This was the headline this morning when I read the news on my iPad NZ Herald app from the NMSSA (National Monitoring Study of Student Assessment) report. I wanted to share my thinking about the report.
The NMSSA reports are what NEMP used to be. People head around the countryside testing students in various curriculum areas and then these results are assessed at Otago University.
The article quoted Chris Duggan, House of Science, as stating that primary teachers lack confidence in teaching science and there is a 'huge lack of resources'. It was great to see that the study clearly disagreed with this. Teachers are confident, believe they have the resources they need, and are teaching science regularly. I was disappointed to see her also saying that science advisors are 'long, long gone' -we're not! The job description has changed a little ('facilitators' rather than 'advisors') and all across the country there are skilled, enthusiastic and able facilitators working with every type of school! Although in the 'old days', you simply rang up an advisor and one came out to support your teaching, there are still those opportunities today. Yes, it's a little more lengthy, but every school can apply every term for as many hours and as long as a period as needed for PLD customised to their needs.
The article stated that there are no assessments in science. NZCER have been doing a great job, first with the science engagement tool, and then with creating a Year 4-6 online assessment Science Thinking with Evidence (STwE). The Years 7-10 STwE continues to be useful to intermediates and secondary schools. Using the STwE, schools I have been working with have seen achievement being far higher than the '20%' NMSSA are suggesting are behind curriculum levels at a Year 8 level. NZCER also have the Assessment Resource Banks with a range of activities to support teachers in assessing science.
So what might be happening? Students are keen on science and reasonably confident. Teachers enjoy teaching science and believe that they are focusing on the nature of science strands as well as being confident in the context strands.
I know that the House of Science are doing a great job at getting science kits into schools and ensuring that everything in the kit is ready to go... rather than the good ol' electricity kit on the shelf with flat batteries and blown bulbs! The Sir Paul Callaghan Science Academy is working with teachers developing capability, as well as providing science resources. The Royal Society's Science Teaching Leadership Programme is also available supporting teachers in developing an understanding of how science works and then supporting teachers back in the classroom. Doesn't sound like there's a lack at all! Oh, and there are people like Anne Barker and myself working with schools too!
I left the Science Learning Hub until last on purpose... because I really like the changes they've made to become more effective in supporting teachers. You see, I'm not sure kits, unit plans and lesson ideas on their own are going to help teachers. It's about shifting pedagogies. The folk at the SLH not only share great resources, but they also host webinars and can give one on one advice. I think this is one of the big keys -we must be about the how we teach science, as well as the why, before focusing on the what!
So it's not going to work with just resource kits or people heading off for courses. It also won't work with just getting in great facilitators (!). And this is the second key -the doing science. The article talks about the crowded curriculum as well as the focus we've had on literacy and numeracy. So how do we ensure science is happening? Can we integrate it with reading and writing? Can maths lessons incorporate some science? This year, I've noticed a clear difference between the schools that are deliberately doing science and the schools that haven't had the time. The STwE results clearly show a better improvement to schools who set aside the time for science. Even though I might be working in both sorts of schools, the PLD and resources are simply not enough. We need to be clear about the need for science, the purpose of science and setting aside the time to do science. I'm happy that even the schools I'm working with who don't manage to do a lot of science still see improvements in student achievement -it's just not as marked as schools that set aside time for science.
Finally, teachers need to know what science looks like at different levels. With a curriculum that has Levels 1 and 2 the same and Levels 3 and 4 the same or similar, as well as a set of science capabilities with no levelled expectations, it can be difficult to know what science might look like at different levels. The Assessment Resource Bank (arbs) and STwE can help with this. I tend to use the Progressions for literacy and mathematics as a starter, as well as getting teachers to look at the STwE questions to get some idea of what science might look like at different levels. Talking to the Year 9 science teachers can help too -what are their expectations? What would they like children to come 'ready and able' with?
I must admit being surprised at the results, particularly the Year 8 data but it does reflect international monitoring as well. I hope that it isn't quite that bad and certainly my work with schools doesn't show averages quite that low. I do think we need to be setting aside specific time to teach science, using resources (unit plans, kits, and people!) as well as understanding why we teach science, to continue to improve the achievement. Integration is part of the answer but not the only one. The most important one is already there: you teachers!
So, have a great break!
Thank you for reading these posts (if you're still here of course!) and I so appreciate your support, encouragement and enthusiasm as well as comments! Here's to a great 2019!!!
Paul
Good come back. Keep on preaching the good word. Let's keep on doing science and keeping it real. Have a great holiday.
ReplyDeleteThanks Alison! And thanks for your comments too!
ReplyDeleteI had seen that article too Paul and thought "Where's their evidence?". Great to read your perspective.
ReplyDeleteI haven't had a chance to read more than the article headline, but have been doing lots of thinking around science learning over the last few days. This is because with it being the end of the year, my students have just completed PATs in reading and maths. They all get stanines of 5 and above in these subjects. I wanted to give them the Science thinking with evidence (more for curiosity sake than anything) but don't have it. So gave them the science PAT instead. There were very few children who did well. Which got me thinking! I went through the questions with them yesterday, because I was interested in what their thought processes were as they answered. I wanted to also get an idea of to what extent was their poor performance down to lack of knowledge and how much of it was a result of not thinking like a scientist. It was interesting that some of my capable students were saying "How would I know that, we haven't covered that?" So this was why I have been doing lots of thinking. My science this year has been based more on the capabilities - getting them to think and what I would refer to as doing deep meaningful science. For example, having noticed our oak tree swarming with wasps at this time of year, led to thinking about why. We researched honey bees and German wasps to compare and contrast in a scientific report, and used the research to make wasp traps that wouldn't kill the bees. When they didn't work, we questioned why. We made observational drawings of both. All of this and more, I thought was good science. But it probably didn't help them answer the PAT questions. (Not that I think this is at all important - just an observation!) But then this week (decided upon before the news report came out), I have let pairs of children choose their own science question to explore. One pair are exploring the pH level of different liquids and then mixing them to see what happens to the pH. (This actually follows on from them now knowing that bee stings are acidic and wasp are alkaline, and not knowing what this meant at the time.) Another pair are investigating how weight effects speed using model cars. (They want to go faster on their motorbikes.) Two are making circuits with different numbers of lightbulbs and investigating if the size of the battery effects the brightness. Two are looking at if adding various things to the water, they can get beansprouts to grow faster. The last pair are exploring magnets to see what materials they can get a magnet to still pick up a magnetic ball and are also thinking about strength of magnets. They are having a "hands on" ball -all of them.
ReplyDeleteSo where am I going with all this? Not 100% sure! But what I'm thinking is that the science areas they are covering remind me more of how I used to teach science. It's those sort of science units, that we taught having a clear idea before we even started, of what the end point would be, or the knowledge they would get from doing it. The purpose was perhaps to ensure the students got key knowledge - like an alkaline can neutralise an acid, or that north and north on a magnet repel. Where as I feel that the way we generally do science now, focuses on developing skills (the science capabilities) in our learners that make them better scientists. So I suppose what I have been wondering is does my science programme need to change? Do I have a balance of both? Do I need to have both? And several other questions too?
These are all rhetorical questions - just thought I'd share some of the thinking that I will be doing over the summer break.
Sorry for my ramble... Have a good break.
You are more than welcome to ramble -that's how conversations start! And I do it fortnightly on a wee science blog...
DeleteThe Science Thinking with Evidence for years 4-6 is online and free this term apparently. The years 7 to 8 students use a booklet. It is a really interesting topic, the whole idea of context vs capabilities with assessment. Do children need to know something of the context to be able to answer or even be confident to answer. NZCER folk have always said 'no' to me when I've had this argument with them but I do wonder. If children do have some content knowledge in science, does that make them more confident to answer other questions based on a different context? Even if the question is about the capabilities, do they still actually need to now 'stuff' to answer i.e. that snow is frozen water and is x degrees compared to boiling water which is y degrees?
And if we are going to use content knowledge, which content knowledge do we use? Are there particular aspects teachers need to be doing (keeping in mind that the NZC science topics would easily take more than two years at each level!)?
I feel that with the NZCER assessments (STwE and arbs), there may be particular questioning styles as well as the content of the questions that throw the kids. We can practise these skills by using the arbs and making sure that the ideas shared in the questions are in our science programmes: using data in tables and graphs, extrapolating, contrasting, comparing, critiquing as well as ensuring that our science programmes do have children learning 'stuff' that can be used across the sciences.
And that's my ramble in return!
I guess it depends on what you want to achieve. I think that if you want your children actually developing a real interest in Science and actually enjoying it, then you are on the right side of history. If you want to achieve results in PAT, then chalk and talk my friend. I like the sound of your approach. It surely demonstrates the Nature of Science more than a multi-choice standardised test ever would. Keep on rocking it.
ReplyDeleteThanks Glen. I think that the NZCER Science Thinking with Evidence assessment tools would reflect the science capabilities rather than the content. My worry is that these NMSSA assessments are purportedly of the science capabilities and this concerns me that the scores are quite different from what I have seen reflected in STwE data -it's a lot lower.
DeleteOf course, the other issue is that PISA and TIMMS science results are always higher in schools that 'chalk and talk' so...!
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Thanks! Hope it's useful although I'm not really up with what the science curriculum looks like in India.
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