Technology Enhanced Science Education in Middle School

This project team is developing four web-delivered units (including units focused on force and motion, position, energy, and gravity) to replace or supplement middle school physical science curricula. Units will unfold in the classroom as follows. Teachers will begin by presenting an engaging hands-on or computer simulation demonstration of a concept. Then, classes will engage in a "What Do You Know?" discussion using web-delivered visuals to gauge knowledge or misconceptions. Student teams then perform inquiry activities using hands-on apparatus and matching computer simulations for viewing phenomena on a molecular level, for varying parameters that cannot be adjusted in a laboratory (e.g. gravity), and for viewing results instantly. At the conclusion of these inquiry activities, teams summarize their findings in a presentation to classmates. Unit activities conclude with classrooms engaging in a "Concept Solidification" discussion where students are asked to compare their initial concepts to what they learned during the unit. The use of the to-be-developed simulations allows students to explore concepts such as force and motion at the everyday world scale (e.g. a basketball trajectory), at the cosmic scale (e.g. moon orbit), or at the atomic scale (e.g. electron orbit).