https://telearn.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01206700/document

Phases of inquiry-based learning: Definitions and the inquiry cycle

The world needs young people who are skillful in and enthusiastic about science and who view science as their future career field. Ensuring that we will have such young people requires initiatives that engage students in interesting and motivating science experiences. Today, students can investigate scientific phenomena using the tools, data collection techniques, models, and theories of science in physical laboratories that support interactions with the material world or in virtual laboratories that take advantage of simulations. Here, we review a selection of the literature to contrast the value of physical and virtual investigations and to offer recommendations for combining the two to strengthen science learning.

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/sci/340/6130/305.full.pdf

Physical and Virtual Laboratories in Science and Engineering Education

The Go-Lab federation of online labs opens up virtual laboratories (simulation), remote laboratories (real equipment accessible at distance) and data sets from physical laboratory experiments (together called “online labs”) for large-scale use in education. In this way, Go-Lab enables inquiry-based learning that promotes acquisition of deep conceptual domain knowledge and inquiry skills, with the further intent of interesting students in careers in science. For students, Go-Lab offers the opportunity to perform scientific experiments with online labs in pedagogically structured learning spaces. Go-Lab’s inquiry learning spaces (ILSs) structure the students’ inquiry process through an inquiry cycle and provide students with guidance in which dedicated (and connected) scaffolds for inquiry processes play a pivotal role. Teachers can create and adapt inquiry learning phases and the associated guidance in an ILS through a simple wiki-like interface and can add scaffolds and tools to an ILS using a straightforward drag and drop feature. Teachers can also adapt scaffolds and tools (e.g., change the language or the concepts available in a concept mapper) through an “app composer”. In creating ILSs, teachers are supported by scenarios and associated defaults ILSs that can be used as a starting point for development. In addition, teachers are offered a community framework to disseminate best practices and find mutual support. For lab-owners, Go-Lab provides open interfacing solutions for easily plugging in their online labs and sharing them in the Go-Lab federation of online labs. In its first year, Go-Lab created ILSs for thirteen online labs from different lab providers, including renowned research organizations (e.g., CERN, ESA) that participate in the consortium. The design of these inquiry learning spaces has been evaluated through mock-ups and prototypes with students and teachers. More advanced and later versions will be evaluated and validated in large scale pilots. The sustainability of Go-Lab will come from the opportunity for the larger science education community to add new online labs and share ILSs. An open and Web-based community will capitalize on the “collective intelligence” of students, teachers, and scientists.

/pdf/innovations-in-stem-education-the-go-lab-federation-of-12pk8uokm2.pdf

Innovations in STEM education: the Go-Lab federation of online labs

Few studies have focused on peer assessment at the secondary school level. Consequently, we know very little about the quality of the feedback secondary school students can produce and its potential usefulness. This study was implemented in the context of reciprocal online peer assessment of web-portfolios in a secondary school science course. We evaluated both quantitative (grades) and qualitative (written comments) feedback on student science web-portfolios to assess the quality of peer feedback. We further investigated whether either peer or expert feedback led peer assesses to revise their work in any way. Participants (28 seventh-graders) anonymously assessed each other's web-portfolios on designing a CO"2-friendly house. Peer assessors and an expert assessor used the same pre-specified assessment criteria. Peer assessees made revisions as they saw fit after reviewing the feedback. The data sources were: the feedback produced, screen capture and video data and questionnaires. The quantitative feedback was found to differ between peer assessors and the expert and also between peer assessors assessing the same web-portfolio, which resulted in low validity and reliability. Qualitative written feedback from student and expert assessors appeared similar in its structural components. It differed in that students placed less emphasis on peer assessees' skills, provided fewer suggestions for changes, provided more positive judgments, and provided more negative/critical judgments that were not accompanied by evidence. Finally, we found that the majority of changes proposed by peer assessors were scientifically accurate and assessee groups employed decision-making strategies to screen and process peer and expert feedback. These findings yield a number of implications for practice and policy. The mere explanation of the assessment criteria or prior experience with peer assessment procedures is not enough; teachers, researchers and policy makers should focus on the type of training and scaffolding that peer assessors need in order to produce high quality feedback.

Peer versus expert feedback: An investigation of the quality of peer feedback among secondary school students

With hundreds of millions of pounds spent on digital technology for education every year – from interactive whiteboards to the rise of one–to–one tablet computers – every new technology seems to offer unlimited promise to learning. many sectors have benefitted immensely from harnessing innovative uses of technology. cloud computing, mobile communications and internet applications have changed the way manufacturing, finance, business services, the media and retailers operate. But key questions remain in education: has the range of technologies helped improve learners’ experiences and the standards they achieve? or is this investment just languishing as kit in the cupboard? and what more can decision makers, schools, teachers, parents and the technology industry do to ensure the full potential of innovative technology is exploited? There is no doubt that digital technologies have had a profound impact upon the management of learning. institutions can now recruit, register, monitor, and report on students with a new economy, efficiency, and (sometimes) creativity. yet, evidence of digital technologies producing real transformation in learning and teaching remains elusive. The education sector has invested heavily in digital technology; but this investment has not yet resulted in the radical improvements to learning experiences and educational attainment. in 2011, the Review of Education Capital found that maintained schools spent £487 million on icT equipment and services in 2009-2010. 1 since then, the education system has entered a state of flux with changes to the curriculum, shifts in funding, and increasing school autonomy. While ring-fenced funding for icT equipment and services has since ceased, a survey of 1,317 schools in July 2012 by the british educational suppliers association found they were assigning an increasing amount of their budget to technology. With greater freedom and enthusiasm towards technology in education, schools and teachers have become more discerning and are beginning to demand more evidence to justify their spending and strategies. This is both a challenge and an opportunity as it puts schools in greater charge of their spending and use of technology

/pdf/decoding-learning-the-proof-promise-and-potential-of-digital-3rzrqb4p20.pdf

Decoding learning:the proof, promise and potential of digital education

Science Created by You (SCY) is a project on learning in science and technology domains. SCY uses a pedagogical approach that centres around products, called 'emerging learning objects' (ELOs) that are created by students. Students work individually and collaboratively in SCY-Lab (the general SCY learning environment) on 'missions' that are guided by socio-scientific questions (for example 'How can we design a CO2-friendly house?'). Fulfilling SCY missions requires a combination of knowledge from different content areas (eg, physics, mathematics, biology, as well as social sciences). While on a SCY mission, students perform several types of learning activities that can be characterised as productive processes (experiment, game, share, explain, design, etc), they encounter multiple resources, collaborate with varying coalitions of peers and use changing constellations of tools and scaffolds. The configuration of SCY-Lab is adaptive to the actual learning situation and may provide advice to students on appropriate learning activities, resources, tools and scaffolds, or peer students who can support the learning process. The SCY project aims at students between 12 and 18 years old. In the course of the project, a total of four SCY missions will be developed, of which one is currently available. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Jeremy Toussaint

Papers

Learning by creating and exchanging objects: The SCY experience