VModel: A visual qualitative modeling environment for middle-school students (original) (raw)
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A qualitative modeling environment for middle-school students: A progress report
2001
Learning how to create, test, and revise models is a central skill in scientific reasoning. We argue that qualitative modeling provides an appropriate level of representation for helping middle-school students learn to become modelers. We describe a system we have created that uses visual representations to provide a studentfriendly notation for creating qualitative models. This system is currently undergoing pilot testing in Chicago Public School classrooms, using curricula developed in collaboration with teachers.
Qualitative modeling for middle-school students
2004
Abstract Qualitative modeling offers the potential for engaging middleschool students in scientific modeling. This paper discusses the design decisions underlying VModel, a qualitative modeling environment that has been used in several studies in Chicago Public School classrooms. We discuss how these decisions were influenced by the constraints imposed by the conceptual development of the students and the middle school curriculum and environment.
2009
Modeling is a core practice in science and a central part of scientific literacy. We present theoretical and empirical motivation for a learning progression for scientific modeling that aims to make the practice accessible and meaningful for learners. We define scientific modeling as including the elements of the practice (constructing, using, evaluating, and revising scientific models) and the metaknowledge that guides and motivates the practice (e.g., understanding the nature and purpose of models). Our learning progression for scientific modeling includes two dimensions that combine metaknowledge and elements of practice—scientific models as tools for predicting and explaining, and models change as understanding improves. We describe levels of progress along these two dimensions of our progression and illustrate them with classroom examples from 5th and 6th graders engaged in modeling. Our illustrations indicate that both groups of learners productively engaged in constructing and revising increasingly accurate models that included powerful explanatory mechanisms, and applied these models to make predictions for closely related phenomena. Furthermore, we show how students engaged in modeling practices move along levels of this progression. In particular, students moved from illustrative to explanatory models, and developed increasingly sophisticated views of the explanatory nature of models, shifting from models as correct or incorrect to models as encompassing explanations for multiple aspects of a target phenomenon. They also developed more nuanced reasons to revise models. Finally, we present challenges for learners in modeling practices—such as understanding how constructing a model can aid their own sensemaking, and seeing model building as a way to generate new knowledge rather than represent what they have already learned.
Learning and teaching about scientific models with a computer-modeling tool
The study presents efforts to support pre-service primary school teachers in learning and teaching about scientific models, and discusses the impact of these efforts on their understandings. We provided pre-service primary school teachers with a module on computer modeling and studied the effects of this experience on their abilities to construct viable scientific models with a computer-modeling tool, namely, Model-It [Metcalf, in order to teach a sixth-grade science lesson. The results of the study showed that Model-It, through its scaffolds (i.e., Plan, Build, and Test), enabled the majority of pre-service teachers to build models that were structurally correct, but simplistic. The participants showed a tendency to teach science using more often the explorative modeling method than the expressive method, and only few of them employed both methods in their lessons. In essence, Model-It effectively scaffolded pre-service teachers' first modeling experiences and enabled them to quickly build and test their models as well as reflect on the viability of their models. However, according to the results, teachers need extensive learning experiences in order to achieve a comprehensive understanding of the process of scientific modeling in science.
Incorporating modeling into elementary students’ scientific practices
2008
Abstract: This paper reports on work with 4th and 5th grade elementary students examining the development of their modeling knowledge and modeling practice. Within this grade band, we designed instructional materials and conducted studies that guide the development of this learning progression.
Interaction Design and Children
Coordinating modeling and real-world data is central to building scientific theories. This paper examines how a complementary focus on modeling and data contributed to 8th grade students' learning of mechanisms underlying wildfire smoke spread in MoDa, a webbased environment that integrates computational modeling side-byside with real-world data for comparison and validation. Epistemic network analysis of student responses in pre-post tests revealed a shift from primarily macro-level explanations to explanations that integrated macro and micro-level explanations of the phenomenon. Video data analysis revealed three design elements that contributed to student learning: Naming of the blocks, match between data and model visualization, and collective reflections on models. We reflect on implications for the design of environments that integrate computational modeling with real-world data analysis. CCS CONCEPTS • Applied computing → Education; • Human-centered computing → Human computer interaction (HCI); Interaction design.
Modelling and Argumentation with Elementary School Students
Canadian Journal of Science, Mathematics and Technology Education, 2020
Argumentation and modelling are core scientific practices, and studies suggest that incorporating the specific practices in the teaching of science can engage learners. This is a qualitative study of a classroom of 10-12-year-old students working collaboratively in argumentation and modelling. The aim of the study was to explore how primary school students use their models whilst arguing about a socioscientific issue and to explore whether and how the process of arguing is linked with the modelling process. In order to explore the aforementioned, a learning environment was designed to help students participate in the epistemic practices of argumentation and modelling. Our findings indicate that the students engage in argumentation by providing rebuttals, and there is an intersection of higher-level modelling cognitive processes and higher-level argumentation epistemic aspects. We hypothesize that the use of models might have contributed to high-level argumentation. Our findings point to the idea that if we want science teaching and learning to be more productive even for younger students, we should be developing the epistemic practices of modelling and argumentation in unison as a way to promote and support both practices and as a consequence to promote both content learning and reasoning skills. Résumé L'argumentation et la modélisation sont des pratiques scientifiques fondamentales, et certaines études indiquent que, si on intègre ces pratiques spécifiques à l'enseignement des sciences, on incite les apprenants à participer plus activement. La présente est une étude qualitative portant sur une classe d'élèves de 10 à 12 ans qui ont travaillé en collaboration dans l'argumentation et la modélisation. Le but de l'étude était d'explorer comment les élèves du primaire utilisent leurs modèles alors qu'ils se penchent sur un problème socio-scientifique, et d'explorer les façons dont le processus d'argumentation est lié, ou non, au processus de modélisation. Pour ce faire, nous avons conçu un environnement d'apprentissage pour aider les étudiants à participer aux pratiques épistémiques que sont l'argumentation et la modélisation. Nos résultats indiquent que les étudiants participent à l'argumentation au moyen de réfutations, et qu'il y a une
This study uses interview data involving a variety of modeling contexts to investigate eighth grade students' beliefs about the nature and purpose of scientific models. The participants have been exposed to modeling curricula for the past three years, allowing us to ask questions in a variety of familiar modeling contexts as well as in a novel context introduced during the interview. Results indicate that, overall, students' responses are more consistent when reasoning about familiar modeling contexts than novel contexts, although some students do give very consistent responses across all contexts. All students were able to talk about previous models they had worked with and articulate similarities across them. Students are most likely to talk about models as showing processes and explanations, and some also mentioned models as generalizing to new cases when this was a salient feature of the context.