News at Concord Consortium

Technology CAN Improve Education!

Recent results support our basic tenet that technology-enhanced student activities can improve education (www.concord.org/research).

Young Learners Learn Better with Probeware

Can students as early as grade three learn science with probeware? Many educators assume that elementary learners are not ready for sophisticated probes, sensors, and the associated quantitative data, arrays of numbers, graphs, and analysis. Our classroom data shows precisely the opposite.

We equipped 40 diverse grade 3-8 classrooms throughout Missouri and in other locations with probe-based science and technology activities and studied their learning. Non- computer tests given before and after each unit showed that in all cases, students learned important, standards-based concepts. Compared to the year before using our materials, our approach resulted in more learning in most cases.

Modeling Skills Accelerate Learning

We followed over 12,000 high school students for up to three years as they worked with model-based learning activities in traditional science courses. Our software reported each student’s every move, from their manipulations of computer-based models to their use of visualization tools and their answers to embedded questions.

Analysis of this detailed information revealed patterns in the students’ use of models that correlate with other aspects of their learning, such as their scores on traditional question-and-answer assessments. Students who were systematic in their use of models learned the content better and were able to apply their knowledge more broadly than students whose manipulations of the model were haphazard. We also saw a longitudinal effect: students exposed to our materials in one year performed significantly better than their peers when they encountered another set of model-based activities in a subsequent year, even though the scientific domains of the two units were entirely different.

Anyone Can Learn About Atoms and Molecules

The conventional wisdom is that atoms and molecules are too abstract and intangible to be tackled before high school chemistry, but the Molecular Workbench (MW) is so interactive, and makes atoms and molecules so tangible, that we embarked on a series of studies to test that hypothesis.

Our studies indicate that middle, high school, and community college students can use MW-based materials to construct robust mental models of core content such as the random motion of atoms, the relationship of temperature to kinetic energy, gas laws, states of matter, dissolving and diffusion, and protein folding. In all classes, from 8th to 13th grade, misconceptions about atomic-scale phenomenon virtually disappeared and student content scores increased significantly.

Having demonstrated that it is possible to teach important concepts by interacting with MW, we are now looking at whether student learning persists and whether this approach is better than others. Prelimin-ary studies indicate that students retain clear mental models of the activities for at least six months. Students who engage in MW activities showed improved content know-ledge, compared to those who learned similar materials without the models.