Spring 2007 Philosophy 1 Your initial philosophy will be generated as a series of claims about the purposes and goals of school science, how children learn science, and the role of the teacher in supporting children’s science learning. You should generate 5 single statement claims about science teaching and learning in the elementary school. Each claim will be supported by multiple pieces of evidence, such as your own experiences as a learner or readings from the class. In addition, a justification is necessary to explain the ways in which each piece of evidence supports the claim. The ultimate aim is to develop a compelling, evidence-based argument about meaningful and conceptual science teaching and learning. Example: Claim: (example) I believe children learn science best by reading a textbook in round robin fashion. Evidence: My second grade science experience learning about constellations Our textbook: How To Lecture In Elementary School, Ch.2, pp. 25-50. Justification: The evidence for this claim comes from my own personal experiences as a learner. When I was in second grade, we learned about planets and constellations. We read directly from the text so we were able to get the “right” and “correct” science knowledge. We then repeated the information back to the teacher in our own words; this enabled the teacher to know if we had in fact heard the information right. In addition, the tests we took were directly connected to the text passages. I passed all the tests with A’s and B’s, so I must have learned. Our textbook from class, How To Lecture In Elementary School (Slekar, 2002), also supports this strategy for supporting student learning. In chapter 2, the author states how the experience of reading aloud enables students to learn because most students are auditory learners and it is helpful to hear the words out loud. As students hear the words, either from themselves or someone else, they repeat them in their head. Research on information processing has shown this repetition is important. This is why I believe I as a teacher I should include these experiences for the children in my classroom.Spring 2007 Philosophy I Rubric Levels Needs Improvement (1) Meets Most Expectations (2) Meets/exceeds Expectations (3) Criteria Claims Claims are vague responses to the prompts Most claims are clear and reflect responses to the prompts Claims are thoughtful, specific responses to the prompts Evidence Evidence is vague, not linked to the claim, not a personal experience or a reading citation Evidence is linked to claim and is a personal experience or cited from readings Multiple forms of evidence substantiates and is clearly linked to the claim; represents a personal experience in addition to cited readings Justification Justification is vague; does not connect to the claim Justification is an explanation connecting the claim and evidence; connects to some research Justification is a clear explanation connecting the claim and evidence; specific examples from the research included Overall Quality Argument not compelling or connected to current science education issues Argument hangs together and is somewhat compelling Argument is thoughtful and substantive. Connected to current science education issues Spelling & Grammar Paper has 5 or more spelling errors Paper has 2-4 spelling errors Paper has 0-1 spelling or grammar errors /15 points