Using Programmable Crickets to Help Beginning Teachers Experience Authentic Scientific Inquiry. Fred Martin, Ph. D. and Anita Greenwood, Ed.D. University of Massachusetts Lowell

Some questions Why is classroom robotics fun? What is authentic? What is inquiry? Wolff-Michael Roth:  How can you intentionally learn something you do not yet know?  When you do know something, can you remember not knowing it? Learning Science: A Singular Plural Perspective, 2006

Other important things Self-identity in teaching Asking questions and not knowing the answer—in public. Making sense of messy data Caring about the answer and not already knowing it

Rationale for our work Encouraging beginning teachers to adopt a more inquiry-oriented approach in their teaching is a priority for teacher preparation (National Research Council, 1996).

Beginning teachers……. Develop and conduct an authentic inquiry. Respond to and account for the “messiness” of the data collected during authentic inquiries.

Examples of students’ initial questions Home Heating and Cooling is my insulated attic warmer than the non-insulated garage? is my bedroom cooler than my roommates’ rooms? Car Heating does car color make a difference in heating from sun? how fast do cars heat up with windows open vs. closed? Clothing & Personal Wear do my 3 types of wetsuits actually perform differently? Beverage Quality & Safety what sort of wine cooler works best? what container is best to keep my coffee hot? Nature and Environment do sunflowers actually track the sun’s motion over a day?

Working with the Cricket

Indoor Football Toss

Outcomes No data generated in the Cricket projects could be overlooked because their relevance was unknown in advance. Consequently, the demands on teachers’ empirical-inductive thinking were high and it became clear to us, that in spite of possessing undergraduate degrees in science, some teachers had not fully developed the reasoning skills that are essential in inquiry-oriented work.

For more… NSF-funded project to encourage teachers to experience “authentic inquiry” and bring it to their students Contact me if interested: