Week 10- NGSS Lesson Screener and Test Review

 What question are we investigating?

For the tenth week of Science Methods I, we would look at the question: “What makes a good science lesson according to the NGSS?”. We would firstly individually read through the NGSS Lesson Screener and try to come up with examples based on our lesson plan. Then we would talk in small groups over our examples within the lesson plan and write it down on the whiteboard. We also would do a test review day to see the information that could be put on the final exam. This would allow people to ask questions over the final exam if they had any.

What did we do in lab to investigate this question?

The teacher started by asking everyone to go to the NGSS Lesson Screener and look at Criterion A which was explaining the phenomena or designing solutions. She also would ask everyone to pull up their lesson plans they submitted over the NGSS standards. This would allow everyone to individually read over the NGSS Lesson Screener first and find out examples from their own lesson plans. Then she would allow us to go into small groups to talk about our thoughts over the NGSS Lesson Screener and the examples we found in our lesson plans. This would allow everyone to be able to write their examples onto the whiteboard. This would allow as a whole group activity to talk about the different examples everyone came up with and talk about how this helped us to learn about how to improve for the next lesson plan we have to create over the NGSS standards in the future. 

What did we figure out?

Another main part of the class was to do a test review over Lesson 1, Lesson 2, and Lessons 3 and 4. This would allow everyone to quiz themselves over the information that could be over the final exam in biology and see if they know it before taking it. We would do this through being put into small groups and doing different probes over this information. Firstly, we would individually read the probe and then talk as a small group to see what we thought the answer for the probe was and to give evidence for it. An example of this Lesson 2 and giving us the probe to ask what trees are made up mostly of. I would explain that I remembered it saying in a video air so either carbon dioxide or oxygen and someone else would explain they felt it was more likely to be carbon dioxide. This would allow me to see that I needed to review more about Lesson 2 and see different information that I forgot over the rapid questions she asked us after explaining the correct answers for each of the probes. An example of this personally for me was complete and incomplete for animals. This would help me to remember that complete is when something changes from their early years like a butterfly and incomplete is something that just gets bigger in the same form like a grasshopper. 

What are new or remaining questions after the investigation? 

This lab taught me about how to improve my lesson plans in the future when I become a teacher. An example of this can be allowing the students to find the thinking over the driving question first and not needing to give them the “correct” answer for what they are learning. It also would allow me to review over the new biology terms that were shown throughout this semester and think of different information I may have forgotten throughout the semester that could be on the final exam.