Instructional Science

Promotion of students’ scientific literacy has long been and continues to be a central goal for reform efforts in science education. Although there is a great number of research conducted to evaluate student’s scientific literacy, less is known about how we can improve students’ scientific literacy through variety of scientific practices. In this study we aimed to refer to this shortcoming in the literature by examining the effect of argument driven inquiry (ADI) instructional model to promote 8th grade students’ scientific literacy. A mixed method quasi experimental design was used in this study. Sixty-seven eighth grade students from the same public school attended the study. Two intact classes were randomly assigned either in structured inquiry (SI) or ADI groups. The data sources included a Scientific Literacy Assessment (SLA) and semi-structured interviews. The results indicated that students experiencing ADI instruction scored higher on the SLA-D test and personal epistemology dimension of SLA-MB test than students experiencing SI instruction. The results propose that engaging students in meaningful scientific practices may support their scientific literacy.

Advances in graphing technologies and learning sciences pedagogy have the potential to equitably support students when exploring complex systems depicting dynamic relationships across multiple disciplinary topics in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM). We report on the cumulative impact of science units designed in a Research Practice Partnership (RPP) that leveraged Knowledge Integration (KI) pedagogy to support middle school students to generalize insights to new graph representations and science topics. Teachers across 11 schools incorporated the graph-science units into their curriculum plans. We analyzed ~ 8000 responses to validated and reliable graph-science KI assessment items administered before the first year and after one, two, or three years of instruction aligned with KI pedagogy. With random coefficient, multi-level, mixed-effect regression modeling, we analyzed performance after one-, two-, and three-years of graph-science KI instruction. We also analyzed the growth trajectories of subgroups, i.e., multilingual learners. Data suggest two years of graph-science KI instruction is needed to make significant impacts on student learning and ameliorated the disparity between students with different native language fluencies. These results illustrate the value of technology-enhanced, pedagogically aligned K-12 science instruction that is designed to support connecting diverse graph data and science knowledge comprehensively and cumulatively.

Comparison is an important mechanism for learning in general, and comparing two worked examples has garnered support over the last 15 years as an effective tool for learning algebra in mainstream classrooms. This study was aimed at improving our understanding of how Modified for Language Support-Worked Example Pairs (MLS-WEPs) contribute to effective mathematics learning in an ESOL (English to Speakers of Other Languages) context. It investigated a novel instructional approach to help English Learners (ELs) develop better understanding in mathematical reasoning, problem solving, and literacy skills (listening, reading, writing, and speaking). Findings suggest that MLS-WEPs not only enhanced ELs’ ability to solve algebra problems, but it also improved their written explanation skills and enabled them to transfer such skills to different mathematical concepts. Moreover, when controlling for ELs’ prior knowledge, the effectiveness of the MLS-WEPs intervention for performing and explaining calculations did not vary by their English proficiency.