Toward an Effective Pedagogy of Climate Change: Lessons From a Physics Classroom
Vandana Singh
备注：
71 pages, including references and endnote; 4 figures; this version differs from the previous in a) Title change, b) some language edits (no change to substance of paper), c) figures moved to end of document d) new abstract that is a better description of the key points of the paper. In submission process
A major roadblock to effective climate education is the lack of radical visions (Kwauk, 2020) for engaging with climate change and related social-environmental crises in the classroom. Key aspects of the climate system: its inherent complexity and transdisciplinarity, the entanglement of social and natural systems, and the fact that it spans large scales of space and time - all present serious challenges to our modern, compartmentalized formal education systems. I present an argument for a justice-centered, inter-to-transdisciplinary conceptualization of climate change at the nexus of science, society and justice, which is designed to engage with the very features of the climate system that make it challenging. Based on pedagogical experiments in an undergraduate physics classroom for non-science majors, I identify five general barriers to teaching climate change, and formulate four dimensions of an effective climate pedagogy: the scientific-technological, the transdisciplinary, the onto-epistemological, and the psychosocial action dimensions. Within the context of a collaborative classroom culture informed by transformational learning, I describe the use of a meta-conceptual framework that, along with the issue of climate justice, seeks to realize all four dimensions of an effective climate pedagogy. This broad holistic framework is potentially adaptable to contexts and disciplines beyond undergraduate physics.
Most STEM students experience the introductory physics sequence in large-enrollment (N $\gtrsim$ 100 students) classrooms, led by one lecturer and supported by a few teaching assistants. This work describes methods and principles we used to create an effective "flipped classroom" in large- enrollment introductory physics courses by replacing a majority of traditional lecture time with in-class student-driven activity worksheets. In this work, we compare student learning in courses taught by the authors with the flipped classroom pedagogy versus a more traditional pedagogy. By comparing identic…
The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 has greatly impacted all forms of social activities globally, including traditional classroom activities across all levels of instruction (kindergarten to universities). While many countries have opted for suspension of lessons, this cannot continue indefinitely and alternative means to continue lessons must be developed. While online and blended learning (including MOOCs) have been an active subject of research and discourse during the pre-pandemic days, onset of the pandemic has suddenly created an immediacy to such means of course delivery, better …
A large body of research shows that using interactive engagement pedagogy in the introductory physics classroom consistently results in significant student learning gains; however, with a few exceptions, those learning gains tend not to be accompanied by more expertlike attitudes and beliefs about physics and learning physics. In fact, in both traditionally taught and active learning classroom environments, students often become more novicelike in their attitudes and beliefs following a semester of instruction. Further, prior to instruction, men typically score higher than women on conceptual …
A flipped classroom was introduced in pre-service education in order to promote MM and the quality of their use in the teaching and learning process in laboratory. The course, Physics Lab Didactics, promoted active learning through the direct experience of young teachers. The flipped classroom approach was presented and discussed with the aim of clarifying the teaching process and in-training teachers were invited to explore how to implement this methodology in a class after their experience. Different open source or free software were proposed (Audacity, Algodoo, GeoGebra and Tracker) with so…
Artificial Intelligence (AI) education is an increasingly popular topic area for K-12 teachers. However, little research has investigated how AI education can be designed to be more accessible to all learners. We organized co-design workshops with 15 K-12 teachers to identify opportunities to integrate AI education into core curriculum to leverage learners' interests. During the co-design workshops, teachers and researchers co-created lesson plans where AI concepts were embedded into various core subjects. We found that K-12 teachers need additional scaffolding in the curriculum to facilitate …
Developing and implementing an Einsteinian science curriculum from Years 3 to 10: Part B Teacher upskilling: response to training and teacher's classroom experience
Our educational systems must prepare students for an increasingly interconnected future, and teachers require equipping with modern tools, such as network science, to achieve this. We held a Networks in Classroom Education (NiCE) workshop for a group of 21 K-12 teachers with various disciplinary backgrounds. The explicit aim of this was to introduce them to concepts in network science, show them how these concepts can be utilized in the classroom, and empower them to develop resources, in the form of lesson plans, for themselves and the wider community. Here we detail the nature of the worksho…
This STEM education study investigates the Streamline to Mastery professional development program, in which teachers work in partnership with university researchers to design professional development opportunities for themselves and for fellow teachers. Our research describes the process of teacher professional growth both through changes in agency and through a shared pursuit of an improved understanding of classroom scientific inquiry. Videos, emails, lesson reflections, survey responses, and interviews were analyzed to glean insight into changes in teacher discourse around inquiry and into …
This paper aims to share the use of Tracker a free open source video analysis and modeling tool that is increasingly used as a pedagogical tool for the effective learning and teaching of Physics for Grade 9 Secondary 3 students in Singapore schools to make physics relevant to the real world. We discuss the pedagogical use of Tracker, guided by the Framework for K-12 Science Education by National Research Council, USA to help students to be more like scientists. For a period of 6 to 10 weeks, students use a video analysis coupled with the 8 practices of sciences such as 1. Ask question, 2. Use …
Using tablets and smartphones as experimental tools in the physics classroom: effects on learning and motivation
Institute of Teacher Education, University of Geneva（日内瓦大学教师教育学院）；Univ. Lille, ULR 4072 – PSITEC – Psychologie: Interactions, Temps, Emotions, Cognition（里尔大学 PSITEC 心理学实验室（互动、时间、情绪、认知））；Department of Physics, University of Geneva（日内瓦大学物理系）
Over the past two decades, I have been actively involved in teaching astronomy and astrophysics to Chicago Public School (CPS) students and their teachers, in collaboration with various groups as well as by myself. Valuable resources that we have created for schools include the Multiwavelength Astronomy Website, with modules for infrared, optical, ultraviolet, X-ray and gamma-ray astronomy. The content of each lesson is derived from interviews with scientists, archived oral histories, and/or memoirs. Lessons are evaluated by a science educator and at least one subject matter expert before bein…
