Diffusion of Online Labs and Inquiry-Based Science Teaching Methods and Practices Across Europe (original) (raw)
Related papers
Golabz: Towards a Federation of Online Labs for Inquiry-Based Science Education at School
2014
This paper represents a repository for online laboratories, learning applications and Inquiry Learning Spaces (ILS) towards introducing Inquiry-Based Science Education (IBSE) in schools. In the first part, a classification scheme for online labs and a methodology for creating a federation of online labs are described. In the second part, technical implementation of the defined classification in the Go-Lab Repository is represented. In the third part, a usage scenario is described targeting science teachers of primary and secondary schools, who want to use online labs in their classroom activities. In sum, this paper aims at communicating the pedagogical background and advantages of the represented approach, as well as opportunities opened up by the Go-Lab Repository for teachers practicing inquiry-based learning activities in their classes.
Towards an Online Lab Portal for Inquiry-based STEM Learning at School
Nowadays, the knowledge economy is growing rapidly. To sustain future growth, more well educated people in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) are needed. In the Go-Lab project we aim to motivate and orient students from an early age on to study STEM fields in their future educational path by applying inquiry learning using online labs. This paper presents an inquiry learning portal where teachers can discover, use and enhance online labs appropriate for their courses and students can acquire scientific methodology skills while doing experiments using the labs. The Go-Lab portal architecture is presented, which contains a repository of online labs, inquiry learning spaces and complementary services. The paper discusses a first version of the portal and our future plans.
Aishe J the All Ireland Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, 2014
Inquiry-Based Science Education (IBSE) has been promoted in recent years as an innovative teaching and learning methodology that engages students in science and motivates them to pursue careers in this area. IBSE is a student-centred methodology which aims to both support students in developing a deep understanding of scientific knowledge, facts and concepts and to enhance students' abilities to reason and become independent learners. Through this approach students become capable of identifying main questions and finding relevant answers. Many recent national and international innovations in science education have focused on increasing the use of IBSE methodologies in primary and secondary level classrooms. The ESTABLISH project has contributed to this movement by adopting a pan-European approach for developing and implementing teacher education in IBSE and teaching and learning IBSE materials. The project consortium has engaged with national policy makers, teachers and educations, as well as scientific and industrial communities across the eleven participating countries in this endeavour. This paper will discuss the overall approach adopted by ESTABLISH and in particular, will present the experience of initial implementation with a cohort of Irish pre-service science teachers. The impact on this cohort's understanding of and attitudes to IBSE will be reported and will be used to inform the development of other pre-service and in-service teacher education programmes and their evaluation.
Reviewing inquiry-based learning approaches invirtual laboratory environment for science education
Διεθνές Συνέδριο για την Ανοικτή & εξ Αποστάσεως Εκπαίδευση, 2019
In science education, students’ active involvement in experimental procedures contributes to higher performance achievements compared to traditional lecturing, as laboratories play a key role and help learners develop the necessary skills of inquiry. Inquiry-based learning, a learning method based on students’ personal involvement in the cognitive process through searching, querying and posing questions, is an educational approach where in the case of research, the learner formulates hypotheses which tests them via experimentation and observation of the experimental results. The educational value of the inquiry learning method has been verified in several studies, where the application of the inquiry learning approach resulted in more effective learning, compared to traditional teacher-centered methods. The evolution of the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) contributed towards the popularity of the inquiry-based learning, since it supports the development of educational approaches and environments which facilitate the inquiry learning process. Virtual reality laboratories give the user the opportunity to conduct the same scientific inquiry provided by hands-on experiments but with the advantages of the virtual environment. The present study focuses on the identification of the inquiry-based learning applications and methods used based on virtual laboratories in the field of science. The peer-reviewed literature was the main source of information and data. The findings of the reviewed studies indicated that virtual labs, when used in combination with hands-on labs in inquiry learning, support learners and help them gain deeper conceptual understanding of science
Literacy Information and Computer Education Journal, 2014
One of the challenges of Science Education in the 21 st century is that of engaging learners in meaningful learning. Learning science from books does not equip them with the skills and competences necessary to become scientists. The European Commission [1] has recognized this challenge and advocated inquiry-based learning as the main pedagogy to be adopted for teaching science. This paper presents the work in progress of the FP7 project Pri-Sci-Net which aims to promote inquirybased learning approaches at primary level of education with children from age 3-11 years across Europe. There needs to be a shared understanding among teachers of inquiry with reference to young children, and consequently identifying the required pedagogical skills. In addition, teachers need resources which they can gain through sharing their experiences with other teachers. The paper puts forward a vision for inquiry-based learning, highlights the need for the training teachers, and explores the potential of a virtual platform which can promote CPD for the use of IBSE among teachers.
WESPOT: INQUIRY-BASED SCIENCE EDUCATION APPROACH AND TECHNOLOGIES IN ACTION
Math, science and technology (MST) education in Europe is significantly based on experiments and problem solving. The innovative project weSPOT aims at enhancing MST education by emphasizing scientific inquiry, individualization of learning and the role of social interaction. To achieve this goal, students are supported by a set of software tools, helping them to plan, implement, comment and document their personal scientific experiments. The students are encouraged to share and discuss their experience and to learn how to conduct scientific research. They share their achievements in class as well as in their own social community (friends, family, scientists, etc.). This paper describes in details the scientific approach which is the base for the pilot experiments of the weSPOT methodology. It presents the first pilot of Inquiry-Based Science Education (IBSE) conducted in the First Privite Mathematical School and analyses applicability of the used software products.
Inquiry-based learning in science enhanced by digital technologies
2011 9th International Conference on Emerging eLearning Technologies and Applications (ICETA), 2011
The science education in Slovakia currently faces the new curriculum reform that emphasizes the role of scientific inquiry in education that is in good correspondence with massive European movement oriented on implementation of Inquiry based science education. As many researches show, the implementation of digital technologies into science education can help a great deal in the process of scientific inquiry.