Brainball: Teaching Inquiry Science as a Team Sport

197 Pages·2014·1.27 MB·English

by  Mickey Kolis, Todd Lenz, Benjamin H. Kolis

BRAINBALL
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Other Books by Mickey Kolis
Rethinking Teaching: Classroom Teachers as Collaborative Leaders in Mak-
ing Learning Relevant
Powerful Ideas in Teaching: Creating Environments in Which Students
Want to Learn
Student Relevance Matters: Why Do I Have to Know This Stuff?
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BRAINBALL
Teaching
Inquiry Science
as a Team Sport
Science Edition
Mickey Kolis, Todd Lenz,
and Benjamin H. Kolis
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD
Lanham • Boulder • New York • Toronto • Plymouth, UK
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Published by Rowman & Littlefield
4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706
www.rowman.com
10 Thornbury Road, Plymouth PL6 7PP, United Kingdom
Copyright © 2014 by Mickey Kolis, Todd Lenz, and Benjamin H. Kolis
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any
electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems,
without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote
passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Available
ISBN 978-1-4758-0887-2 (cloth : alk. paper)
ISBN 978-1-4758-0888-9 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN 978-1-4758-0889-6 (electronic)
™
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper
for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
Printed in the United States of America
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CONTENTS
Foreword ix
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction xiii
SECTION I: BRAINBALL! 1
1 Brainball (Science Edition)—The Point of the Game Is Learning 3
2 The Big Ideas: Product, Process, and Community
Aligned with Purpose 12
3 Brainball (SE) Beliefs (Dispositions) 19
4 Brainball (SE) Key Concepts (Knowledge) 28
5 Brainball (SE) Skills 37
SECTION II: FIVE COACHING TIPS 43
6 Tip 1: Keep the End in Mind 45
7 Tip 2: Play the Game 54
8 Tip 3: Competitions as Evaluations 59
9 Tip 4: Sequences Matter 64
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CONTENTS
10 Tip 5: Explicit Communications 75
SECTION III: DAY-TO-DAY LESSON PLANS:
BRAINBALL ILLUMINATED 83
Lesson 1: Perceptions 87
Lesson 2: Observations 90
Lesson 3: Patent Description 95
Lesson 4: Problem Statements 98
Lesson 5: Picking Problem Statements 102
Lesson 6: Gathering Information 105
Lesson 7: Gathering More Information 108
Lesson 8: Hypothesis 112
Lesson 9: Null Hypothesis 114
Lesson 10: Experimental Procedure 117
Lesson 11: Experimental Design 120
Lesson 12: Presenting Data (Tables) 123
Lesson 13: Presenting Data (Graphs) 126
Lesson 14: Analyzing Data 128
Lesson 15: Writing a Conclusion 131
SECTION IV A MORE INTEGRATED EXAMPLE! 133
11 All Together Now! 135
Conclusion 142
Appendixes
A: Community Roles 144
B: Shifting Points of View Story 146
C: Circle of Power and Respect/Monday Meetings 148
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CONTENTS
D: Why Observations Matter/SRP Chart 150
E: Recipe for Catalase Solution 153
F: Idea Evaluator 154
G: Rubric for Science Lab Report 155
H: Bad Directions 159
I: Data Table Assignments 160
J: Graph Assignments 163
K: Choosing the Appropriate Statistical Test 167
L: Social Contracts 169
M: Dialogue 171
N: Team/Community-building Books 173
References 176
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FOREWORD
ore than twenty-five years ago, Professor Robert Yager chastised the
M
science education community in an article titled “Never Playing the
Game.” Yager asserted that science students spend years learning about the
products and facts of science, but never get to do science. They rarely are
allowed to ask questions about the natural world, design investigations, or
struggle to make sense of their data. He compared the situation to that of
an athlete being asked to spend several years learning the rules and strategy
of the game, but never being allowed to play. “If potential athletes had to
wait thirteen years before playing a single scrimmage, a single set, a single
quarter, how many would be clamoring to be involved?” (Yager 1988, 77).
In this book, Mickey Kolis explores the game of science and the potential
for classrooms to be a playing field where all students have a role on the
team. With the teacher as a coach and students as the active players, Kolis
lays out the background and strategies necessary to change a classroom envi-
ronment to one where the responsibility for playing is placed on the student,
with learning of content, skills, and dispositions all given an explicit focus.
In an era of high-stakes testing, many school “reform” efforts, and calls
for “accountability,” students are often treated as little more than test scores
with a goal of individual college or career “readiness.” As the reader learns
more about how to help students play the game of science, the purpose
becomes quite clear; this is about far more than individuals, and far more
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