First-Day Observations!! And Curriculum Decisions

Looking at lesson planning on the most macroscopic scale, the Iowa Common Core dictates what classes students have to take. Eight years ago, sweeping changes were made (e.g., earth science was pushed to the high school from the middle school). The local administration dictates what "flavors" instruction should have. For instance, at GHS, inquiry and authentic activities are stressed--learning targets should focus on how students can apply the knowledge to their own lives. Also, teachers need to plan using learning targets.

Madeleine Hunter has come up a couple of times (and is present in the lesson planning) of the lessons I've been observing this past year, from multiple teachers. It seems like all of the science teachers post on their board: an L.T. (either in statement or question form), 2-4 activities for the day (the classes are an hour-long), homework, and upcoming quizzes or exams.

It is at this nitty-gritty level that teachers have more control; although instructors may be required to stress science as inquiry and to have their students do labs or build models, teachers control the labs and models used in class. Teachers also have control over the numbers of labs, activities, etc.--it's not like there is a school-wide rule of "Do One Lab a Week for Ten Weeks." The students obviously gain a lot of control in the content that is covered, since it should be relevant to their own lives and interests.

So, today, I observed the first period of physical science for the trimester. The students are mostly freshmen and asked questions like, "What's chemistry?" "What's physical science?" I thought it was interesting that they didn't have a schema for the different sciences, since that means they don't have the previous misconceptions we all do about silo'd education (since they haven't been taught this bias yet!). A couple of other interesting things that I was made to think about (for the first time in a long time!) are: teachers have to distribute textbooks and other material at the high school level, and they have to have a way planned out ahead of time on how they will do this effectively; teachers have to explicitly teach what to do in a case of tornado or fire drills. Freshmen won't know to just leave the building, and I'll still have to monitor them when drills occur (unlike at the college level, where I'd just expect everyone to take care of themselves in a drill).