Designing and Assessing Science Units & Courses of Study
It's the night before the first day of school, and the teacher can't sleep! First days are full of anxieties. What will the student's be like? Will they like me? Am I ready for them? Do I have all my textbooks? Will I have the supplies I need? Why did the department head assign me four section of survey biology, and one section of survey Earth science? Are my lesson plans written? One way to rid oneself of these anxieties is to invest quality time in the preparation and development of teaching plans.
Question: What do these concepts have in common?
Answer: They are some of the elements that make up a dynamic and effective strategy that science teachers can use to design and assess learning materials for the science classroom.
Designing and assessing science units and courses of study is the focus of this chapter. The chapter is organized in such a way that you will be designing science teaching plans as you work through the chapter, and you will create assessment measures for the teaching plans that you design as well. Planning and assessment are integral aspects of the process of teaching. Too often assessment is thought as something separate from instruction, and because of this I have integrated assessment and instructional planning, and placed them in the same chapter.. When you finish the chapter, you will have created the following products:
1. A rationale for a science unit including general science education goals.2. A list of objectives (we'll call them intended outcomes) for a science unit grouped according to type of student learning.
3. A concept map showing the relationships among the central ideas in your unit.
4. An instructional plan (a set of lesson plans) describing the unit, including what learning objectives are intended, and the strategies you will employ to help student achieve the unit's objectives.
5. An assessment plan describing measures to assess the major objectives of the unit to provide feedback to the students, and feedback for you on the effectiveness of your science unit.
PREVIEW QUESTIONS
1. What processes can be used to design an instructional plan?2. How should a teacher proceed to develop a mini-unit of instruction?
3. What are intended learning outcomes? How do cognitions, affects, cognitive skills and psychomotor skills differ?
4. How can cognitive maps be utilized in the planning and development of teaching materials?
5. What are the elements of the following types of lessons: direct/interactive, cooperative learning, inquiry/laboratory?
6. What are the elements of a course of study?
7. What are some trends in the development of assessment strategies?
8. What are the components of a comprehensive assessment strategy for student learning and instruction?