题能力的组成及培养策略

素质教育的发展背景下,新课改也对高中数学的教学提出了新的要求,尤其是在对问题的分析和解决能力方面,其要求上升到了另外一种高度。高中数学的教学与学习过程中,需要做到的不仅仅是学生的高考分数的增加,更应该使学生的数学综合能力得到最大的提升。而众多的综合能力中,占据主要位置的便是对于问题的分析和解决的能力。本文通过对高中数学分析和解决问题能力的组成以及培养策略进行具体的研究和探析,以期推动和促进高中数学教学的发展与进步,保证学生对问题的分析和解决能力得到最大的、切实有效的提升。     

Complex problem solving in L1 education: Senior high school students' knowledge of the language problem-solving process

The solving of reasoning problems in first language (L1) education can produce an understanding of language, and student autonomy in language problem solving, both of which are contemporary goals in senior high school education. The purpose of this study was to obtain a better understanding of senior high school students' knowledge of the language problem-solving process. Fifty-three 11th-grade high school students solved standard, comprehension, and linguistic reasoning problems. Before solving the problems, the participants had filled in open-ended questions inquiring about their knowledge regarding the effectiveness of a chosen problem-solving strategy. Content analysis of the responses indicated four categories and nine subcategories. The implications of the relatively few responses in the category of explicit knowledge of the language problem-solving process are discussed in the light of the changing needs of L1 students.     

Inquiry training and problem solving in elementary school children

An experiment designed to determine whether children can benefit from directed instruction in the strategies of problem solving.     

A framework for exploring small group learning in high school science classrooms: The triple problem solving space

Instructional Science - Classroom activities using an inquiry approach often feature students working in small groups to reduce teacher-centeredness and maximize student autonomy. Within science...     

Funding at-risk compensatory programs: An urban high school case study

A Texas urban high school with a 98 percent minority student enrollment was selected to conduct a micro-finance analysis on site-based at-risk per pupil costs. A process was developed to define site-based state compensatory education (SCE) and to account for all students receiving direct and indirect state compensatory education services. Program costs data were analyzed to develop a relationship between full-time equivalent (FTE) state categorical program costs and regular education program costs. At-risk student background characteristics were defined using a parent home survey, conducted with a sample of twenty at-risk students and twenty regular education students. The data revealed that 68 percent of the students exhibited one or more of the state-defined at-risk variables; the highest program costs produced the highest achievement: and based on student backgroud characteristics, all of the students, including regular funded students, were at risk.     

Gender discourse in an Arab-Muslim high school in Israel: Ethnographic case study

Although the school constitutes a key cultural arena for the production and reproduction of gender identities, few studies have addressed gender discourse in educational institutions in developing societies. Such studies are especially sparse in Arab society in Israel. This study goes some way to addressing what is often absent from many sociological portrayals of young pupils and schools, since it uses the words of the teachers and students to clarify the construction of gender discourse in an Arab high school in Israel. It points to activities considered to be gendered; identifying distinctions between the sexes (if they exist) in the staff’s and students’ perceptions of educational experiences at school; and examining to what extent school authority is seen as masculine and whether the school promotes debate and socialization for equality between the sexes. The research employed an inductive methodology including ethnographic data-collection techniques: observations, focus group interviews of students and in-depth personal interviews with school role-holders. Findings indicate that a covert learning program influences gender construction in the Arab school, a program intended to maintain the existing hegemonic social hierarchy. Patriarchal control of the adolescents’ agenda appears weakened and a generation gap separates teachers from students. Voices of students and younger staff advocate deconstruction of the traditional structure and norms of Arab society, suggesting a new agenda, promoting egalitarian discourse, and new personal and collective identities. Conclusions are drawn concerning the school’s role in the deconstruction of the existing male hegemony, the promotion of gender equity. The paper provides ethnographic insights concerning the Arab high school in Israel, pointing up a need for empathetic educator-student dialogue, that will promote egalitarian perceptions and practices, listen to the voice of the younger generation and challenge residual social norms of Arab Muslim society. The findings indicate that a more open gender discourse could offer symbolic resources and/or practical tools to enhance the every-day implementation of equity in the school. The paper also suggests some new research directions.     

高中物理问题解决的元认知训练研究

根据我国新课程改革的精神、高中物理课程标准和认知心理学理论,采用具体认知策略与元认知策略相结合的思维训练模式,提出高中物理问题解决建模的三个阶段,及各阶段相应的认知策略．用白编教程,进行了元认知训练．实验表明,思维活动中的元认知在对学生学习方法和能力的培养有显著作用．