Transcript Slide 1

What Do Students Get from PBI?
Permission to Think For Themselves
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They get to actively participate
They begin to experience the teacher as a “facilitator”
and as a learner instead of a “disiminator” of information
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 They get the opportunity to think like scientists
 They have the opportunity and encouragement
to take ownership for thinking & learning
What Do Students Get from PBIS?
A Chance to Learn “HOW” To Learn
Engagement in the higher levels of thinking:
Analyzing data, Synthesizing data, Application
of data
Participation in a culture that promotes collaboration,
reasoning, reflection
How Do Good Friends Make Me Sick?
(The Spread of Diseases)
This activity illustrates : :
 How quickly a disease can spread through a population
 How a disease can spread through a population
without any symptoms
 How good friends can make you sick
without your knowing it
What is Inquiry ?
“An active learning process in which students
answer research questions through data analysis.”*
Students :
 Conduct the analysis
 Draw their own conclusions
* National Science Teacher’s Association
Most students need substantial scaffolding before they are ready to
develop scientific questions and
design effective data collection procedures
to answer these questions.
This is where PBIS “hits a homerun” .
They recognize this fact and “ . . .seek to provide
experiences that help students progress to greater
inquiry skills through series of graduated steps.”
Many worthwhile science activities traditionally
do not involve a research question or data analysis
Inquiry based activities must
start with a scientific question:
EXAMPLES:
How does temperature affect the rate of a chemical reaction?
How does the amount of load affect the rate of fall of a parachute?
How does light affect the germination of a seed?
Students need practice in inquiry, building
up to increasingly open
and complex levels of inquiry
PBIS gives an excellent progression of activities
to accomplish this
What Is Going To Be Hard?
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As a teacher, keeping quiet!
Letting kids do the talking
“Hands off” approach
Rubrics and assessment
Grades
Managing the pace
What Benefits Do You Get?
• A chance to inspire students to grow and improve Science skills
• A chance to produce Student Scientists, not just Science students
• A chance to meet your Science Curriculum goals in a more engaging way
• An opportunity for students to better retain what they learn
• A chance to set a culture of collaboration, learning, and rigorous thinking.
• A structure for “easing” in to Inquiry method
• A chance to dramatically reduce undesirable behaviors
Hey Mrs. Tenenbaum,
It’s Samantha from your old 7th/8th grade Science class!!
…I felt it would be exciting to tell you what the Riverwood kids
have done with the knowledge
you have taught us! Do you remember the coaster cars?
I never thought I would ever make use of that information! (No offense)
Last Friday I was proved wrong. Some students were invited to
participate in a special technology/physics contest
in a day long school event.
It involved engineering and related skills.
Our first challenge was to build and
An air jet car. We looked at each other and laughed.
Needless to say,we blew away the competition
and won first place. Just thought you’d like to know!
Your student,
Samantha
Parachute Activity