Tool time: Gender and students' use of tools,control, and authority

In this study, we examined how students used science equipment and tools in constructing knowledge during science instruction. Within a geographical metaphor, we focused on how students use tools when constructing new knowledge, how control of tools is actualized from pedagogical perspectives, how language and tool accessibility intersect, how gender intersects with tool use, and how competition for resources impacts access to tools. Sixteen targeted students from five elementary science classes were observed for 3 days of instruction. Results showed gender differences in students' use of exclusive language and commands, as well as in the ways students played and tinkered with tools. Girls tended to carefully follow the teacher's directions during the laboratory and did little playing or tinkering with science tools. Male students tended to use tools in inventive and exploratory ways. Results also showed that whether or not a student had access to his or her own materials became indicative of the type of verbal interactions that took place during the science investigation. Gender‐related patterns in how tools are shared, how dyads relate to the materials and each other, and how materials are used to build knowledge are described. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 37: 760–783, 2000     

An online categorization task to investigate changes in students' interpretations of organic chemistry reactions

In this study, we investigated how students organized their knowledge about organic chemistry reactions in a transformed curriculum, including their choices, abilities, and changes over time. This transformed curriculum focuses on interpreting the underlying mechanistic patterns of chemical reactions and emphasizes the principles of reactivity in organic chemistry. Data from this study were collected at beginning and end of an Organic Chemistry II course using an open and closed online categorization task with a set of organic chemistry reactions. In the open task, participants organized the set of reactions as they chose, giving us insight into how the participants preferred to organize their knowledge. In the closed task, participants were asked to organize the set of reactions in a specific way—by each reaction's governing mechanism—which would provide a measure of the students' ability to categorize the reactions in that way. We investigated the similarities and differences of the open and closed categorizations at each time of administration and analyzed the changes over time. Findings from this study emphasized the efficacy of the transformed curriculum for: (a) promoting a focus on process-oriented features of reactions over static features of a reaction and (b) increasing the students' abilities to categorize a set of reactions according to the mechanism governing the reaction. Findings revealed implications for the transformed curriculum, which addresses key areas for improvements, potential implications for research, and also limitations of the current study. We further describe possible extensions of this study to how the open and closed categorization tasks may be used for research and instruction in other science, technology, engineering, and math disciplines.     

Prevalence of reading failure in boys compared with girls

The hypothesis that proportionately more boys than girls experience reading failure was tested on a sample of 708 children using both test-identified and teacher-identified criteria. Test-identified reading failure was defined by low scores on standardized reading achievement tests given at the end of first and third grade. For Severely Reading Disabled (total reading score at the 10th percentile or lower), the ratio of boys to girls was 1.4:1 at first grade and 1.3:1 at third. At both grades equal proportions of boys and girls were represented in the Reading Disabled category (total reading score between the 11th and 30th percentile). Teacher-identified reading failure criteria consisted of enrollment in LD and Chapter One (remedial reading) programs at first and third grades. Teacher-identified ratios of boys to girls in LD were 2:1 at both first and third grade, exceeding the test-identified ratios, while identification for Chapter One services did not show a gender difference.